Tag Archives: MoMA

Iris Barry on Radio 4

September 18, 2025 PH 1 Comment

Where would we be without Iris Barry? Where would all the films be, more to the point? Iris Barry was a pioneering film critic and film preservationist whose life is every bit as interesting as the plots of the movies that she championed and saved.

I am pleased to say that I have presented a BBC Radio 4 documentary on this wonderful woman, titled Iris Barry, First Lady of Film. The documentary will be broadcast on Tuesday 23 September at 4pm in the Artworks strand. Please do listen in to hear the story of the woman who wrote about cinema for the Spectator and the Daily Mail (who sacked her for dissing Elinor Glyn), co-founded the Film Society, and went on to start the world’s first film archive at MoMA in New York.

The documentary is the brainchild of producer James King and consultant Igor Toronyi-Lalic. It features contributions from Richard Brody, Bryony Dixon, Robert Sitton and Henry K Miller. Don’t miss it!

Listen to Iris Barry, First Lady of Film on BBC Radio 4, 23 September at 4pm. Is should subsequently be available on catchup.
Read about Iris Barry on the Women Film Pioneers Project.
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The Silent London Poll of 2023: And the winners are …

January 26, 2024 PH Leave a comment

I may be a humble blogger typing at my desk, but just imagine I am a glamorous celebrity cracking first-rate jokes while wearing a designer ballgown. I have counted the votes, and I am ready to announce the winners of the Silent London Poll of 2023!

Congratulations to all the people mentioned below – as ever, these categories were bursting with great nominations. Thank you for all your votes, and your comments, which remind us all of the passion for silent film out there.

Without further ado, let me open this giant stack of golden envelopes. Here are your winners.

1. Best orchestral silent film screening of 2023

Your winner: Stella Dallas (Henry King, 1925), with a score composed by Stephen Horne, orchestrated by Ben Palmer and performed by Orchestra del Teatro Comunale directed by Timothy Brock, in the Piazza Maggiore Bologna, as part of Il Cinema Ritrovato

I said: “Before Monday night’s screening of the original 1925 adaptation of Olive Higgins Prouty’s weepie, some people in Bologna were still dropping the names of Barbara Stanwyck and King Vidor. After Monday, the talk of the town was only Belle Bennett, Henry King and Stephen Horne, whose marvellous score, alongside Bennett’s impeccable performance, left the piazza awash with tears. Horne has long championed this film, as have I, and the new restoration from MOMA is a very welcome, and beautiful thing. I really hope more people get to see this wonderful film now. Silent melodrama really can be the very finest melodrama.”

Honourable mention: Lady Windermere’s Fan (Ernst Lubitsch, 1925), at the same festival, with Timothy Brock’s new orchestral score.

2. Best silent film screening with a solo musician or small ensemble of 2023

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The First Year (1926): The cure for matrimonial measles

October 23, 2023 PH Leave a comment

This is an expanded version of an essay I wrote for Sight and Sound in 2020. The First Year (Frank Borzage, 1926) screens this week at MoMA on the opening night of the After Alice, Beyond Lois programme, curated by Kate Saccone and Dave Kehr to commemorate 10 years of the Women Film Pioneers Project.

Frank Borzage was one of the greatest Hollywood directors of young love. When we remember his silent work in particular, a very distinctive kind of romantic melodrama come to the fore: a passionate tale in which two youthful lovers confront unbearable adversity and yet are finally saved by the redemptive, mystical power of true love. Most famously, this path from darkness into light was trod by Janet Gaynor and Charles Farrell in a trio of celebrated Borzage films from the end of the silent era: 7^th Heaven (1927), Street Angel (1928) and Lucky Star (1929).

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After Alice, Beyond Lois: Celebrating the Women Film Pioneers Project at MoMA

October 17, 2023 PH 1 Comment

Some news is too good not to share, even if the Atlantic Ocean makes this a little inconvenient for me, personally. If you can be in New York later this month and next, I urge you to attend a particularly excellent birthday party.

The Women Film Pioneers Project, an impeccable resource for early and silent film history, has reached its 10^th birthday. The brainchild of Jane Gaines, and managed by Kate Saccone, the WFPP has been doing the good work of balancing the gender books of film history for 10 years now, and this calls for a celebration. One that takes the form of a film season, curated by Saccone with Dave Kehr at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

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