There was really no rhyme or reason to the order of books I read for my summer reading. Fortunately, I managed to save what turned out to be my favorite book of the summer for last. Shelley Stamp’s Lois Weber in Early Hollywood is an …
Continue ReadingDating back to the very origins of cinema, music has been readily used alongside the moving image. How music is (or isn’t) used in film has varied throughout the history of cinema and throughout the world, whether it be originally scored orchestral music from the …
Continue Reading
The best compliment a film projectionist can receive from their audience is none at all. In other words, the best projectionists are never noticed by the audience when they deliver a flawless screening: a smooth transition between changing reels, a correctly matted screen ratio, an …
Continue Reading
Of all the silent directors who emigrated from Europe to Hollywood, Ernest Lubitsch was arguably the most successful and popular director. After becoming world-famous for his German comedies and costume dramas such as Madame DuBarry and Anna Boleyn (both 1920), Lubitsch signed with Warner Brothers …
Continue Reading
“Imagine studying a building not by walking its hallways or perusing its blueprints, but by examining each of its bricks”, Frank posits at the beginning of Frame by Frame. Frank suggests that animated film can, and should, be studied in a similar manner, investigating …
Continue ReadingJacqueline Najuma Stewart’s Migrating to the Movies: Cinema and Black Urban Modernity is a great starting place for anyone interested in learning about African American experiences with and in silent film. In the book, Stewart examines how “the urban and northern immigration of African Americans …
Continue Reading