Tweet Who are you? (Formal introductions)

Not just for you, Emilie.

Bob

This place is amazing.

Hi! My name's O. Sharp. I got introduced to old silents in the '70s when PBS began screening films from the Paul Killiam collection, and fell completely in love with them. There's also a deep fondness for early '30s Max and Dave Fleischer cartoons, Carl Laemmle horror movies and Bogart.

Not that it matters, but I'm also quite the J.R.R. Tolkien fan, and managed to release the original 1944 version of the movie "The Lord Of The Rings" just before Peter Jackson could release his. :)

It's here, if interested: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUf8reRSImk" target="_blank

Hello Everyone,

Great to have found this site! My name is Rosemary and I live in New York. I am a great fan of silents, I first discovered them in 1979 when there was a "Silent Clowns" festival for several weeks at the 8th Street Playhouse in Greenwich Village. I remember looking at Buster Keaton's face in Seven Chances and falling in love. Lee Erwin was the organist. I saw all the Keaton features that were in that series and later on the Cameraman and I think I have seen all his shorts, latest being the Love Nest.

Afterward I would watch many silents - some of my favorites the well known ones like Sunrise, The Wind, and so on - but currently I work in the evenings so my opportunities are limited though I have rejoined MOMA in hopes of more silents coming my way. I am grateful to those who have mentioned Classic Flix, who have just sent my first DVD to me ("Souls for Sale") and I hope to have more to discuss soon.

Nice to meet you all!

This place is amazing.

Hi! My name's O. Sharp. I got introduced to old silents in the '70s when PBS began screening films from the Paul Killiam collection, and fell completely in love with them. There's also a deep fondness for early '30s Max and Dave Fleischer cartoons, Carl Laemmle horror movies and Bogart.

Not that it matters, but I'm also quite the J.R.R. Tolkien fan, and managed to release the original 1944 version of the movie "The Lord Of The Rings" just before Peter Jackson could release his.

It's here, if interested: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUf8reRSImk" target="_blank" target="_blank

I much prefer your LOTR to the humdrum Peter Jackson version. The casting was a work of genius.

I'm Rick and I'm from The Netherlands, which is one of the reasons I came to the 'Classic Movies' game at a rather late stage in my life - there is no real movie culture in The Netherlands.

Since a couple of years I'm in the process of catching up. Not only by watching many, many classic movies, but also by reading about, and 'studying' film history and theory. This last development came about after I had watched my first couple of Jean-Luc Godard movies. His approach and method really opened my eyes and truly made me see movies are more than simply 24 images per second.

Although American Classics are still my main focus, German Expressionism, French Impressionism, Russian Montage, Italian Neo-Realism, Nouvelle Vague etc. all have my warm attention.

I found this site via the TCM forums where I have become active in the Silents board. I'm currently in a sort of 'silent' frenzy, trying to watch as many silents as I can, especially those mentioned in David Bordwell's "Film History - an Introduction".

This site could be dangerous, adding more fuel to the frenzy, but I'll take my chances

At the end of the day nothing beats an MGM/RKO Tarzan classic.

[Mike Gebert]

Not that it matters, but I'm also quite the J.R.R. Tolkien fan, and managed to release the original 1944 version of the movie "The Lord Of The Rings" just before Peter Jackson could release his.

It's here, if interested: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUf8reRSImk" target="_blank

Cool! I saw this a few years back and it cracked me up no end, really well done. Many of the choices-- Welles as Harry Lime as Saruman-- were quite inspired...

Not that it matters, but I'm also quite the J.R.R. Tolkien fan, and managed to release the original 1944 version of the movie "The Lord Of The Rings" just before Peter Jackson could release his.

It's here, if interested: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUf8reRSImk" target="_blank" target="_blank" target="_blank

Cool! I saw this a few years back and it cracked me up no end, really well done. Many of the choices-- Welles as Harry Lime as Saruman-- were quite inspired...

My favourite was Lorre as Gollum.

