The only one of Hitchcock’s silents not to be a literary adaptation and his first to be made at British International Pictures, The Ring is a boxing movie, with a love triangle plot neatly expressed by the film’s central symbol. The ring is where Jack “One Round” Sander and his rival Bob compete, but it’s also a nod to the wedding band that Jack’s wife Mabel (Lillian Hall-Davis) wears, and her bracelet, which was given to her by … Bob.
With flashy editing that betrays a Soviet influence and some neat typological tricks too, The Ring is a visual triumph. The subject matter may not be what we expect from the master of suspense, but Hitchcock was very proud of it:
“You might say that after The Lodger, The Ring was the next Hitchcock picture. There were all kinds of innovations in it, and I remember that at the premiere an elaborate montage got a round of applause. It was the first time that had ever happened to me.”
The Bioscope was just as fond of it as it was of The Lodger, heralding it as “the most magnificent British film ever made”.
The Ring (1927)
That said, The Ring is not so popular today. The plot lacks the fireworks of a Hitchcock thriller and the stars here are not so well remembered as Novello, say. There’s also the matter of some outdated and offensive language. The Ring is set in multiracial 1920s London, and yes, some people use that word. They did then. It’s not pleasant, but it’s not a reason to avoid the film.
The Ring is one of Hitchcock’s most successful silents, and its tight dramatic structure as well as its obsession with circles is a precursor to the pleasing graphical neatness of many of his better-loved later films: the grids of glass in Rear Window and the “criss-cross” of train tracks in Strangers on a Train. Indeed, from Kim Novak’s chignon to Janet Leigh’s iris, spirals and circles continued to fascinate Hitchcock throughout his career (the explanation for this may be slightly distasteful).
It’s also worth remembering that this is the work of Hitchcock’s A-team – he collaborated on the script with Eliot Stannard and, of course, Alma Reville. Those visual effects are enhanced by the work of painter W Percy Day, too.
This summer’s gala screening of the BFI’s restoration of The Ring promises to reinvigorate the film. A film with this much style and swagger will shine when it has been been fully restored and it’s going to be shown at the Hackney Empire with a score by Soweto Kinch, known for his socially aware fusion of hip-hop and jazz. Indeed, the premiere screening of the new print at this year’s Cannes apparently received a standing ovation.
Synopsis: Love triangle melodrama set in the world of boxing. When Jack ‘One Round’ Sander is discovered by promoter James Ware, his career takes off. But rival Bob Corby, heavyweight champion takes an interest in his girlfriend. (BFI Screenonline)
Hitchcock moment: Eight minutes in: a discovery, a proposal, and a whole lot of circles within circles.
The Ring screens at the Hackney Empire on 13 July 2012, with a new score by Soweto Kinch. The screening will also be livestreamed on The Space. More information here.
Don’t forget that you can still donate to the For the Love of Film Blogathon, to get The White Shadow streamed online with a new score, if you can, please spare some cash for this good cause.
This is a guest post for Silent London by Ayşe Behçet
Hi everyone, again thank you for taking time out to read this instalment of Charlie’s London. This segment is going to look at the importance of family with the backdrop of the Lambeth Workhouse. Events that transpired behind the walls of that Victorian institution would change Charlie’s life; but it also holds some personal significance for me too.
I thought long and hard about how to start this piece. The answer to my prayers came in the form of my three-year-old godson Jayden, whose mannerisms and speech are so precociously adult-like you can imagine him starring in The Kid. Jayden is my cousin Em’s little boy, I was there when he was born and have never lived more than three doors away from his mother my entire life. Jay waltzed into my bedroom one afternoon after playing in our joint garden (Em’s parents live next door to us) and pointed at my wall.
“What’s that, Ayşe?” He was referring my two framed Chaplin film posters, one of The Kid and one of The Gold Rush. When I explained to him that they were posters from films made by a very funny man called Charlie Chaplin, Jayden was intrigued.
“Can we watch him?” Well! I don’t need an excuse, so I reached for one of my DVDs.
We snuggled up on the sofa to watch The Kid (I choose this one because I felt Jay could really identify with little Jackie Coogan, both cheeky and comical). I was right; Jayden loved it! He giggled and squealed at every comedy moment, until the scene when the Kid is ripped away from the Tramp. It disturbed him, you could see in his little face the terror and torment; the fear that someone could do that to him, and he would no longer see his mother and father. I have to confess, Coogan’s lips moving to the words “I want my daddy” always causes a lump in my throat. Of course, when the Tramp rescues the boy from the moving orphanage van and holds him the way only a father can, I assured Jay that all little boys have their parents in the end, if they are good little boys.
After he had gone home I sat thinking about the film. Jayden’s reaction had hit a nerve with me that I needed to explore.
Hannah Chaplin
Chaplin never hid the fact that he cared about human suffering, and it has been suggested the world over that his own poor upbringing left him with emotional scars. If my godson at three felt moved and distressed at he sight of this in a film, what must a young Chaplin have felt? His whole world, mother and Syd ripped apart from him by a system that was designed to protect but ultimately hindered the welfare of the poorer classes and their children. Initially, a frightened seven-year-old Chaplin, his mother Hannah and brother Sydney went of their own accord to the Lambeth workhouse, once known as the Newington Workhouse because of its location (just off Newington Butts in Lambeth). This was largely because of their mother, who struggled to cope with the financial difficulties the family had to endure. Once the family were admitted their clothes were removed and their heads were shaved; can you imagine the humiliation? I have to be honest: I think Hannah’s decision to admit her sons rather than show defeat actually showed love and strength. She admitted to herself they deserved better, what more can a mother who loves her sons do?
Hannah Chaplin’s breakdown and the family’s arrival at Lambeth Workhouse happened in 1896. By June that same year the two boys were removed from their mother, which caused Chaplin much distress, and sent to Central London District School at Hanwell in west London. The journey seemed like a holiday to the young brothers, who travelled to their new home by horse-drawn bakery van. However, when they arrived, they spent time in an “approbation” ward where Chaplin was separated from his beloved brother and placed in the infants section of the school. Chaplin remembered in his Autobiography many years later how the older girls would bathe the younger boys, recounting in particular the cold and wet all-over flannel wash he received from a fourteen-year-old.
