#mrs. douglas fairbanks

[rwpohl]

the taming of the shrew, sam taylor 1929

[hotvintagepoll]

Congrats to the ultimate winner of the Hot & Vintage Movie Men Tournament, Mr. Toshiro Mifune! May he live happily and well where the sun always shines, enjoying the glories of a battle hard fought.

A loving farewell to all of our previous contestants, who are now banished to the shadow realm and all its dark joys and whispered horrors—I hear there's a picnic on the village green today. If you want to remember the fallen heroes, you can find them all beneath the cut.

What happens next? I'll be taking a break of two weeks to rest from this and prep for the Hot & Vintage Ladies Tournament. I'll still be around but only minimally, posting a few last odes to the hot men before transitioning into a little early ladies content, just like I did with this last tournament. The submission form for the Hot & Vintage Ladies tournament will remain up for one more week (closing February 21st), so get your submissions in for that asap! Once the form closes, there will be one more week of break. The first round of the Hot & Vintage Ladies Tournament will be posted on February 29th, as Leap Year Day seems like a fitting allusion to leaping into these ladies' arms.

Thanks for being here! Enjoy the two weeks off, and send me some great propaganda.

In order of the last round they survived—

ROUND ONE HOTTIES:

Richard Burton

Tony Curtis

Red Skelton

Keir Dullea

Jack Lemmon

Kirk Douglas

Marcello Mastroianni

Jean-Pierre Cassel

Robert Wagner

James Garner

James Coburn

Rex Harrison

George Chakiris

Dean Martin

Sean Connery

Tab Hunter

Howard Keel

James Mason

Steve McQueen

George Peppard

Elvis Presley

Rudolph Valentino

Joseph Schildkraut

Ray Milland

Claude Rains

John Wayne

William Holden

Douglas Fairbanks Sr.

Harold Lloyd

Charlie Chaplin

John Gilbert

Ramon Novarro

Slim Thompson

John Barrymore

Edward G. Robinson

William Powell

Leslie Howard

Peter Lawford

Mel Ferrer

Joseph Cotten

Keye Luke

Ivan Mosjoukine

Spencer Tracy

Felix Bressart

Ronald Reagan (here to be dunked on)

Peter Lorre

Bob Hope

Paul Muni

Cornel Wilde

John Garfield

Cantinflas

Henry Fonda

Robert Mitchum

Van Johnson

José Ferrer

Robert Preston

Jack Benny

Fredric March

Gene Autry

Alec Guinness

Fayard Nicholas

Ray Bolger

Orson Welles

Mickey Rooney

Glenn Ford

James Cagney

ROUND TWO SWOONERS:

Dick Van Dyke

James Edwards

Sammy Davis Jr.

Alain Delon

Peter O'Toole

Robert Redford

Charlton Heston

Cesar Romero

Noble Johnson

Lex Barker

David Niven

Robert Earl Jones

Turhan Bey

Bela Lugosi

Donald O'Connor

Carman Newsome

Oscar Micheaux

Benson Fong

Clint Eastwood

Sabu Dastagir

Rex Ingram

Burt Lancaster

Paul Newman

Montgomery Clift

Fred Astaire

Boris Karloff

Gilbert Roland

Peter Cushing

Frank Sinatra

Harold Nicholas

Guy Madison

Danny Kaye

John Carradine

Ricardo Montalbán

Bing Crosby

ROUND THREE SMOKESHOWS:

Marlon Brando

Anthony Perkins

Michael Redgrave

Gary Cooper

Conrad Veidt

Ronald Colman

Rock Hudson

Basil Rathbone

Laurence Olivier

Christopher Plummer

Johnny Weismuller

Clark Gable

Fernando Lamas

Errol Flynn

Tyrone Power

Humphrey Bogart

ROUND 4 STUNGUNS:

James Dean

Cary Grant

Gregory Peck

Sessue Hayakawa

Harry Belafonte

James Stewart

Gene Kelly

Peter Falk

QUARTERFINALIST VOLCANIC TOWERS OF LUST:

Jeremy Brett

Vincent Price

James Shigeta

Buster Keaton

SEMIFINALIST SUPERMEN:

Omar Sharif

Paul Robeson

FINALIST FANTASIES:

Sidney Poitier

Toshiro Mifune

and ok, sure, here's the shadow-bracket-style winner's portrait of Toshiro Mifune.