Even though I've been posting here for a few months, I thought that I would finally get around to introducing myself. My name is Art, and I'm a 25 year old biochemistry graduate student. I've been into older movies and silents for a good deal of my life. My parents got me into watching older movies when I was very young. In particular, my oldest recollection of watching a silent was Harold Lloyd's Speedy. I was probably only 7 or 8, and I was sick and had to stay home from school. My dad saw that this movie was being shown on Cinemax (of all channels!) and recorded it for me to watch. Well, that movie hooked me. A year or two later, AMC (back when they were still decent) had a film preservation festival and had day long marathons devoted to Buster Keaton and Laurel & Hardy. I filled up a few VHS tapes from those marathons and almost wore them out from watching them so much. A few years later, my local cable provider started carrying TCM, and that was when I started seeing a lot of the great silents (Fairbanks, Pickford, Chaplin, Griffith, etc.). So, that's my story of how I became a fan of the likes of Keaton, Lloyd, Chaplin, Fairbanks, and just silents and old movies in general.
As for my screen name, I thought "Little Caesar" was appropriate since I'm a fan of Edward G. Robinson and happen to a quarter Italian (even though Robinson wasn't Italian at all )

[Danny Burk]

Thanks for posting, Art - glad to have you with us.

A lot of us seem to have found our interest between ages 7 to 11, or thereabout. I've loved silents since first seeing THE GOLD RUSH on PBS when I was 7, and started collecting 8mm (mostly Blackhawk shorts) when I was 11, which has since progressed through most known formats of film and video!

My name is Eileen and I live in Virginia. I recently stumbled across this site while looking for some way to evaluate two reels of films from the 1930's that belonged to my family. My grandfather used to run these for my father and my aunt when they were small children in the mid-to late 1930's. One is a reel of cartoons, probably several different cartoons spliced together. The second reel (in a metal container) is marked "Tom Mix - Riders of the North" but when you look at the film itself it is titled "Reckless Riders." Can anyone suggest a curator/expert in the Virginia area who could look at these films for me and evaluate their condition/worth as I would like to find a home for them. Thanks.

[silentfilm]

In what part of Virginia do you live? The Library of Congress film archive is in Culpeper.

Claire, welcome. I don't know how far you are from Opotiki, but New Zealand has their own silent film festival: http://www.silentfilmfest.org.nz/Festival_Films.htm" target="_blank

Opotiki is in the North Island & I live in the South Island of New Zealand. So couldn't go to that film festival.

And I don't think my little town of about 1000 people would hold one. Perhaps I could hold a mini, personal one in my own home?! Hmmmmmm, may not be too bad of an idea.....................................

Hey Y'all,

I currently work at a restaurant, in NYC, doing reservations and I spend the rest of my time performing improvisation and writing and performing sketch comedy.

I became interested in film after years of watching GONE WITH THE WIND. Melanie was my favorite character and so I started reading more about Olivia de Havilland and watching as many of her films as I could. From there I branched out to Errol Flynn, Bette Davis, Michael Curtiz and the rest of Warner Brothers. I am slowly learning as much as I can about the studio era.

I became interested in silent films after watching the reconstructed METROPOLIS. I started reading as much as I could about silent film and discovered that many silent film stars were born in Kansas (my birthplace, I love when actors are from Kansas). I'm slowly expanding my knowledge and viewing of silent films as well.

I have recently thought about going back to school and getting involved with film preservation and restoration but I don't know too much about any of that yet. I've recently ordered some books on the subject to see if this is something I could do.

I'm very happy to have found this forum. It appears to be full of intelligent people eager to share their passion and knowledge of film. I look forward to learning a lot for everyone.

Since you're in NYC, if you're interested in seeing silent comedies, check out (shameless plug) The Silent Clowns Film Series, which screens these on a monthly basis year-round at the auditorium at the Library for the Performing Arts (a/k/a the Lincoln Center library).

Ben

Hi, everyone.

My name is Lincoln Spector. I write about technology for a living because I haven't been able to convince anyone to pay me to write about film. But I do that anyway, in my blog bayflicks.net.

I do get to write about home theater, which I cover sometimes for PC World. In fact, if you Google classic blu-ray, one of the top articles will be one of mine: 10 Blu-ray Titles That Show Off Classic Movie Formats (http://www.pcworld.com/article/182386/1 ... rmats.html).

My movie tastes are pretty wide-ranging. Kurosawa is my all-time favorite filmmaker, but I also love Keaton, Ford, Hitchcock, Bergman, Scorsese, Chaplin, Vidor (at least his silents), and many others. I enjoy both escapist movies and serious films, if they're well-made, and hate them if they're not.

Best way to see a movie: In a theater, sitting close to the screen, with an enthusiastic audience. Worst way? On a plane (something I've never done all the way through).

Lincoln

Greetings to All...

I've been checking in on these message boards for quite a while and officially registered mainly in order to be able to ask questions and hopefully draw upon the collective knowledge of you good folks here at NitrateVille. (Although I also hope to occasionally contribute to the discussions...at least to the best of my limited ability.)