If you have read these blogs before you will know I’ve mentioned my great-grandmother Nanny Harris before. Her daughter Esther, my nan’s sister whom I always lovingly referred to as Auntie Etty, was born in a Lambeth workhouse. My nan’s brother, my uncle Fred, was also born in one too. Family story leads us to believe my great-grandmother literally sat upon the steps of the workhouse each time her waters broke and told them to take her in: “Or I am going to have this bleeding baby in the street.”
The Cinema Museum in south London (formerly Lambeth Workhouse)
What’s more, a family mystery could tie us directly to Chaplin – and we didn’t realise it for many years.
There is a famous picture of Chaplin, huddled against a group of small boys, his seven-year-old face looking at the camera with the same cheeky grin that would later make him a worldwide star. Two rows back is a small boy, his jawline is strong and his face familiar, this boy we believe is the brother of my great-grandmother, who, if records are to be believed was in the Lambeth Workhouse the same time as Chaplin. Unfortunately no other photo of him exists as an adult, no photos of my great-grandmother survive either, so it really is a family mystery that will never be solved. The family would again later return to this building but thankfully in better circumstances.
In the 1960s my mother volunteered at the building when it was still a hospital and institution within the borough, she probably stood in the chapel area, famously linked to the Chaplin family, and never realised the connection that her own daughter would later write about. Now, of course, the workhouse has become the Cinema Museum. Recently it was my turn to return there, to meet David Robinson, a hero I have been reading from the age of 11, for a fantastic presentation on Chaplin, my ultimate hero – I came full circle!
Each week, as you know, we’ll be looking at a different silent Hitchcock – and this week we have arrived at The Lodger, a bona fide Hitchcock thriller, yet only the third feature he directed. The film he made before this and after The Pleasure Garden, The Mountain Eagle, is sadly a lost film.
The Lodger is a wonderfully atmospheric “is-he-or-isn’t-he?” intrigue starring Ivor Novello as a man suspected of being a serial killer – a ripper who calls himself the Avenger and targets pretty blonde women. Heralded as an early classic and praised for its Expressionist flourishes now, The Lodger was almost never released following a damning assessment by a distributor at an industry screening. Michael Balcon and Film Society member Ivor Montagu both went to bat for the film and after the addition of some elaborate intertitles, The Lodger was finally released, pleasing critics and audiences alike. The Bioscope praised it, saying: “It is possible that this film is the finest British production ever made”.
The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog (1927)
The film bears the evocative subtitle “A Story of the London Fog”, but the peasouper here is really a miasma of suspicion, temptation and guilt. To varying extents, the lodger’s landlord and lady (the Buntings) suspect him of being the killer, as do their daughter Daisy and her steady policeman boyfriend, but still they welcome him into their home. When Daisy first kisses the lodger, she does so with open, watchful eyes. When Mrs Bunting sees some cash on his mantelpiece, her mind immediately turns to theft. Does she not even trust herself?
It’s a grimy, nasty film in so many ways, but there’s humour here of course, most notably in the gallows mode from the wearily pragmatic dancing girls who crowd round the paper to read about the latest murder then go out with brunette ringlets tucked in their hats as a precaution.
Hitchcock has said that he was forced to drop his preferred ending for the film and The Lodger‘s final moments are from convincing. It’s not as audacious as Murnau’s tacked-on happy ending for The Last Laugh (1924), but knowing that Hitchcock saw that film goes a long way to explaining the tone of the final scene.
Synopsis: London is being terrorised by a Jack the Ripper-style murderer, the Avenger, who targets young blond-haired women. A mysterious new lodger arrives at the home of Mr and Mrs Bunting, whose daughter Daisy is courted by a policeman on the case. When the lodger begins behaving strangely, he attracts suspicion, particularly when he shows an interest in Daisy. (BFI Screenonline)
Hitchcock moment: Three minutes in, Joe initiates a very ghoulish conversation over tea, but is interrupted by something apparently terrible happening upstairs.
Watch out for: Hitchcock’s first cameo, as a newspaper editor.
The Lodger screens at the Barbican on 21 July 2012, with the London Symphony Orchestra performing a new score by Nitin Sawhney. The film will then be theatrically released on 10 August 2012. More information here.
Don’t forget that you can still donate to the For the Love of Film Blogathon, to get The White Shadow streamed online with a new score, if you can, please spare some cash for this good cause.
The podcast returns – we love the talkies don’t we? This time around, I’m lucky enough to be joined by Matthew Turner from viewlondon.co.uk and podcaster extraordinaire Pete Baran. We’ll be hearing what you thought of the recent British Silent Film Festival, anticipating the forthcoming silent Hitchcock screenings in London and Matthew will be talking about his favourite silent film. If you haven’t seen Greed (1924), be warned: here be spoilers. There is plenty of suspense, however, in discovering whether we fail The Artist Challenge – and if we do, who the culprit will be.
File this one under Not Quite Silent Film – but that doesn’t mean it won’t be of interest to the esteemed readers of this blog. And if you scroll down, you’ll be able to get yourself a special deal on tickets too.
Pioneered by Whirlygig Cinema and film-score artists The Cabinet of Living Cinema, Making Tracks is an ongoing interactive event that provides a unique platform for new filmmakers to get their work seen. The premise is simple; Whirlygig seek out amazing films to showcase, strip them of their original soundtracks, and The Cabinet perform brand new live re-scores. It is a perfect way for filmmakers who have had problems with music copyright to get their work screened in public.
Put simply, Making Tracks is all about the magical combination of movies and live music, and even if the films themselves weren’t originally silent, they will be on the night. They can be, however, and you may remember that the award-winning short film Dogged featured at a Making Tracks night a few months back.
Here’s a lovely blog review of a Making Tracks night that puts it in context of the silent film revival and how lucky we are in London to have so many silent film and live music screenings.
With a live soundtrack you feel the vibrations, hear and see everything intensely, get a few shivers down your spine, and share your entrapment in the vision of the filmmaker with your fellow audience.
Hitchcock, Hitchcock, Hitchcock, these days it’s all I ever blinking think about. Specifically silent Hitchcock, ahead of the feast that awaits us this summer. So today I’m kicking off a short introduction to the silent Hitchcocks, taking one film a week, so you’ll be fully up to speed by the time the screenings start in the summer.