[coffeeandcinemaandmusic]

In 1963 photographer Bert Stern photographed some of the top actors/actresses at the height of their fame playing their dream roles for a photo series in LIFE magazine's December 20, 1963 issue.

Cary Grant as Charlie Chaplin's Tramp / Audrey Hepburn as Pearl White in 'Perils of Pauline' / Tony Curtis & Natalie Wood as Rudolph Valentino and Vilma Bánky in 'The Sheik' / Paul Newman as a Douglas Fairbanks Sr. swashbuckler / Frank Sinatra & Dean Martin as Judah Ben-Hur and Messala from 'Ben-Hur' / Bing Crosby & Bob Hope as 1930s gangsters / Jack Lemmon as a war pilot / Shirley MacLaine as one of Busby Berkeley's showgirls / Rock Hudson as Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

[the1920sinpictures]

1922 Douglas Fairbanks, Mrs. Fairbanks (aka Mary Pickford) and Mary’s niece Gwynne.

[ufonaut]

Can we get the official ufonaut alan scott costume ranking

YES WE CAN YES WE CAN!!!

i won't include variations like puffy or regular sleeves/long or short cape/chest symbol or no chest symbol (in the case of the 1940s and the 1990s respectively) because the general concept is the same and alan really hasn't had an extensive amount of costumes! without further ado:

10. the atrocious lantern body cast from justice society of america 2007

i know he was paralyzed and he single-handedly brought himself back from the brink of death! i know he claims the lantern body keeps the starheart contained lest he explode and kill everybody! there's still no excuse for it. prolonged exposure to this atrocious costume induces blindness of the soul.

9. new 52 earth-two generic superhero costume

it's not abysmal but boy, not even andy kubert can save it! as generic as it can get, this is a dollar store brand green lantern. new 52 alan-2 has his moments, rare as they are, especially early on in his series when he was written by james robinson but the costume never did work

8. the current justice society of america 2022 redesign

it's not bad and i love the beard (and pray nightly that it means we're entering the alan scott bear era) but as far as redesigns go, it's almost an offensively lazy one -- his tights seem to have been traded for slacks and his shirt for a button up that's perplexingly got the logo slapped right on it (how does he unbutton it? that's for him to figure out and explode about). it's got no flair! no panache!

7. midlife crisis insanity extravaganza

when alan turned young again in green lantern corps quarterly 1992 and proceeded to suffer various mental breakdowns throughout #4-5, he underwent a couple other significantly more temporary aesthetic changes too and quickly circled through a couple hellish landscapes that had him dressed real appropriately for them. i love this! the ponytail! the horns! the pointy ears! at the end of the story he finds out these illusions were mere reflections of how he feels about himself and isn't that a doozy! i'll let you do with that what you will

6. stargirl spring break special 2021 redesign

this is a significantly better redesign! this is something that does feel like alan's classic outfit while still remaining new and exciting, it's not afraid to steer towards the possibility of ridiculous in order to bring us a real hit. however, it loses points for the boots inexplicably straying from the colour scheme

5. MURDER VIOLENCE RAGE

while this is part of the above midlife crisis insanity extravaganza from glcq #5, i think it deserves its own place on this list solely because of how indicative it is of alan's rage (at the world! at molly! at himself!) and how utterly insane of a look it is

4. checkmate 2006 uniform

i'm an enthusiast of eye patches and military-esque uniforms so this is one of my favourite alan looks ever and one of his most entertaining eras too but we see too little of this look before he either goes back into his regular costume or full civilian and that's a crime in itself! 10/10 despite the unimaginative colour scheme

3. MR KINGDOM COME

MR KINGDOM COME

2. old faithful

i mean, what is there to say? it's a classic! i adore alan's regular costume! i think it's one of those character designs to have just immediately gotten it so right it's crazy! it's a real beauty, drawing on mart nodell's love of greek mythology (the sandal-like laces on the boots), theatre (the tights, the ring), and a healthy dose of inspiration from douglas fairbanks' the black pirate 1926 (the shirt). it's really just great, as enduring and timeless as it gets!

