Re: Not silence, but . . .

From: Myron Ort (email suppressed)
Date: Wed Oct 28 2009 - 12:37:15 PDT


That was a riveting story Jeffrey. I am recalling that a young
Antonin Artaud who plays the kindly priest was also later in a
mental hospital, not necessarily to suggest a direct
connection.....but (?)

mo

On Oct 28, 2009, at 11:28 AM, JEFFREY PAULL wrote:

> A number of years ago - maybe 1980 - at the Toronto International
> Film festival,
> they had a screening of Dreyer's "The Passion of Joan of Arc.",
> which I attended.
> The glories of that screening were 3: Here is the story:
> After the films initial screening(s) in Denmark, the original neg
> was sent to a lab in Germany (I think),
> along with the theatrical print to act as a guide to making correct-
> looking prints.
> It was to be duplicated for all Euro screens, and, I suppose, beyond.
> But the lab burned down, destroying the neg and the print.
> The distributer forced Dreyer to reconstruct the movie from his
> "outs", which he didn't want to do.
> But he did it, and that's the version that everybody saw in film
> schools, and theatres, until . . . ..
>
> In about 1978, the Danish archive got a phone call from a mental
> hospital in Norway: (!)
> They had found, in the basement, a wrapped package that had been
> there for an unknown number of years.
> When they opened it up, they saw it was old 35mm film, so might the
> Danish archive be inerested in
> having it.
> The film turned out to be a second projection print of the true
> version of "The Passion of Joan of Arc.",
> that nobody had seen since the fire. It had been presumed lost.
> Nobody knew what it was doing in this mental hospital or how it got
> there.
>
> So this screening at the Toronto fiolm festival was the first
> (either in N. America or anywhere)
> of the original authentic version of the movie.
> That was glory #1.
> Glory #2 was the ravishing beauty of the images run at correct
> slower projection speed.
> But glory #3 was totally unexpected as well.
> The film was accompanied by the original accompanying music, live,
> with a woman's chorus.
>
> I wept.
> And that was after being moved to my bones, years before, in film
> school, watching the (usual) crummy 16mm print
> sitting at old oak chair-desks in a basement classroom. That
> screening, of course, was silent.
> And seen through the vague haze of cigarette smoke because we could
> smoke in school in those days.
>
> Jeffrey Paull
>
>
> On Wed 28/10/09 13:45 , Tom McCormack email suppressed sent:
>> Dreyer's 'The Passion of Joan of Arc' (1928) was meant to
>> be shown in complete silence.
>>
>> -Tom
>>
>> On Wed, Oct 28, 2009 at 12:32 PM, Rob Gawthrop wrote:
>> Check out Rick Altman’s “Silent Film Sound” though I doubt if
>> it answers your questions about silence.
>> Rob
>> On 28/10/2009 16:58, "Myron Ort" wrote:
>> It is often mentioned that "silent" films were meant to have live
>> performed sound tracks, organ, piano, orchestras, etc. Were any
>> early films actually meant to be shown truly silent by their
>> creators? What is known about this? Melies, Griffith, Eisenstein etc.
>>
>> did they all prescribe music/sound for their film showings? If
>> not,
>> what is the earliest known film truly meant to be shown
>> intentionally silent?
>> When, where, and how prevalent was it to show films in silence.
>> Obviously, as a film students for the most part we saw early
>> silent
>> films without any soundtracks, live or otherwise. This was
>> widespread. How misleading was this typical experience? Now that I
>> recall, most all of the shows I attended in my youth at that little
>> movie theater across from my high school that showed Chaplin, Keaton,
>>
>> etc. were always silent. I am thinking I was mislead......
>> default silence versus intended silence
>> Myron Ort
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