Silent movies often get pigeonholed as either zany slapstick with exaggerated acting or serious, dark, depressing art films. In reality, the silent period covers vast amounts of genres, topics, sensibilities, and filmmaking styles and came from countries all around the world. From the invention of projected cinema in the 1890s to the final films shot without synchronized dialogue in the early 1930s, filmmakers found inventive ways to use a nascent art form without ever needing any synchronized dialogue.
On The Everyday Cinephile, I’ve sought to cull together a wide variety of information from throughout the silent period to highlight the artistic power and beauty of numerous filmmakers. My hope is that this collection of information related to silent movies will break down many common misconceptions in an engaging, informative fashion so that the newest newcomers and the most experienced silent movies fanatic alike will dive into something new and spectacular from the era.
Browsing through my selection of silent movies-related posts and articles, you will find everything from rankings of Harold Lloyd films to introduction guides to silent cinema to deep dives into a single silent film. Make sure to use the search bar located on the top right of the site or on the left side widget to search for silent film terms, filmmakers, and performers you’d like to learn more about. Feel free to reach out to me to suggest topics you’d like to see covered or any specific films or filmmakers you’d like to learn more about.
This post is the third historical overview in my series Celebrating 125 Years of Utah and the Movies. Visit the series page for other historical overviews and reviews of films shot in Utah or made by Utahns.
While Utah failed to compete as an …
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To deepen my knowledge of the silent era on the European continent, I created the European Silent Cinema Project. I review two European silent films each year starting in 1895 and ending in 1930. Visit the project’s main page for a comprehensive list of …
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Outside of a few big names like George Melies or D.W. Griffith, whenever silent movies are mentioned there is a good chance that people are talking about the 1920s. From Dr. Caligari to Safety Last and Phantom of the Opera to The Passion of Joan …
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During the peak of her popularity, Clara Bow was Hollywood’s biggest box office star and a worldwide 1920s cultural phenomenon. Only working in pictures for a decade before an early retirement and retreat from public life in her late 20s, Clara won over the hearts …
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Over the past twenty years, there has been a heightened interest in the hundreds of women who worked in the silent era and helped build the film industry into the global entertainment force it is today. Karen Ward Mahar’s Women Filmmakers in Early Hollywood tells …
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Ohio-born author Zane Grey, originally a dentist and minor league baseball player before trying his hand at writing, was instrumental in solidifying the major themes, characters, and tropes of the American Western genre. Writing dozens of novels and short stories from the first decade of …
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