I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.
... View MoreAlthough I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.
... View MoreAll of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.
... View MoreI think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.
... View MoreIf only this gorgeous looking film can reappear intact. How could it have gone missing? It looks like a high profile enough film in its day, so it's a shame it somehow vanished.At least we have the two trailers. I've seen one of them.By the way, that's Ford Sterling, not Gray, in the scene with Brooks.Many clips from rare films can be found on YouTube, which is a blessing for many of us who always hear about these films but can never find them otherwise.Many "lost" films may only be in hiding, with perhaps one copy being in someone's collection; I can only hope that in time many longtime missing titles can reappear and be on view again. There's so much missing history from the silent days.
... View MoreI saw two trailers for this film, both of them fascinating documents, restored to near-mint condition by the Library of Congress (their present home). The first was black and white, with a lot of attention payed to Fay Lanphier, the hazel-eyed, honey-blond beauty who had just be crowned Miss America 1925. A close-up of her is followed by a shot of Esther Ralston, but I initially thought it was another shot of her (they look so much alike). Briefly seen is a comedic bit where Louise Brooks is showing a man some undesired romantic interest.The second trailer starts with giving the measurements of Venus di Milo, and asking the female half of the audience if they measure up. This trailer is tinted violet and contains some technicolor footage, two shots exactly, which apparently show the staging of 'tableaux vivants' (I should mention that W.T. Benda's only screen role appears to have made it down through the ages in one of these shots). There is a shot of a teary-eyed Lanphier, a repeated shot of Ralston flexing her arms in a bathing suit, and what appears to be the second half of the scene between Brooks and the man (it has to be Lawrence Gray). In this shot, he is trying to keep Brooks' presence in the room a secret from Edna Mae Oliver.The presence of seventy-five beautiful women AND the latest fashions from Paris are highly stressed in both advertisements. Interestingly, nobody remembers Fay Lanphier today, but once Brooks flashes across the screen, the entire theater sounded with applause. One thing that struck me about Lanphier: not only is she beautiful (and photogenic) she seems to have been a decent actress as well. What went wrong? Unless the rest of the film surfaces, we are likely never to know.Production values are great. Always happy to see some two-strip Technicolor, and the set- ups they exposed it too in 1926 were great. Maybe one day we'll see the whole thing, the way it was meant to be seen.
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