1. SENTINEL (1992-1999)

IT'S SENTINEL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! DEMONIC CAPE HAIR MASK. OPERA GLOVES. ALL SHARP ANGLES ALL THE TIME. ANGER LIKE YOU WOULDN'T BELIEVE. ALAN'S BEST LOOK AND ERA. YOU EITHER GET IT OR YOU DON'T!

[chaplinfortheages]

Top photo:

Charlie Chaplin with friend Tim Durant, Ciro’s Nightclub in Los Angeles following a private showing of The "Great Dictator", Oct. 7th, 1940.

Bottom photo: Caption reads:

"Charlie Chaplin is still receiving congratulations on “The Great Dictator”, Mr. & Mrs. Douglas Fairbanks Jr, expressed their sentiments when all met recently at New York’s El Morocco. Tim Durant is the name of the gentleman whose head is turned." October 14th 1940.

[rmelster]

This photo of Douglas Fairbanks Jr. is all I have ever imagined of Mr. Pemberton (Lawrance’s father) and more.

[wahwealth]

Douglas Fairbanks | The Iron Mask ~ D'Artagnan and The Three Musketeers...

The Iron Mask is a 1929 US part-talkie D'Artagnan and The Three Musketeers adventure film directed by Allan Dwan. Some of the film has dialogue, and some feature a synchronized musical score with sound effects and a theme song.  The film is an adaptation of the last section of The Vicomte de Bragelonne by Alexandre Dumas, père, which is based on the French legend of the Man in the Iron Mask. Film historian and Fairbanks Biographer. Jeffrey Vance has said of the film, "As a valedictory to the silent screen, The Iron Mask is unsurpassed. CAST Douglas Fairbanks – D'Artagnan Belle Bennett – The Queen Mother Marguerite De La Motte – Constance Bonacieux Dorothy Revier – Milady de Winter Vera Lewis – Madame Peronne Rolfe Sedan – Louis XIII William Bakewell – Louis XIV/Twin Brother Gordon Thorpe – Young Prince/Twin Brother Nigel De Brulier – Cardinal Richelieu Ullrich Haupt – Count De Rochefort Lon Poff – Father Joseph: the Queen's Confessor Charles Stevens – Planchet: D'Artagnan's Servant Henry Otto – the King's Valet Leon Bary – Athos Tiny Sandford – Porthos (*Stanley J. Sandford) Gino Corrado – Aramis Never miss a video. Join the channel so that Mr. P can notify you when new videos are uploaded: https://www.youtube.com/@nrpsmovieclassics

[mirandamckenni1]

