Movies 'Til Dawn BLOG

LAUREL&HARDY SILENT-FEST DAY TWO: ‘WE FAW DOWN’

By the late 1920s, Hal Roach had struck a lucrative distribution deal with MGM, resulting in expanded theatrical exposure, better music soundtracks and a lion roaring silently in the opening credit sequence. (Actually this version of the MGM lion is a rather sullen one, who seems to be grumbling about

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‘TWO TARS’–THE SILENT L&H FEST BEGINS

I’ve always loved this blessed last week of the year. It’s a week free of the calendar–no day has any significance since almost everything but basic services is closed, nobody’s at work and it’s not even a holiday. Truly a lost week–a wonderful, liberating and rare occurrence. For several years

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SICILY–LIMEY-STYLE

On Monday I posted a British Pathe newsreel showing the local side of glamorous Rome in 1967. Although the twitty English announcers narration was a tad on the condescending side (more than a tad actually) the lovely color photography made the whole thing a delight to watch. Today we have

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ROMA–LIMEY STYLE

What have we here? It’s a 1967 British Pathe newsreel (really? they were still making newsreels in Britain?) showing us ‘The Real Rome’. The quality of the color photography is excellent and the musical score is quite perfect. And then there’s the narration which is an astonishingly stupid and snide

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CHARLES LINDBERGH DANCE PARTY

Recorded on May 26, 1927,  just five days after Lindbergh’s arrival in Paris, ‘Lucky Lindy’ (posted below) was a major hit record and one that Lindbergh apparently loathed. He was more than a little surprised at the world-wide hoopla that greeted him upon landing and regarded much of it with

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LINDBERGH LANDS

There;’s a saying in aviation that ‘taking off is optional but landing is mandatory. Yesterday I posted Charles Lindberghs take off from Roosevelt Field in Long Island for his historic Atlantic crossing. Today, above, we see his landing in France. It’s not the most graceful three-point landing you’ll ever see–the

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LINDBERGH LIFT-OFF

Yesterday I read a large chunk of Scott Berg’s magnificent biography of Charles Lindbergh (rather appropiately on a plane) and discovered that the actual take-off of ‘The Spirit Of St. Louis’ was captured by newsreel cameras. It’s hard now to grasp, from a centuries distance, how special this event was

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N BY NW; A ROGER THORNHILL JOINT

I hadn’t seen the Cary Grant Vs. the Crop Duster scene from ‘North By Northwest’ in ages so I looked it up over lunch today and was surprised by how little of it I recalled. The long prelude–six minutes before the plane begins its attack–is Hitch at his methodical best,

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FLIGHT OVER FLANDERS–1919

Here’s some remarkable colorized footage of the post-World War I remains of Flanders taken from the air in an open Bi-Plane. The colorization and sound bed (vintage airplane noise of course) give it a hauntingly realistic sense. Much as grainy old black and white footage has its own eerie charm,

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PAUL ANKA; A–HOLE

Last night we watched the HBO Paul Anka doc and I knew from the very beginning, which featured 85 year-old Anka on board his private jet with his sixteen year old wife, that he was a prick. Not that he said or did anything obviously prick-ish. He wouldn’t have let

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