Fresh and Exciting

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

In Czarist Russia, a peasant officer (John Barrymore), resented by the aristocrats, falls in love with a princess.The version on Netflix streaming goes a bit fast, as in it is set to the wrong frames-per-minute. This works great for silent comedies (Keaton, Chaplin and Lloyd) but makes this seem a bit more silly than it ought to.Seeing as this film was made in 1928, there was time enough to look back at the revolution. Of course, that is not the intent, with this being a love story, but it is interesting to have a soldier who disapproves of the czar. We know (and the makers of this film knew) that was came after was not necessarily better. Perhaps people were still blinded at this point (we did not turn against Russia until after 1945).

Monday January 23, 7pm, The Paramount, Seattle "Epaulets don't make an aristocrat. They will never accept you." A peasant rises through the ranks to become an army officer in Czarist Russia. Treated with contempt by the aristocracy, Ivan (John Barrymore) is disgraced and imprisoned by the princess he loves, as revolution looms on the horizon.Directed by former Harold Lloyd gagman Sam Taylor, Tempest (1928) is notable for Charles Rocher's photography and the art direction of William Cameron Menzies. Receiving the first Academy Award in that category for Tempest and The Dove (1928), Menzies created the role of production designer within the Hollywood studio system.Barrymore ignored his audience in choosing Beloved Rogue (1927) and Tempest, his last silent films. Both casting and performance fall short in a lackluster story with one single, extraordinary exception. Character actor George Fawcett, the standard bearer for paternal authority figures in nineteen-twenties Hollywood, gives his career performance as The General. Fawcett's final scene, with Barrymore, is worth the price of admission.

This is a neglected gem.! Amazing camera work, wonderful sets and art direction, and above all the great performance of John Barrymore make this a silent classic all film fans should see. Barrymore was a true master of the craft, and I wish there were many more of his performances available today. Those that are available have impressed me repeatedly. His reputation as one of the finest actors of his time was well deserved, and until late in his life, his talent shown through and survived the ravages of his personal demons. He really delivers on this film, in a more subtle and well-developed character than some of his other silent roles. The character undergoes a shift from fury to affection at one point, and he's magnificent here. The female lead is a bit wooden at times, but mostly hits her mark, first as arrogant, contemptuous, even cruel. The script doesn't give her much opportunity for redemption, but a softer side does emerge and she has eyes and a face that work well in silent cinema. The chaotic and vengeful culture in the immediate aftermath of the revolution is shown rather than alluded to or omitted, as are the cruelties of the aristocrat/peasant one before it. Some early film slants heavily to the "feel good" side, but this seems an honest treatment. It's just such a shame more folks don't appreciate silent films on their own merits, rather than trying to compare them to contemporary ones…its like apples and oranges.

'Tempest' gives John Barrymore plenty of chances to show his left profile. The plot -- utmost tosh, about a peasant cavalry officer obsessed with Princess Tamara during the Russian revolution -- doesn't stand up to analysis. Suffice it to say that this is one of those movies where a man keeps harassing a woman until she falls in love with him.As Tamara, the haughty White Russian princess, Camilla Horn makes a magnificent entrance on horseback, riding sidesaddle in a form-fitting outfit with gauntlet gloves. Barrymore acquits himself well with a ridiculous script. There's one painful scene in which Lieutenant Markov (Barrymore) sups large quantities of booze to show how manly he is. Knowing what alcohol did to Barrymore's life and career, I cringe when I see him drinking on the screen.Among the ridiculous elements is Boris de Fast as a gap-toothed Bolshevik whose ability to be conveniently present during all the plot twists (even surreptitiously entering a military stockade) borders on the supernatural. Ullrich Haupt, as Barrymore's villainous superior officer, is splendidly hissable in a role that seems tailored for Erich von Stroheim. Character actor Michael Mark plays one of the cavalry troopers: no dialogue, no business, but his distinctive facial structure calls attention to itself. Louis Wolheim supplies a bit too much comic relief as the bulbous and bull-like Bulba: I guess he must be Taurus Bulba. Wolheim plays a cavalry sergeant, but his immense bulk makes him implausible in the role; Wolheim is built more like an infantryman.By far, the greatest appeal of this movie is Charles Rosher's dazzling camera-work, supplemented by the usual brilliant production design of William Cameron Menzies. The opening scene is a travelling shot of a military garrison: the camera is clearly panning across models, but they're as exquisitely detailed as one of those miniature villages that used to be so popular in Britain. Eventually the camera turns round a corner to show men walking past full-scale buildings ... but the cut is so well done, it's nearly seamless. Elsewhere, there's a splendid subjective shot through the bottom of an upturned glass ... and a fine example of double-exposure as the delirious Barrymore, rotting in the stockade, envisions his comrades in battle.I was also impressed with the consistent use of dissolves whenever printed words, handwriting or inscriptions were shown on screen. As all the characters are Russian, we first see signs and captions written in Cyrillic, followed by a dissolve into English translations. (Compare this with 'The Last Command', made at a different studio this same year, in which a Russian telegram is shown on screen in English.) Just a couple of times in 'Tempest' the dissolve device is not used, and there's one bizarre shot in which a handwritten note reading 'Do not disturb' in English is posted on the same door as a sign reading 'Commissar' in Cyrillic. Still, I'm vastly impressed that the art department went to so much trouble.Although the script is rubbish -- and I'm dismayed that the Bolsheviks are depicted favourably -- Barrymore's role has an impressive amount of moral ambiguity. Lieutenant Markov is basically moral and ethical, but he becomes obsessed with Princess Tamara ... and his behaviour degenerates accordingly. The script (and Barrymore) could have taken an easier route by contriving to make all of Markov's reversals a matter of circumstances rather than down to Markov's personal flaws.Despite a howlingly implausible script, the visuals and the acting are so good in this film that I'll rate it 7 in 10.