Cringey Christian Clickbait: "Autism Cured by God" Today we're looking at one of the worst channels I've ever come across, a super cringe Christian channel which ticks every 'controversial' clickbait topic, from transphobia to 'curing' autism with God. Join this channel to get stompid emmotes (see what I did there) https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBP1symGPqYIqi86gaXiX-Q/join Captions by David Glennon: flcaptioning@gmail.com Like and subscribe if you enjoyed! Website: https://ift.tt/xo9XirZ Emma Thorne Extra: https://www.youtube.com/@EmmaThorneBackstage Gaming Channel: https://www.youtube.com/LittleDuckGaming Twitch: https://ift.tt/GiZS7UK Instagram: @emmainashes Twitter: @EmmaTheGoblin Patreon: https://ift.tt/Qq6yh5R Merch: https://emma-thorne.com Ko-Fi: https://ift.tt/X8O4iKk PO BOX: Emma Thorne PO Box 78387 LONDON E4 0HY Timecodes: 00:00 Start 01:37 On "Cringe" 05:02 Kaden Pody's Channel 08:40 "Autism set free" Video 18:30 MrBeast Video Huge thank you to my Colossal Quackers and Giant Chickens on Patreon! Alex Aspen Bill Garrett Chad Stewart Chaotic Quakka Childfree Matto Chocolate Jesus Douglas Steingraber 2 Fat Houdini HiMyNameIsSpoon Jaderian Jason Haase Jeremy Buck John newman Kori Gailliot Lord Nibbles Dankworth IX Marissa Arciero Mike Nick Muggio Philip Doherty Robi Groves Samandme59 Sean Hamill supremepotato 471 Vermont1777 A very confused looking badger Aaron Reece Aaron Speer Abigail Hess Alexander C Fairbanks Alltag Amber Ambo aka Fearless Ambassador Andrew Andy is ducking around April Washburn Asinga Skeladale Azku Baked Bads Ben Eiynk Bert Whitehead Bike Murns Brandon Brian B Brian McKemey Broos Nemanic Buddmeister2.0 C Cackles Catherine the Great Ceilidh Chantale Charlie edwins ChickFilADeathFries(John) Chris Davies Chris Simpson cmd Connie Wright Connla "Chicken Maximus" Lyons Cory Garner Danny Danny Van Hecke Darren McHaffie Darth_Rondoudou DasMonitor Dave Kircher Dave Smith David Daylin denny5252 Dr. Mint Dreffed Dylan Sweetland Eamonn Sheridan Ephemeral Entropy Buffer FalcorTheGinger Farron Sutton Faye The Succubus Flash -prez- Bluewolf Flirty Imp Franciszek Stefanek Fulcrum GamingRidge gay of reckoning Geeeee (NOT FOR VIDEOS) George Bush gm gm GrayV Greymond Henry Curtis I climbed the rope ladder to face dictator of the world JadedJabberwocky James Crick James Eastwood Jan Bojarp Jason Metcalf Jason Runcie jedidragonwarriorqueen jghfghjhgy Jilly Gee Jim Lathrop Jo Ro John Fry Justin Rogers Kent Woodward Kevin Levites Kiwi Satan Kristjan Wager LadyKeira Laker Sparks Laughing Sisyphus Lizzy Gayle Lucie Lamprell Lulidine Lynn Dobbs Lynn Shackelford Manny Roman Mark Threlfall Matthew Goderre Matthew Green Mattus McChicken Nuggetus MilesTeg (aka Jim Bennett) Militant Agnostic miss_bunburyist Mogarringa Mordlex 200 Mr Cya Mr Smeeth Mr. Creosote Nerd Fiction Niamh Coghlan Nick Ellis NINJARED Nixie Noisy Blue NotMyselfThisTime Novaria Lebedev Nullunit ohsosmooth Paul McGinty paul mueller PaulM Payne309 Peter Kyrouac pewmewnoire pewmewnoire PlatypusBear Plux Quique León RacingPig razbitom Red Ochsenbein Repti-Verse Richard Jackson RileyTheTortoise Rosyna Keller RPGMP3 Rudy Bee samsbro1952 . samsbro1952 . Sarah Chavis Sean Siliconself Silly Kristy Silly Kristy SIRIUSLY SuperSquidHunk taisau Tank Lowe Tax Man That person The Shropshire Lad ThmsR Thomas V Lohmeier Tracey O'Raw Valyrie Ville Paanasalo VinceWasSu Wasatch Witch WeirdyBeardy Will Crouch William Witt Willow the Wendigo Zuhl via YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z9GOeAgdGoI

[imoim36news]

Brad Pitt nhập vai Jack Conrad Tạo ra hình Brad Pitt vào phim Vào BABYLON, Jack Conrad là 1 ngôi sao sáng phim câm phổ biến, anh ta lý tưởng cùng với khét tiếng và gia tài, mến thực hiện TT của những buổi tiệc hoang phí. Song cùng theo với việc phân mục phim câm thoái trào sinh sống Hollywood, sự nghiệp của Jack theo này cũng trở xuống. Lần đi đầu khán fake chạm mặt Jack Conrad là Khi anh đó thuộc người vợ chuẩn bị ly hôn của chính mình Ina (Olivia Wilde) trên buổi tiệc của Wallach. Jack gợi cho những người coi lưu giữ cho tới John Gilbert, Douglas Fairbanks và Rudolph Valentino – những ngôi sao sáng năng lượng điện hình họa phổ biến của kỷ nguyên phim câm. Brad Pitt là 1 trong mỗi khuôn mặt hạng A của Hollywood với việc nghiệp trải nhiều năm nhiều thập kỷ. A ma tơ ko tuổi được biết tới qua cụm kiệt tác World War Z, Ocean’s Eleven, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Fight Club, Ad Astra, Moneyball, Mr. and Mrs. Smith, cụm phim của Quentin Tarantino như Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Inglourious Basterds. Quy định mời Brad Pitt thủ vai Jack Conrad – một ngôi sao sáng phim câm đang được sinh sống đỉnh điểm sự nghiệp – sẽ cho tới một cơ hội vô thuộc đương nhiên. “Brad là một trong số ít những diễn viên hiện đại khiến chúng ta nhớ về những ngôi sao điện ảnh trong quá khứ.” Chazelle phản hồi. “Sở hữu một... website tin : afamily.vn #Siêu #phẩm #nhận #đề #cử #Oscar #quy #tụ #dàn #tài #tử #đình #đám #Hollywood