As we’re starting on Friday 18 May, there’s just enough time for us to squeeze this first post into the marvellous For The Love of Film blogathon, a noble endeavour to raise funds to get the remaining reels of The White Shadow online, with a freshly composed score, streaming to cinephiles around the world. Here’s a little more explanation from the Self-Styled Siren:
This year, we are raising funds for the National Film Preservation Foundation’s project, The White Shadow, directed by Graham Cutts and written, assistant-directed, and just generally meddled with in a number of different ways by the one and only Alfred Hitchcock. The goal is to raise $15,000 to stream this once-lost, now-found, three-reel fragment online, free to all, and to record the score by Michael Mortilla. Marilyn Ferdinand, Rod Heath and the Siren are pleased to announce that we now have more than 100 bloggers signed up for this hoedown.
Now, to business. Each week we’ll be looking at a different silent Hitchcock – there’ll be a short introduction here, a juicy clip, and some carefully selected links. We’re starting with Hitch’s directorial debut, The Pleasure Garden.
The Pleasure Garden (1925)
This tale of backstage romance and farflung misdeeds may have been Hitchcock’s directorial debut, but he was so proud of it that he put his signature in the credits. “Actors come and actors go,” he told the Film Society, “but the name of the director should stay clearly in the mind of the audiences.” As for the “cattle”, American star Virginia Valli plays the heroine, Patsy, and Miles Mander the brute she is unfortunate enough to fall for. Another US star, Carmelita Geraghty, plays Patsy’s friend and ambitious fellow dancer, and her love interest arrives in the form of popular Scottish actor John Stuart.
The Pleasure Garden was filmed in Germany, but it has a very British feel, from the leery music-hall audiences to our leading ladies’ aspidistra-and-doily lodgings. It may not be a suspense thriller, but The Pleasure Garden opens in fine Hitchcockian style with pretty blonde showgirls (and their legs) being ogled on stage. It’s good old innocent fun to start with, of course, but unless it really is 1925 and this is the first Hitchcock film you’ve ever seen, you’ll sense a sinister frisson in such ardent voyeurism. And you’d be right to.
Poster for The Pleasure Garden (from Hitchcockwiki)
Like so many of Hitchcock’s silents, The Pleasure Garden was adapted for the screen by Eliot Stannard, a towering, if often unsung, figure in British silent cinema. While Hitchcock’s silents are undoubtedly less consistently surefooted than his blockbuster sound films (yer Psychos, yer Vertigos), they are all polished, sophisticated productions, deftly made by a team of film professionals. His debut benefits from the work of Stannard, Hitch’s wife Alma Reville, and producers Michael Balcon and Erich Pommer, nopt to mention its stars, including Valli, whom you may have seen elsewhere in King Vidor’s Wild Oranges (1924) and Mander whom you’ll surely know from his tour de force The First Born. But it’s Hitchcock’s show nonetheless: indeed, when the Spectator’s Iris Barry saw Hitchcock’s bravura debut, she sniffed out “new blood” for the British film industry immediately. This juvenilia is not so juvenile.
It must be said, however, that all reviews were not so enthusiastic. In the States, Variety spluttered: “A sappy chorus picture, probably intended for the sappy sticks where they still fall for this sort of a chorus girl story.” Fair comment, but Jill and Patsy themselves are hardly sappy, chorus girls or no.
Synopsis: “The diverging lives of two dancers from The Pleasure Garden nightspot. Jill rises to the heights and leaves her humble friend Patsy, and her fiancé, behind. Meanwhile, the good-natured Patsy stumbles into marriage with the selfish, dangerous Levet.” (From BFI Screenonline)
Hitchcock moment: Three minutes, 50 seconds into this clip, Jill gets her pocket picked by a couple of no-good hoods.
Watch out for: Patsy’s dog. There’s wisdom in those woofs.
Who do you watch silent movies with? Your friends? Your partner? Toute seule on the front row taking notes? The answer is that we all watch silent films in the company of the musician, who is not just accompanying the movie, but guiding the audience through it as well. Whether composing a score or improvising on the fly, silent cinema musicians are arguably closer to and more involved with the film then anyone else in the auditorium. Which is why it’s always fascinating to hear what they have to say about the movies.
Neil Brand does more to share his wisdom than most, with regular appearances on TV and radio discussing film history and film scores – as well as his work with the British Silent Film Festival too. But for the real skinny on silent cinema as he sees it, you need to catch him on stage, with a projector and a piano, holding forth. The good news is that Brand’s The Silent Pianist Speaks show is back in London on Saturday, at our beloved Cinema Museum.
From the earliest, earthiest comedies and thrillers, through a silent cine-verité classic scripted by a young Billy Wilder, to the glories of Hollywood glamour and the sublime Laurel and Hardy, Neil provides improvised accompaniment and laconic commentary on everything from deep focus to his own live cinema disasters. He investigates how music works with film by inviting the audience to score a love scene, and the show culminates with Neil accompanying a clip ‘sight unseen’ whilst simultaneously describing his reactions to it. The result is a hilarious, sharp and ultimately moving show about cinema and music which pays tribute to the musicians of the silent era through the observations of one the world’s greatest improvising accompanists.
You don’t want to miss this, do you?
The Silent Pianist Speaks is at the Cinema Museum on Saturday 19 May 2012 at 7.30pm. To read more about this particular event, and to buy tickets at the bargainous price of £8.50 or less for concessions, click through to the Cinema Museum website here. Read more about The Silent Pianist Speaks here. If you don’t live in the capital, you;ll be pleased to know that the Silent Pianist Also Speaks Elsewhere. Visit Neil Brand’s website for details of shows around the country (there’s one coming up in Ipswich on 27 May).
This is a guest post by Ayşe Behçet for Silent London.
Welcome back for the next instalment of Charlie’s London. In this segment I am looking at the Lambeth Workhouse, an institution that Chaplin spent some time as a youngster. But unlike in the previous chapters of this blog, which focus on either my connections with Charlie or the places our paths have crossed, I want to look at a fantastic event that really brought home to me the importance of keeping his memory alive.
I have always sworn by the events calendar Silent London offers its readers, and three months ago was no exception. While browsing, I came across a presentation by the much loved and highly accredited film expert and Chaplin scholar David Robinson. Robinson on Robinson, as it was called, promised to be a fascinating insight into a career spanning many years, with many stories. The event, on Saturday night, did not disappoint, with brilliant anecdotes and wonderful tales of the Hollywood elite, and Robinson’s own career as the backdrop. For me this experience meant so much more. The event was held at the Cinema Museum, which holds masses of film memorabilia and regularly hosts film screenings and lectures – and the Cinema Museum is housed in the building that was once the Lambeth Workhouse.
