Spoilers below, mateys.
Finally, an early silent that held my interest! Stars Rudolf Valentino and Dorothy Dalton in a swashbuckler complete with pirates and shanghai-ed sailors. Valentino made this one after his biggie, The Sheik. (He made four that year...busy guy.) Some interesting early photos of San Francisco... the title card accompanied by a photo of the harbor entrance, known as "the golden gate", 15 years before there was a bridge across it. They also showed the turntable at the end of the SF cable-car line. Some early gender-bending here - they call the rich playboy "Lillee of the Vallee", and the captain's daughter is quite mannish, and has no interest or use for men. The title card actually says "I never could care for a man... I'm not made for men. I ought to have been born a boy." The use of different color tints was a little distracting... when Moran is fighting off the evil pirate near the end, they switch back & forth between the blue and yellow tints. Also, the director frequently uses a close-up camera circle pinpoint to point out something. Probably since the medium was so new, he wasn't sure if the audience would catch what he wanted them to see. Good, steady plot. The set up, the adventures, and we see the conflicts get resolved so they can live happily ever after.
Directed by George Melford, who had started out making shorts in the the early days of the film biz. Turner Classics is showing the 2006 restored version. I can seldom stand silents, as the plots are usually too simple for my taste, but this one was pretty good. If you appreciate the history of the film business, this one would be a good one to watch.
Finally, an early silent that held my interest! Stars Rudolf Valentino and Dorothy Dalton in a swashbuckler complete with pirates and shanghai-ed sailors. Valentino made this one after his biggie, The Sheik. (He made four that year...busy guy.) Some interesting early photos of San Francisco... the title card accompanied by a photo of the harbor entrance, known as "the golden gate", 15 years before there was a bridge across it. They also showed the turntable at the end of the SF cable-car line. Some early gender-bending here - they call the rich playboy "Lillee of the Vallee", and the captain's daughter is quite mannish, and has no interest or use for men. The title card actually says "I never could care for a man... I'm not made for men. I ought to have been born a boy." The use of different color tints was a little distracting... when Moran is fighting off the evil pirate near the end, they switch back & forth between the blue and yellow tints. Also, the director frequently uses a close-up camera circle pinpoint to point out something. Probably since the medium was so new, he wasn't sure if the audience would catch what he wanted them to see. Good, steady plot. The set up, the adventures, and we see the conflicts get resolved so they can live happily ever after.
Directed by George Melford, who had started out making shorts in the the early days of the film biz. Turner Classics is showing the 2006 restored version. I can seldom stand silents, as the plots are usually too simple for my taste, but this one was pretty good. If you appreciate the history of the film business, this one would be a good one to watch.