Reviews
The silent program
Twelve films from 1920 to 1928, each one in the public domain in the United States. Every review starts with the take we would post, then gives the film the longer paragraph it deserves.
-
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
The sets are painted on, the shadows are painted on, and the whole town leans like it's about to fall over. Conrad Veidt's sleepwalker is the image you'll keep. The story is thin but the look is so strong you stop caring. Horror starts here.
Worth your time
-
The Kid
Chaplin finds a baby in an alley and the movie finds its heart. Jackie Coogan is the best child actor of the silent era, easily. The window-repair scam is perfect comedy. The dream sequence is a detour, but the rescue on the rooftop will get you anyway.
Worth your time
-
Häxan
Half history lecture, half fever dream. The woodcut slideshow opening is a slog, then the devil shows up licking his lips and it turns wild. Some scenes are still shocking for 1922. Uneven, but there's nothing else quite like it.
For fans only
-
Nosferatu
Murnau shot real streets and real ships and made them feel cursed. Max Schreck barely moves and it's still the scariest vampire on film. The shadow on the stairs does more than most modern jump scares. Watch it at night, with a good score.
Must see
-
Safety Last!
You know the clock shot. You don't know how much funnier the 50 minutes before it are, or how nauseating the climb still is. Harold Lloyd plays the eager striver better than anyone. My palms were sweating at a movie from 1923.
Must see
-
Sherlock Jr.
A projectionist falls asleep and walks into the movie, and the movie keeps cutting around him. Made in 1924 and it still feels like a magic trick. 45 minutes, no filler, a motorcycle ride you won't believe. Show it to anyone who says silent films are slow.
Must see
-
Battleship Potemkin
It's propaganda and it's a film-school lecture, and it's also genuinely thrilling. The Odessa Steps sequence is six minutes that every action editor has borrowed from. The maggoty meat close-up still makes people gag. Watch it once for the cutting alone.
Must see
-
The Gold Rush
Chaplin boils his boot and carves it like a Sunday roast. Then two forks and two bread rolls become the cutest dance ever filmed. The cabin teetering on the cliff is a perfect suspense gag. Watch the 1925 cut; the romance is slight, the comedy isn't.
Must see
-
The General
A chase movie where the chase goes both ways, on real trains, with Keaton's face never moving. Every gag pays off twice. The bridge scene used a real locomotive and you can feel the weight of it. If you only watch one silent comedy, make it this one.
Must see
-
Metropolis
Fritz Lang built the future out of plaster and light and it still looks better than most CGI cities. The politics are mush and it's long. But Brigitte Helm's robot Maria is one of the great screen performances, and the flood sequence is pure spectacle.
Worth your time
-
Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans
A farmer plans to drown his wife, then spends a day in the city falling back in love with her. It sounds impossible and Murnau makes it work. The camera floats like no other film of the 1920s. Janet Gaynor will wreck you. The best silent film we know.
Must see
-
Steamboat Bill, Jr.
The first hour is a gentle father-son comedy on a riverboat. The last 20 minutes are a cyclone that rips a town apart around Keaton. Yes, the house front really fell on him. Watch the hat-trying scene too, it's a perfect bit of small comedy.
Must see