David Robinson with Ayşe Behçet
For me, who had grown up in South London, loving Chaplin, knowing this very building was the old Lambeth Workhouse and of course reading Robinson’s biography of Chaplin since I was 11 years old, this event was really the final piece in the jigsaw. I was 10 when I first saw the biopic Chaplin starring Robert Downey Jnr. I had wanted to read more about Chaplin’s life, and so ventured to the local library with my nan, where I uncovered Robinson’s book. I can remember sitting on a stool in the library stool while my nan browsed, my elbows rested on the table while my hands were placed firmly on my jaw line, head transfixed in the book. Everyone always tells me they know when my concentration level is at its highest: I swing my legs like a crazy person or bite my bottom lip as I read. Well, according to my nan this is exactly what I did.
I borrowed the book for two weeks and read the whole thing. I was hooked. For my birthday I asked for my own copy – Mum couldn’t quite understand why, especially as I had not long finished the library copy. I just knew, even at that age that I would want to read it over and over again. Now, 18 years later, it’s still sitting there on my shelf. I have used it for references, quotes, even to solve arguments – it has always been my true companion on my Chaplin journey. Of course, I understand the book very better now as a grown woman than I did as a child, with life comes greater understanding. Yet I will never forget asking my nan what certain words meant and if she had heard of the actors and actresses mentioned in the books. Did she remember any of the events and of course what was it like to actually see a Chaplin film in the cinema? Her stories always fascinated me!
The first time I met David Robinson was at the 2012 Slapstick Festival in Bristol. It was January and traditionally cold and miserable, but the festival cheered up every dreary day. Robinson gave two presentations that weekend, one on Chaplin’s life and one showing shorts and clips from some of his most memorable films. I watched in fascination at the first event, which I remember being 9am on the Saturday morning. It was everything I loved and adored about Chaplin, his London and how it affected him; his controversies and how he reacted to them. Well, after nearly 20 years and quite a bit of courage I finally got to talk to Robinson, and if I ever felt his book was an inspiration I can promise anyone who reads this that the man himself it so much more. Through him I have met some amazing and interesting people: I have continued a journey I started as a small child and I have felt very privileged in many ways. I wouldn’t have half the material I have in my blog without him, that’s for sure.
So this blog post has been rather sentimental, not that the others have really been anything else! And of course I have quoted Robinson and mentioned him before. But it is no exaggeration that you cannot possibly research Chaplin without having his biography constantly on hand. For me, being sat in the very room where Charlie and Sydney Chaplin spent such hard times, listening to David and remembering my roots, I truly felt I had come home. London never leaves you. Getting off the tube at the Elephant and walking down towards Renfrew Road; seeing the Imperial War Museum in the background; remembering the stories I grew up on – all these things remind me of the person I really am. Your home and your birth make up a large part of who you are. My nan always taught me that, and just as Robinson said in his reminiscence that Chaplin had always been in his life because of his father’s love of his films, so has he (and Robinson) very much always been in mine. I truly hope that this will always continue!
Thank you so much for taking time to read this blog spot, normal Chaplinesque service will be resumed in two weeks’ time when we will venture back to the workhouse once more to give some context to our hero and his life in London, as well as its use now as a fantastic gem of a museum.
I can tell you right now – the 2012 summer blockbusters will have nothing to match Robin Hood (1922). The towering sets, the impossible stunts, the mischievous humour, the prancing Merrie Men and at the heart of it all, handsome lunatic Douglas Fairbanks springing from one perilous situation to the next. In tights. It’s ridiculous, sure, but it’s ridiculously good fun too. Not for nothing did Kevin Brownlow call it “unique in every respect … as legendary as the story which inspired it.”
This July, Robin Hood will be shown in the grand surroundings of Chelsea’s Cadogan Hall, with an equally grand accompaniment – the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra playing a new score composed by John Scott. If you want to introduce your children to silent cinema, I can think of few better ways to do it. This quote from Scott bodes well for a feisty soundtrack and a thrilling night.
The film calls for an action-packed score. There is romance, intrigue, terror, spectacle, suspense, and as the story progresses it demands more and more, culminating in the spectacle of a royal wedding.
Robin Hood screens at Cadogan Hall on 12 July 2012 at 7.30pm. Tickets start at £12.50 and you can buy them here on the Cadogan Hall website.
Giorgio Moroder, at the controls of his own 'heart machine'
Last year, we reported that Kino Lorber was releasing Giorgio Moroder’s musical re-edit of Fritz lang’s Metropolis on Blu-Ray in America – followed by a limited theatrical release. Now, Eureka Entertainment has announced a UK DVD/DVD steelbook release for the movie on 23 July 2012.
If you need to refresh your memory, Giorgio Moroder’s version came out in 1984 and looks very different to the latest restoration. Working with the most complete version of the film he could find at the time, Moroder added a rock soundtrack, washed some different scenes with bright tints and made the whole thing run faster by removing the intertitles and using the text for subtitles. It’s a strange beast, and perhaps needless to say, a cult favourite.
So – after all the recent excitement over the “complete” Metropolis, are you horrified by the thought of watching Moroder’s hard-rocking version? Or do you have fond memories of this “retro-futurist” experiment? Perhaps it was the the first silent movie you saw and it holds happy memories of your first steps into early cinema? Maybe you’re just a big Freddie Mercury fan. Let us know what you think by completing our poll, or commenting below
This is a guest post by Ayşe Behçet for Silent London.
Thanks for returning for another instalment of Charlie’s London! This piece is going to look at the pubs in Chaplin’s life. It has always been my intention to show Chaplin’s emotional side, and also how there we can still see the South London of his youth around us. Chaplin appears not to have been much of a drinker, but two significant incidents in his life were connected to public houses that you can visit in London today.
First, we will look at the Three Stags just off the Kennington Road, opposite the fantastic Imperial War Museum. Then we will look at The Coal Hole on the Strand, a beautiful Victorian building.