[picturessnatcher]

Mr. Fix-It (Allan Dwan, 1918)

[artofemmanation]

Some things that made 2021 a little more bearable....

Just a collection of movies/books/tv shows that I was into in 2021.  

- “Off With Their Heads: A Serio-Comic Tale of Hollywood”, Frances Marion, 1972.  

- “Black Sails”.  Late to the party, but I see now why this show enjoys a vigorous afterlife on Tumblr.

- “Emily in Paris”.  Pure sugar, and not memorable, but enjoyable nonetheless.

- “It’s a Sin”, which also meant that I had to rediscover my love of the Pet Shop Boys

- “The Ghost & Mrs. Muir”, 1947.  I loved it so much I also read the book!  The sitcom from the late 60′s was cute and didn’t shy away from the romance, but that’s about it (you can find it on YouTube, if you’re curious).

- “Laura”, 1944.  Again, I loved it so much I also read the book!  Dana Andrews became my new favourite leading man.

- “Gilda”, 1946.  I had NO IDEA that this movie was kinky.

- “Blood and Sand”, 1941.  Will never like Tyrone Power, but Rita Hayworth and Anthony Quinn have a smokin’ hot dance number.  I never finished watching the 1922 version with Rudolph Valentino, but I should.�� Did you know that there’s also a cocktail named “Blood and Sand”?

- “The King and I”, 1956.  Honestly, it’s all about the “Shall We Dance?” number.  “Anna and the King” from 1999, on the other hand, was a total snooze.

- “Loki” because SYLKI!!!

- “Our Modern Maidens”, 1929.  Douglas Faibanks Jr. became my new NEW favourite leading man.

- “The Thief of Baghdad”, 1922, just because I had to see how Fairbanks Senior compared. 

- “Let Us Be Gay”, 1930.  I will watch anything with Queen Norma Shearer, and this led me to the plays of Rachel Crothers.

- “Citizen Hearst”, “The Cat’s Meow” and “The Times We Had: My Life with W.R. Hearst” by Marion Davies.  Never could understand their relationship...

- “Britannia” Season 3.  There had better be a heartfelt reunion in Season 4 or Jez Butterworth will be hearing from me!

- “Downton Abbey” rewatch.  Tom Branson is love, and that’s all there is to it.

[ladychlo]

"All our dreams have melted down, we are hiding in the bushes from dead men doing Douglas Fairbanks' stunts. All our stories burnt, our films lost in the rushes, we can't paint any pictures as the moon had all our brushes. Extracting wasps from stings in flight. Who killed loved Mr. Moonlight?"

[siena-sevenwits]

Thank you for the tag, @hollers-and-holmes! Sharing my ten favourite male fictional characters is no easy task - not at all, as you could ask me tomorrow and get a different batch of characters entirely! But here's the best some cursory thought can produce. I eliminated fictionalized versions of verifiably historical characters, as well as characters from media other than books (with one exception, just to chop down my options.

In no order:

Sydney Carton (A Tale of Two Cities by Dickens) - Sincere, supremely witty, human, daring, grapples with despair and terrible choices, leading to one of the most incredible redemption arc ever written. He's given me a lot of hope in my rock bottom moments. If I were a man, he'd be my dream role to play on stage.

