Feature films? What a concept. They don’t always seem to be the dominant form here at Pordenone. But this afternoon was an exception to that rule, with a triple-bill of four-to-six-reelers back to back. Welcome to a world of truly immersive narrative entertainment, It’s the future.
Continue reading Le Giornate del Cinema Muto 2025: Pordenone Post No 6Tag Archives: Elif Rongen-Kaynakçi
Sine Nomine: Unseen and unidentified silent films at Pordenone 2024
Can YOU help put names to 14 unidentified films screening at this year’s Giornate del Cinema Muto? The festival is asking for your contribution to a very exciting project. Elif Rongen-Kaynakçi explains more.
The story goes that in the early days of the Giornate del Cinema Muto, a small group of film historians sat in a theatre, watched films arriving from different archives from around the world, and identified them by shouting out the names of the actors and actresses appearing on the screen. Whether true or somewhat apocryphal, this is still an appealing idea for film historians and archivists alike. Surely, there are still many unidentified films in the archives, and what better resource in the world than the combined brainpower of the Pordenone crowd would be able to identify them? Following on the trail of exciting, successful, and fun initiatives like the LostFilms.eu portal and various archival YouTube channels, a couple of try-out sessions held by Eye Filmmuseum, and hugely inspired by the “Mostly Lost” Workshops held at the Library of Congress Conservation Center in Virginia from 2012 to 2019, we are launching a film identification thread at this year’s Giornate.
This year 14 films, sourced from 6 archives, each individually numbered, will be screened as shorts before features scattered through the week. The catalogue notes about them have been written by the archivists concerned, providing as much information as possible about the material, its provenance, and any contextual information that might be helpful for identification. Still images are provided as memory aids where possible. We encourage you to make your suggestions in various ways; whether in discussions during lunch or dinner, but also on the white board at the festival hospitality office, here on this Silent London page, or the “Pordenone People” Facebook group. Please provide evidence when you can, whether to support your suggestions or to prove a theory wrong. Please explain why you think in a certain direction, or why you’d rule out some options. And don’t forget to share with us the sources you are using to support your theory.
Continue reading Sine Nomine: Unseen and unidentified silent films at Pordenone 2024
Pirmoji Banga 2022: keeping silent cinema weird in Vilnius
Greetings from Lithuania!
It has been a bit of a quiet summer here. The reason is that I have been working on a couple of research projects, and travelling too – mostly around the country talking about Pre-code cinema (I’m in Scotland this week, and Belfast next month – links below). But also to further-flung spots such as Vilnius, home of Pirmoji Banga. And if you don’t know what that is, you have come to the right blogpost…
Pirmoji Banga means ‘first wave’ and this is a festival of early film, in the extended sense. from the very beginnings to the first talkies, everything before the second world war, more or less. The festival is substantially devoted to silent cinema, which is presented with live music from international artists. And some of this year’s screenings benefited from a benshi too, which was particularly special. The screenings are all held at a smart arthouse cinema by the river, called Skalvijos Kino Centras. A cool place. Very silent film hipster. Check out the foyer display for the festival (and two people who definitely aren’t hipsters in the mirror):
Continue reading Pirmoji Banga 2022: keeping silent cinema weird in Vilnius
Take Cinema’s First Nasty Women home this summer
Yes, I have been hiding it very well, but I am actually a big fan of the Cinema’s First Nasty Women project. Who knew?
Co-curated by Laura Horak, Maggie Hennefeld and Elif Rongen-Kaynakçi, the Nasty Women project has trawled the archives for trailblazing examples of female energy, anger, transgression, rebellions and explosive hilarity in early cinema. The films have been shown at festivals around the globe and this summer you can take them home with you, courtesy of Kino Lorber, in the form of an “irreverent” four-disc box set, available in both DVD and Blu-ray flavours. Here’s the official spiel:
Continue reading Take Cinema’s First Nasty Women home this summer
Silent London 