“Chaplin’s corner”
As an undergraduate student who specialised in the Great War I would often find myself in the Imperial War Museum, studying its vast collection of military artifacts and hours of video footage. It was at this time I first discovered “Chaplin’s Corner”. Myself and three friends decided that, rather than hot chocolate and scones in the museum café we would cross the road to the Three Stags pub. The pub has that hint of Victorian decadence you imagine in the pages of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories: dark, almost black interiors with perfectly preserved stained glass. Once we were seated inside, I looked over to my right and a sign caught my eye. It said “Chaplin’s Corner”. As I ventured over I could see a beautiful picture of Chaplin and Jackie Coogan from the 1921 movie The Kid and an explanation for the naming of this little area.
When Charlie was just 10 years old he happened to wander past the pub and for no reason poke his head through the open door. What he saw would go on to be an important moment in his young life. In his Autobiography he wrote:
The Three Stags in the Kennington Road was not a place my Father frequented, yet as I passed it one evening an urge prompted me to peek inside and there he was, sitting in the corner! I was about to leave, but his face lit up and he beckoned me to him. I was surprised at such a welcome, for he was never demonstrative. He looked very ill; his eyes were sunken, and his body had swollen to an enormous size. He rested one hand, Napoleon-like, in his waistcoat as if to ease his difficult breathing. That evening he was most solicitous, inquiring after Mother and Sydney, and before I left took me in his arms and for the first time kissed me. That was the last time I saw him alive. (Charlie Chaplin, My Autobiography, quote reprinted courtesy of the archives of Roy Export Company Establishment)
I then remembered reading this same passage and more in Chaplin’s My Autobiography, so that night I took my well-read and very battered copy from my bookshelf once more. If you have not read this book I really do recommend it. This book has often come under scrutiny from critics for being “overly Dickensian”. I cannot disagree with that enough! What makes this an interesting read is more looking at the man behind the words, why does he mention certain things and not others? Why does he speak of some quite obscure people and now well-known individuals such as Buster Keaton whom we know he had a good friendship with?
The Coal Hole on the Strand
It was then that I stumbled across another familiar place, a name I had seen before and could not place, The Coal Hole in the Strand. Well, if I felt the Three Stags screamed Victorian thriller then this pub most definitely howled its heritage from the rooftops. The beautiful glowing red sign above the door reminds you of gas lamps and empty gin beakers. Unlike the Three Stags, which no doubt held sad memories for Chaplin, the Coal Hole was the setting for a very touching moment in which he realised his brother Syd’s true affections for him. Chaplin wrote in his Autobiography:
I had been in the Provinces for six months. Meanwhile Sydney had had little success in getting a job in a theatre, so he was obliged to descend from his Thespian ambition and apply for a job as a bartender at The Coal Hole in the Strand. Out of one hundred and fifty applicants he got the job. But he had fallen ignominiously from his own graces as it were.
He wrote to me regularly and kept me posted of Mother, but I seldom answered his letters; for one reason, I could not spell very well. One letter touched me deeply and drew me very close to him; he reproached me for not answering his letter and recalled the misery we had endured together which should unite us even closer. “Since Mother’s illness,” wrote Sydney, “all we have in the world is each other. Do you must write regularly and let me know I have a brother.” His letter was so moving I replied immediately. Now I saw Sydney in another light. His letter cemented a brotherly love that has lasted throughout my life. (Charlie Chaplin, My Autobiography, quote reprinted courtesy of the archives of Roy Export Company Establishment)
It has always been a belief of mine that Syd gets overlooked when we talk about Chaplin. Well thanks to Lisa K Stein and her truly wonderful biography of Syd Chaplin we can now all see the full story. This book is another must-read, alongside David Robinson’s definitive biography of Chaplin, which I have also mentioned before in my little blog. If you can find My Trip Abroad by Chaplin himself, first published in 1922, I also highly recommend that as another look at this great Londoner’s feelings about his home town.
People often ask me why Chaplin never came back to England to live. Of course, I can’t answer that. Only the great man himself could explain and unfortunately we will never have his answer. That is also only one of the questions I get asked. Half the people I talk to about Chaplin don’t even realise he was English, which to me is extraordinary! The only thing I can say is that in my humble opinion Chaplin didn’t need to make constant pilgrimages to the place of his birth, it never really left him.
Last year, a silent film wowed the Cannes film festival, and look where that ended up? This year, the BFI’s new restoration of Hitchcock’s 1927 film The Ring will be premiered at the festival – so the delegates at the film industry’s most glamorous get-together will be the first to see its full splendour.
When the film screens at the Hackney Empire in July, it will have a newly commissioned live score by Soweto Kinch. That screening will also be streamed online so people around the country can join in the sense of occasion. The Cannes crowd are in for a treat too, though: the festival screening will be a gala in itself, taking the form of a ciné-concert with London’s own Stephen Horne providing the music.
Obviously one is rather tired of annual trip to the Croisette, but this year we may make an exception, if only to see what the world’s cinema press make of a work that was heralded on its initial release as: “the most magnificent British film ever made”.
Our major campaign to restore all nine of Hitchcock’s surviving silent films.
Celebrating Cinema’s Master of Suspense
Gala screenings of newly restored British silent films with live scores
Starting with the London 2012 Festival, the BFI is exploring Alfred Hitchcock’s complete works with a celebration which includes gala screenings of the silent classics and a full retrospective at BFI Southbank.
Blackmail
One of the best British films of the 1920s, Hitchcock’s ‘Blackmail’ is a true masterpiece of the silent era. A young girl engaged to a stuffy policeman is enticed up to an artist’s studio, laying herself open to the blackmail of the title. Presented outdoors at the British Museum – the location of the film’s thrilling chase sequence – with a specially arranged score by composer Neil Brand, this is a once-in-a-lifetime film experience. Book now
The Ring
When boxer Bob Corby hires Jack Sander to be his sparring partner, he has no idea that he will become smitten with Mabel, Jack’s beautiful wife. A love triangle emerges in which the bouts in the ring become more than gamely sparring, leading up to the championship fight (famously set in the Albert Hall) between the two men for the love of Mabel. Features a brand new score by Soweto Kinch, multi-award winning British jazz alto saxophonist, hip hop artist, rapper and MC. Book now
The Lodger
A strange lodger may be a serial killer in Alfred Hitchcock’s first suspense thriller. With a new score by Nitin Sawhney, performed live with the London Symphony Orchestra at Barbican Hall. Nitin Sawhney’s score for The Lodger is commissioned by independent film distributor Network Releasing in partnership with the BFI. Book now
On 14 June, the Cinema Museum is showing a programme of little-seen British silent films, including a new print of the racy spy thriller A Woman Redeemed (Sinclair Hill, 1927), starring Brian Aherne and Joan Lockton, with musical accompaniment from Stephen Horne. I’ve seen A Woman Redeemed, and it’s a stylish, well-paced film from the latter end of the silent era that deserves a far more exciting title – and a wider audience. Here, to introduce the film more fully, is a guest post from Amy Sargeant, author of British Cinema: a Critical History (BFI, 2005).