Schmendrick the Magician (The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle) - I only read the book for the first time last year, but it's one of those books that immediately told my heart, "I am one of your kin; I am one of your clan." And Schmendrick - what a character. I mean - he's a sixty-year-old in the body of a twenty-year-old who wants nothing more than to break his curse so he can go on to be who he actually is. Merry and melancholy at once. Supremely hopeful and wise, yet so full of shame. Sweet and funny and lyrical, and with SO many quotable moments. I love his interactions both with Molly and the Unicorn.

Mr. Carpenter (The Emily of New Moon trilogy by Lucy Maud Montgomery) The acerbic yet somehow highly empathetic schoolmaster who zeroes in incredibly on the potential of each of his students and gives them the encouragement and tough love they need to actualize it. It's easy to forget what a revolutionary seeming pedagogical method he had in 1910's PEI - spending more time outside the schoolhouse than in, getting the kids to re-enact the battles and beheadings and adventures, making them invent imagination games to solidify their knowledge of poetry and history and myth - and yet also drilling them hard traditionally in things like math. He is tremendously funny and crotchety and sharp in every sense of the word. As a teacher myself, I didn't evolve into quite the same kind of educator, but I think some of his principles did rub off on me, at least in terms of intention.

Tommy Beresford (from the "Tommy and Tuppence" books by Agatha Christie) It feels slightly odd to talk of Tommy without talking of Tuppence, but here we are. Not only is he plucky, humourous, undyingly faithful, and - gosh, enthusiastic! - he's an awesome character to watch in terms of seeing the progression of his marriage, as one of the only characters Agatha Christie let age along with her youth to golden years. James Warwick's portrayal of him in the eighties series only increased my love for him.

Ebenezer Scrooge (from "A Christmas Carol" by Dickens) What can I say? Every Christmas Scrooge helps me aim for true humility and to turn over new leaves. We're all Scrooge.

Robin Hood (from the Robin Hood legendarium) Every single incarnation of him. From authentic ballads of high Middle Ages. From stories and retellings of those stories and retellings of THOSE stories. Howard Pyle and Roger Lancelyn Greene and Jane Yolen and Douglas Fairbanks and Errol Flynn and Richard Greene. "He called the finest archers to a tavern on the green/ They vowed to help the people of the king / They settled all the trouble on the English country scene, / and still found plenty of time to sing!"

Evan MacIan & James Turnbull (from The Ball and the Cross by G. K. Chesterton) I have such a soft spot for these duelists, the one fighting for the honour of Mary and by extension literally everything he believes in, both religious and philosophical, the other fighting for the sake of being *able* to fight an idea out. Their dialogues are hilarious and brain-stretching/world-view-stretching. They are passionate and really two sides of the same coin. And oh, their shenanigans. Gold star for the time they've been imprisoned separately for months, and finally manage to knock something off the wall and find it leaves a tiny finger-sized hole in the concrete, and MacIan's first thought is literally whether they can find a way to duel each other through the hole.

Bilbo Baggins (the works of JRR Tolkien) I read this book eleven times before I was eleven. Frodo and Sam's story speaks to me more - but, what can I say? When I weighed things, it was Bilbo who had to go on this list.

Nick Bottom & Peter Quince (from "A Midsummer Night's Dream" by Shakespeare) They made me love Shakespeare when I was six. So hilarious, and relatable and just incredibly well-written.

Nicholas Nickleby (from the eponymous book by Dickens) - OK, this one is a funny choice, because Nicholas admittedly is your typical Dickens young-handsome-protagonist - that is to say, he is the only type of Dickens character who rather than bursting with personality is essentially a blank slate. But I think I love him more for all he represents to me than what I must admit he is. He is the stick that beats Squeers. He is the compassionate hopeful who keeps looking no matter how much his plans fall through. He is the character I was in love with at fourteen when I locked myself in my room and wouldn't come out no matter who bade me because it was my first Dickens book I'd truly read on my own and the work as a whole was so superb. He's the main character of one of the books that helped me remember who I was and what I loved during a bad point in my life, that got me back into theatre and great books and joy and hope. He's the lynchpin of the book that helped me lead some of my dear students to a love of Dickens. He's Nicholas Nickleby.

Count Almaviva ("Il Barbiere di Siviglia" by Rossini) I am tired and want to finish this list. So just - go watch "The Barber of Seville", preferably the one with Cecilia Bartoli and Gino Quilico, and have a blast. David Keubler's Count Almaviva is tremendous fun.