'Hollywood taste' – A Woman Redeemed (1927)
Stoll’s 1927 release, A Woman Redeemed, was adapted by Mary Murillo from Frederick Britten Austin’s Strand magazine short story, ‘The Fining Pot is for Silver’. Both scenarios exploit a contemporary appetite for spy fiction – possibly best exemplified by John Buchan’s The Thirty-Nine Steps, Huntingtower and Greenmantle – and the audience for wartime memoirs published by former Secret Service personnel. Basil Thomson, appointed head of the Criminal Investigation Department in 1913, was twice charged with interviewing the alleged spy, Mata Hari. Self-servingly, he concluded:
No drama, no film story yet written has been so enthralling as our daily repertory on the dimly lighted stage set in a corner of the granite building in Westminster. In a century after we … are dead and gone, the Great War will be a quarry for tales of adventure, of high endeavour, and of splendid achievement: when that time comes even some of the humbler actors who play their part in these pages may be seen through a haze of romance.
Both Britten Austin’s story and Sinclair Hill’s film feature an organisation of foreign agents, intent upon power and destruction. Geoffrey Wayneflete (Brian Aherne), an irreproachable young pilot distinguished for his service in the Great War, has designed a wireless controlled, pilotless aeroplane ‘that shall make Britain strong enough to keep peace in the world’. The agents conspire to steal his plans, pressing into service Felice Annaway (Joan Lockton), ordering her to use her ‘charm and beauty’ to seduce Geoffrey. Stella Arbenina, meanwhile, plays the darkly enigmatic and heartless Marta, threatening to expose Felice should she fail to comply with the instructions of a dastardly ‘Twisted Genius’. The Criminal Investigation Department is not to be outwitted and pursues the agents to France; a chase ensues, from Paris to London, the centre of a ‘Proud Empire’.
A foreign agent, 'intent upon power and destruction' – A Woman Redeemed (1927)
A masked ball afforded Walter Murton, Hill’s designer, the opportunity to produce the most spectacular set witnessed to date in British Cinema: spangled bathing belles dive into a pool from tiered platforms. A 1927 Bioscope reviewer commented wryly on the decors provided for Felice’s Paris hotel suite:
The bedrooms with gold and silver draperies seem rather to suggest Hollywood taste, but for anything we know that may be the taste that appeals to ladies in the pay of alien governments.
One guest at the ball has drawn inspiration from Douglas Fairbanks; Geoffrey comes dressed as Harlequin.
'Spangled bathing belles' – A Woman Redeemed (1927)
As an author, Britten Austin was something of a pasticheur, with a range spanning from popular farce to a modish fascination with the occult: Buried Treasure, combining parapsychology, adventure and costume drama, was filmed by Cosmopolitan in 1921 from a Britten Austin short story, as a vehicle for Marion Davies. However, as a prediction of future aerial warfare, A Woman Redeemed bears comparison with Maurice Elvey’s 1929 High Treason, likewise featuring a gang of alien, deracinated mercenaries and idealists.
A Woman Redeemed uses multinational aliases to designate suspect characters. It gestures towards a return to nationalism in Europe in the late 1920s and early 1930s as a guarantor of inner security and the potential incubator of external conflict.
A Woman Redeemed screens at the Cinema Museum in south London on 14 June 2012 at 6.30pm, with musical accompaniment by Stephen Horne. Tickets cost £8.50 or £6.50 for concessions and are available online here.
Images courtesy of the National Film and Television Archive.
“This is for now. This is for audiences now” – Neil Brand, composer, Blackmail
Yesterday I was lucky enough to attend the press launch of the BFI’s Genius of Hitchcock season, where the summer’s blockbuster season of screenings was announced. Creative director Heather Stewart made a great case for Leytonstone’s favourite son, calling him a modernist to compare with Picasso and Le Corbusier, and a cornerstone of British culture, laying the adjective Hitchcockian alongside its counterparts Dickensian and Shakespearean. “The idea of popular cinema somehow being capable of being great art at the same time as being entertaining is still a problem for some people. Shakespeare is on the national curriculum, Hitchcock is not,” she says. Furthermore, she argued that Hitchcock’s work demands not just greater study, but wider audiences. The answer the BFI proposes is to show the films – all of them – in the most comprehensive Hitchcock retrospective ever staged – including his silent films.
“We would find it very strange if we could not see Shakespeare’s early plays performed, or read Dickens’s early novels. But we’ve been quite satisfied as a nation that Hitchcock’s early films have not been seen in good quality prints on the big screen.”
Showing the nine extant silents is of course more difficult than screening the later work. The prints require varying degrees of restoration work – and new scores. For me, the most interesting part of launch event was a panel discussion chaired by Nick James, editor of Sight & Sound magazine, which gave an insight into the process of writing new music for the films. Five composers were on stage, each of whom had been tasked with scoring a different Hitchcock silent. It was fascinating to hear about the different approaches they took, how much they felt that the project was a direct way of expressing their admiration for the director, and their readings of the different films.
Neil Brand, whose orchestral score for Blackmail will be arranged for a smaller ensemble and played at a gala screening in the forecourt of the British Museum, described the “party game” of following Hitchcock’s characters’ shifting motivations and vulnerability. His intention, he said, was “bring out the neurosis” in the film. And he was upfront about the fact that he took inspiration from some of Hitchcock’s later musical collaborators. We were shown a clip from the film that precedes the scene excerpted above. Brand wasn’t, he explained, trying to register the heroine’s desire for the artist, but for the frilly dress hanging in the studio. To that end, he “scored the dress”, with a sparkling theme every bit as frothy as the frock.
Hitchcock’s “switching empathies” were also part of the attraction and the complexity of scoring The Lodger for Nitin Sawhney. He started, he said, by working on the titles, those extravagantly designed, animated captions that decorate the film, and pulling the strands of the narrative apart. It must have been complex. Asked by James if the score was as foggy as the film’s vision of London, he replied no, but added self-deprecatingly that his brain was a little fogged during the composition process. Those who have heard Sawhney’s score for A Throw of Dice will doubtless be happy to learn that this new composition will also be performed by the London Symphony Orchestra at the Barbican in June.
Fog or no fog, young composer Daniel Patrick Cohen showed every enthusiasm for the task of soundtracking Hitchcock’s first film. As a long-term fan of the director he described The Pleasure Garden as “a blueprint for all the wonderful films that Alfred Hitchcock went on to make”. Happily for us, we saw a glimpse of the film with Cohen’s score. It was the opening scene in fact, which sets up so many of Hitchcock’s enduring fascinations: blondes, voyeurism and a ribald, but very British sense of humour. Cohen knows his audience will have been brought up on Hitchcock’s grisly thrillers, and that we know where all these fascinations can lead, and so the music was deliberately playful, but with a steely, sinister edge. When it came to the humour in the film, Cohen promised us “one amusing sound effect” in his score. Just one, and he wasn’t telling where it was to be found. Tease.
Can you imagine Betty Balfour as the pinup of the Occupy movement? Mira Calix can, perhaps. She offered an audacious reading of Champagne, which screens in September, as a critique of celebrity culture and a comment on the financial crisis. I see her point, but can’t quite imagine idle heiress de nos jours Paris Hilton with soot on her face, or indeed flying a plane. Still, Champagne is a film with a great deal of style and Calix quite rightly noted that while 1928 may seem to be the long-distant past, this is a film obsessed with modernity, in all its art-deco, cocktail-sipping, drop-waisted deliciousness. Calix aims to bridge the 84-year age gap with a score for Champagne that incorporates traditional instruments alongside the electronica she is renowned for. I think this will be most of the most distinctive scores in the season, and I am certainly intrigued.
Soweto Kinch didn’t just discuss his score for The Ring, he put his saxophone where his mouth was and accompanied a short clip from the film. His finished score will be played by a five-piece band at the Hackney Empire, but he performed solo in NFT1, his sax lines underscoring each small but significant gesture in one of The Ring’s quieter scenes – and drawing a fantastic response from the audience. Like Calix, he is keen to bring out the elements of the film that feel new. Watching The Ring, he said he was suprised to see such a racially hetereogenous vision of 1920s, pre-Windrush London, and impressed by the films’ treatment of sexuality and gender identity. “It reframed how I thought relationships were in the early 20th century,” he said, adding that he would look a little differently on his own grandparents’ courtship from now on! He was confident, that he would be able to “twin the old and the new” in the film, just as he combines jazz and hip-hop in his music. Hip-hop Hitchcock? Bring it on.
This year’s British Silent Film Festival has an extraordinarily full schedule of films, talks and gala screenings. Whether you favour Soviet gem The Ghost That Never Returns with the full-throttle rockin’ blues of the Dodge Brothers (featuring Mark Kermode), Miles Mander’s sophisticated drama The First Born with Stephen Horne‘s elegant, haunting score, or some much-loved but little-seen favourites from the archives, there should be something to tempt you. And the whole thing takes place in the beautiful city of Cambridge this year (just 45 minutes from the Big Smoke by train).
BUT, very excitingly, the British Silent Film Festival has been kind enough to give away some tickets for free! To you beautiful Silent Londoners. To win a pair of tickets to a screening of your choice, just send the answer to this super-easy question to me, at silentlondontickets@gmail.com.
What is the name of the French silent film-maker whose life was dramatised in Martin Scorsese’s Oscar-winning film Hugo (2911)?
The winner will be chosen at random from the correct answers at 1pm on Wednesday 18 April 2012, when the competition closes – and then notified by email. Good luck, and see you in Cambridge!
This is a guest post by Ayşe Behçet for Silent London.
Thanks again for returning to Charlie’s London with me. First, I want to wish Sir Charles Spencer Chaplin a very happy 123rd birthday! It really is a coincidence that my latest blogpost falls on the anniversary of his birthday, but hopefully it’s a very good blessing.
Today I’m going to be looking at some of the houses in and around Lambeth that Chaplin lived in, and some of those in the same area that my family have called home, too. Unfortunately I can’t say I have ever lived in a house that he graced, but who knows what may happen in the future?
Family was very important to Chaplin, just as it is to me. He entrusted much of his business to Sydney Chaplin, his half-brother who acted wisely on Charlie’s behalf. He was also incredibly close to his mother Hannah, whom he idolised. Contrary to popular belief, he even had a relationship with his father – when he was around. Chaplin spoke fondly of his first meeting with his father during that period in his autobiography.
“The prospect of living with Father was exciting. I had seen him only twice in my life, on stage, and once passing a house in Kennington Road, as he was coming down the path with a lady. I had paused and watched him, knowing instinctively he was my father. He beckoned me to him and asked my name. Sensing the drama of the situation, I had feigned innocence and said ‘Charlie Chaplin’. Then he glanced knowingly at the lady, felt his pocket and gave me half a crown, and without further ado I ran straight home and told Mother that I had met my father.” (Charlie Chaplin, My Autobiography, quote reprinted courtesy of the archives of Roy Export Company Establishment)
Family continued to be important to Chaplin throughout his life, and as you may have realised, I too am very devoted to my own family. The fond memories I have of my own grandmother will never leave me. This is why this personal journey, walking the streets of South London reminiscing, has been a wonderful and emotional experience for me. My grandmother Florence Boakes died on 12 May 1997, and from that time on, it became very painful for me to watch the great silent films, such as Chaplin’s, that we had enjoyed together. If the films were on television or I came across one of our old videos, it was too painful to watch without her there. I had bought her a Chaplin tile on a stand when I went to Hastings for a school trip, and that had to be kept out of sight too.
Ayşe and Kieran
So what brought me back to Chaplin? In short, my husband-to-be Kieran, and our first date almost 12 years later. We had agreed to meet in a Starbucks in Charing Cross and he was early, which is nothing new. When I arrived I was nervous as we had only met a handful of times before. As he was reading a book, that the topic of conversation we used to break the ice.