Anyone who wants to, jump in!

[introvertguide]

Influential Directors of the Silent Film Era

Upon hearing that I am a fan of silent era film, people will ask if I have a favorite actor or movie from the time period. However, when I am asked about my favorites from other fans of silent film, it tends to involve my favorite director. This is because silent film actors had to over gesticulate and performed in an unrealistic way and could not use their tone or words to convey emotion. The directors also did not have a way to review as they shot and would have to use editing skills and strategic cover shots to make sure that everything was done properly and come out the way they imagined it. It was up to the director to be creative and they were forced to be innovative and create ways to convey their vision. Luckily for many average or poor directors of the time, audiences were easily impressed. However, today's more demanding and sophisticated audiences can look back at some of the genius behind the films of silent era Hollywood.

Alice Guy-Blache: Matrimony's Speed Limit (1913) and The Fairy of the Cabbages (1896)

Art director of the film studio The Solax Company, the largest pre-Hollywood movie studio, and camera operator for the France based Gaumont Studio headed up by Louis Lemiere, this woman was a director before any kind of gender expectations were even established. She was a pioneer of the use of audio recordings in conjunction with images and the first filmmaker to systematically develop narrative filming. Guy-Blanche didn't just record an image but used editing and juxtaposition to reveal a story behind the moving pictures. In 1914, when Hollywood studios hired almost exclusively upper class white men as directors, she famously said that there was nothing involved in the staging of a movie that a woman could not do just as easily as a man.

Charlie Chaplin: The Kid (1921), The Gold Rush (1923), City Lights (1931), Modern Times (1936), and The Great Dictator (1940)

It is unfortunate that many people today think of Chaplin as silly or for screwball comedy when, in fact, he was a great satirist of the time. He created his comedy through the eyes of the lower economic class that suffered indignities over which they had no control. He traversed the world as his "Tramp" character who found his fortune by being amiable and lucky. The idea that a good attitude and a turn of luck could result in happiness was all that many Americans had during the World Wars and the Great Depression. He played the part of the sad clown and he was eventually kicked out of the country for poking fun at American society. Today he is beloved for his work, but he was more infamous than famous during a large part of his life.

Buster Keaton: Sherlock Jr. (1924), The General (1926), and The Cameraman (1928).

That man that performed the most dangerous of stunts with a deadpan expression, Buster Keaton was a great actor, athlete, stuntman, writer, producer, and director. It is amazing that you could get so much emotion out of a silent actor who does not emote, but Keaton managed to do it. He was also never afraid to go big, often putting his own well being at risk to capture a good shot. Not as well known for his cinematography or editing as many of the other directors of the time, he instead captured performances that were amazing no matter how they were filmed. Famous stunts include the side of a house falling down around him, standing on the front of a moving train, sitting on the side rail of a moving train, and grabbing on to a speeding car with one hand to hitch a ride. If you like films by Jackie Chan, know that he models his films after the work of Buster Keaton: high action and high comedy.

Cecil B. Demille: The Cheat (1915), Male and Female (1919), and The Ten Commandments (1923)

Known as the father of the Hollywood motion picture industry, Demille was the first director to make a real box office hit. He is likely best known for making The Ten Commandments in 1923 and then remaking it again in 1956. If not that, he was also known for his scandalous dramas that depicted women in the nude. This was pre-Code silent film so the rules about what could be shown had not been established. Demille made 30 large production successful films in the silent era and was the most famous director of the time which gave him a lot of freedom. His trademarks were Roman orgies, battles with large wild animals, and large bath scenes. His films are not what most modern film watchers think of when they are considering silent films. That famous quote from the movie Sunset Boulevard in 1950 in which the fading silent actress says "All right, Mr. Demille. I'm ready for my close-up," is referring to this director.