“It’s about Buster Keaton, I’m a big silent film fan,” he confessed. I smiled as he showed me the front cover and I handed it back to him.
“I grew up watching Chaplin, I was a Chaplin fan,” I answered. He smiled back.
“Silent films never leave you, you’re still a Chaplin fan.”
Of course, he was right. Our next date involved a bottle of wine, some very good food and The Kid, which at first I was worried about watching. For the first time in years I watched the Tramp and I smiled – then I realised my love affair with Chaplin was very much back on. In January 2011 I found myself watching The Gold Rush with Carl Davis conducting the London Philharmonia orchestra, a wonderful Christmas present from Kieran. And this year he took me to the Slapstick festival – anyone who knows me knows how that has changed my life!
Mum was really happy I’d found Chaplin again, so when I decided to start writing this blog the three of us spent a day wandering around, taking pictures of all the sights involved.
We walked from Waterloo towards the Imperial War Museum and down Lambeth Road, cutting down George Road to find West Square. Children were playing in a communal garden; it really is the most beautiful little piece of London. Mum told me my great uncle Fred had a friend who lived in West Square and they would also play around there as children. In his autobiography, Chaplin remembers the family’s time in West Square as being “moderately comfortable; we lived in three tastefully furnished rooms”. The square itself was built in 1791 and you can see it was considered a plush place to live.
Ayşe at 39 West Square, where the Chaplins had ‘three tastefully furnished rooms’
Coming back towards the Imperial War Museum, cutting down Kennington Road, we found ourselves at 287 Kennington Road. This was the home Charlie and Syd shared with their father in 1898. Their mother Hannah was unable to support the family and was institutionalised in Cane Hill Asylum, so Charles Chaplin Senior had care of the two boys instead, along with his very reluctant mistress Louise. What a relief it must have been when their mother finally sent for them. Outside 287 Kennington Road now is a plaque, privately paid for and dedicated to Charlie, reminding passersby that he once lived here. Apparently, the door number is in itself under dispute and even the plaque unfortunately is incorrect. It says that Charlie died in 1978 when he actually died on Christmas Day 1977.
We decided to head back towards the Walworth Road. Getting off the tube at Elephant and Castle we walked to the Walworth Road and of course we couldn’t resist stopping for some pie and mash. I had double of everything and claimed it all as research! Crossing the road we headed down towards Methley Street, another residence for the young Chaplin. No 39 Methley Street was Chaplin’s home between 1898 and 1899. It might look nice now but back then it was a desperate residence with the surrounding area consisting of pickle factories and slaughterhouses.
Looking around this area it is easy to see where Chaplin’s inspirations for films such as The Kid actually came from. To this day, Lambeth is littered with old Victorian streets and houses only recently made fashionable and picturesque. There is a plaque on Methley Street dedicated to Charlie, this time with correct dates, also acknowledging that he was a Water Rat. A Water Rat was a name given to a member of an acting guild who, if in times of hardship could go to the Grand Order of the Water Rats and seek refuge and help. Stan Laurel was a Water Rat too. It is when they were living at Methley Street Hannah began to sew again and for a while they seem to have been quite happy, until her health took a turn for the worse again and she had to send her sewing machine and various garments to the pawnshop to make the rent. Without her sewing machine she could not work, which plunged the little family into further chaos. Charlie would later use a pawnbroker as the backdrop of one of his 1916 films The Pawnshop.
We headed home at this point, and yes, you’ll notice that I haven’t covered the famous Pownall Terrace, the most famous of Charlie’s homes in Lambeth. There is a reason for this, and all will be revealed in a future instalment!
Thanks for reading everyone, and I hope you’ll join me again for next instalment of Charlie’s London in two weeks’ time.
The Barbican is marking the weekend’s 100th anniversary of the Titanic disaster with a moving event that combines live music with archive footage. Gavin Bryars’ The Sinking of the Titanic was inspired by reports that the ship’s string ensemble continued to play the hymn Autumn as the vessel sank; it was written in 1969 and first recorded on Brian Eno’s label Obscure. It will be performed in the Barbican concert hall by the Gavin Bryars ensemble with multimedia artist Philip Jeck.
The archive footage projections have been designed by film-maker Bill Morrison, whose work, including Decasia and The Miners’ Hymns, you may already be familiar with, in collaboration with Laurie Olinder.
Tickets for the event start at £15, but readers of this blog can enjoy a 20% discount when booking online. See the promotional code below.
Throughout the 72 minute piece Bryars and the ensemble weave refrains from Autumn with layers of Jeck’s sample-based materials, creating, at times, clamouring waves of sound that suggest the great engines and massive bulk of the vessel and the ocean that swallowed it. The result is a heart-achingly intimate and direct work.
The Sinking of the Titanic also features projection design by the internationally renowned Bill Morrison, who has commissioned work for some of the most important composers of his time, such as Steve Reich and Henryk Gorecki . Collaborating alongside Morrison is Laurie Olinder, multimedia designer, founding member of New York’s Ridge Theater with previous work being screened at some of the world’s most prestigious arts venues, such as Carnegie Hall, the Lincoln Centre and the Brooklyn Academy of Music.
Silent London readers can claim a 20% discount on tickets for The Sinking of the Titanic. Just enter promo code 15412 when booking online, at barbican.org.uk. The Sinking of the Titanic plays at the Barbican on 15 April 2012 at 8pm.
Read more about the earliest films of the Titanic disaster and about events to commemorate the anniversary in our guest post by Greg Ward here.
The coming of sound was always going to be a shock. But bear with me, dear readers, you’ll soon become accustomed to this new-fangled technology. Silent London has branched into the world of podcasting and and the first edition is ready for you to download and listen to now.
Episode one features Ewan Munro and Pete Baran chatting to me in the studio about Carl Theodor Dreyer’s silent films, the forthcoming British Silent Film Festival, their favourite recent DVD and Blu-Ray releases and a lot more. Sight and Sound contributing editor Mark Sinker also takes the time to tell us about his favourite silent movie, Nosferatu. You’ll information about pretty much everything we discuss on the podcast somewhere on this site, but you may also want to click here, to see the BFI YouTube channel. The music is by kind permission of Neil Brand, and the podcast is presented in association with SOAS radio.
Silent London 