D.W. Griffith: Birth of a Nation (1915) and Intolerance (1916)

Griffith started making films in 1908 and put out just about everything that he recorded. He made 482 films between 1908 and 1914, although most of these were shorts. His most famous film today is absolutely Birth of a Nation and it is one of the most outlandishly racist films of the time. The depiction of black Americans as evil and the Klu Klux Klan as heroes who are protecting the nation didn't even really go over well at that time. Some believe that his follow up the next year called Intolerance was an apology, but the film actually addresses religious and class intolerance and avoids the topic of racism. At the time, Griffith films were known for the massive sets and casts of thousands of extras, but today he is known for his racist social commentary.

Sergei Eisenstein: Battleship Potemkin (1925)

This eccentric Russian director was a pioneer of film theory and the use of montage to show the passage of time. His reputation at the time would probably be similar to Tim Burton or maybe David Lynch. He had a very specific strange style that made his films different from any others. The film Battleship Potemkin is considered to be one of the best movies of all time as rated by Sight and Sound, and generally considered as a great experimental film that found fame in Hollywood as well as Russia.

F.W. Murnau: Nosferatu (1922), Faust (1926), and Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927)

I think that most people would know the bald-headed long-nailed vampire Nosferatu that was a silent era phenomena. It was so iconic that the German film studio that produced the movie was sued by the estate of Bram Stoker and had to close. Faust was his last big budget German film and has an iconic shot of the demon Mephisto raining plague down on a town that was the inspiration for the Demon Mountain in Fantasia (1940). Also, Sunrise is considered one of the best movies of all time by the AFI and by Sight and Sound as well as my favorite silent film. Fun facts: 1) more of Murnau's films have been lost then are still watchable and 2) he died in a car wreck at only 40 when he hired a car to drive up the California coast and the driver was only 14.

Erich von Stroheim: Greed (1924)

Maker of very strange German Expressionist films, Stroheim films are often listed as Horror or Mystery even though he considered himself a dramatic film maker. His most famous movie Greed was supposed to be amazing with an 8 hour run time but it was cut drastically to the point that it makes no sense and was both critically and publicly panned when an extremely abridged version was released in the U.S. Over half the film was lost and a complete version no longer exists. Besides this film, Stroheim was even better known for being the butler in the film Sunset Boulevard as a former director who retired to be with an aging silent film star. He also made a movie called Between Two Women (1937) that told the story of a female burn victim that was inspired by the story of his wife being burned in an explosion in a shop on the actual Sunset Boulevard.

Victor Fleming: The Wizard of Oz (1939) and Gone With the Wind (1939)

Although not known for his silent films, Fleming did get his start during the silent era. He was a cinematographer for D.W. Griffith and then Fleming directed his first film in 1919. Most of his silent films were swashbuckling action movies with Douglas Fairbanks or formulaic westerns. He is the only director to have two films on the AFI top 10 and they happened to have come out the same year.

Hal Roach: Lonesome Luke films starring Harold Lloyd, Our Gang shorts, Laurel and Hardy shorts, and Of Mice and Men (1939)

It is not really fair to put Hal Roach in the silent era directors because he was influential at the time but he had a 75 year career. He was a producer and film studio head and even had a studio named after himself. His biggest contribution to the silent era was his production of Harold Lloyd short comedies and he continued to produce films in the early talkies including Laurel and Hardy shorts, Our Gang shorts, and Wil Rogers films. Roach was the inspiration for the film Sullivan's Travels, in which a famous director who only did frivolous comedies goes out into the world to find inspiration to find a serious drama. Roach did direct a single serious drama, Of Mice and Men, but it came out in 1939 and was buried underneath the works of Victor Fleming. The wealthy cigar smoking studio head that many people think of when they picture a film studio suit is based on this guy. The man would not quit and stayed in the business into his 90s and lived to the ripe old age of 100.

[chaplinfortheages]

Before Mary Pickford there was Anna Beth Sully, the first Mrs.Douglas Fairbanks (mother of his only child Douglas Fairbanks Jr.), to the left seated next to Charlie Chaplin, across the table is Douglas Fairbanks. 

Dinner party given by Jeanie MacPherson 1918 - guest of honor Douglas Fairbanks, for the success of his film “A Modern Musketeer”.

Also seated  Mrs. Allan Dwan, John Brownie, Mrs O’Neill (mother of Jeanie MacPherson) Jeanie MacPherson, Ottaway Treen, Allan Dwan, Mrs. Renwick Knox.