Been a fan of classic 30s-40s films since I was a kid. Interest in silents was fired by my father's appreciation of Chaplin and Lloyd and his fascination with Gance's "Napoleon" - an interest sealed long ago by Brownlow's "Hollywood" TV series. More recently, I've been obsessed with films from later decades - especially those of Hammer, AIP, and their contemporaries - but the classic films are still the foundation of my love for the movies.

My current main subject of study - about which which I will probably have the most questions - concerns the nuts-and-bolts of the history of the movie business: money and distribution - from financing to production...distribution to exhibition...and all of the stages before, after, and in-between. It's a subject that fascinates me, and I hope to learn a great deal from anyone generous enough to weigh in on the subject.

Thanks in advance, and looking forward to talking with everyone here!


Bob Meyer

Greetings all--

I'm Marc...the "chorusgirl" monicker leads people to think I'm a girl, but nope--I just always love the chorus girl characters in 30s and 40s movies ("and to think he's running around with some horrible chorus girl!"). Always one or two of them waiting in the wings to give some smart-aleck comment, whether is a noir, comedy, drama, or a musical. Do they still call them chorus girls today?

I grew up watching the Late Show on channel 13 in Baltimore (mostly RKO...that's where I discovered Astaire & Rogers)...and "Ghost Host" every saturday night on channel 45 (Universal and Hammer horror). By age 14 I was sitting in screening rooms at the main library watching classic movies, and by age 21 I had about 300 VHS tapes and over 100 laserdiscs. I found a one-sheet of "Imitation of Life" in a little junk store in Bedford, PA for $20 (rolled, never folded!) and the gorgeous poster for "Wonder Bar" from an auction for $750 (my prized possession).

I've had the good fortune to meet two old movie stars and personally talk with them at length...Gloria Stuart (graciously signed my "Golddiggers of 1935" sheet music, and chatted about Berkeley with me), and Kim Hunter (chatted about The Seventh Victim). Both were delightful.

I love pre-Code above all else...and have turned many friends on to this genre (is it a genre?). They are as modern and relevant as most anything produced today. The themes never seem to age.

I'm married to an employee of Turner Classic Movies...but sadly this connection has not yielded me a personal copy of "Letty Lynton," or cart blanche access to some archive. But I'm working on it.

Love Nitrateville because it rarely descends into the petty, mean-spirited threads you find on so many film sites. And I don't ever have to explain who Alice White is.

I'm Gary and am new here. I'm a 57 YO retired Army officer living in Texas.

My wife and I are classic movie fans. I caught the bug about 15 years ago while stationed in Saudi Arabia for a year. I had a lot of spare time and spent much of it discovering classic movies thanks to the on-post library.

I started out as a fan of Hollywood and British stuff from the 30s through the 50s, but lately have gotten into German and American silents, and French films from the 20s up through the 50s.

[silentfilm]

Welcome, Gary. In whhich part of Texas do you live? We've got a growing classic film group in Dallas/Plano that gets together once a month.

Welcome, Gary. In whhich part of Texas do you live? We've got a growing classic film group in Dallas/Plano that gets together once a month.

We're about an hour and a half west of Dallas in Stephenville.

[silentfilm]

We drive through Stephenville every time we go visit my wife's family. Unfortunately, it's a little far for you to attend our movie nights, as they usually last until 11-12 p.m.

We drive through Stephenville every time we go visit my wife's family. Unfortunately, it's a little far for you to attend our movie nights, as they usually last until 11-12 p.m.

It depends on the particular night of the week, but we might be able to make the drive. Could you give me some more details?

It depends on the particular night of the week, but we might be able to make the drive. Could you give me some more details?

We have all our shows on Saturday nights. Everybody shows at 7 and we roll film at about 8pm. Usually it's over by about 11. We hold them at either my house in northwest Dallas or another members up in Plano. I live very near the intersection of I-35 & 635 (LBJ Expwy). You are more than welcome. If you send Bruce and I your email, we'll put you on the list. Our last movie night was this last Saturday. We had a Lon Chaney double feature of The Unknown and the talkie Unholy 3.

Hi everyone! As a fan of both silent and early talking pictures, this discussion group is heaven! My name is Raymond Valinoti, Jr. I live in Murray Hill, NJ and I've been a fan of old movies ever since I was a boy. I have written several articles on the subject in both MIDNIGHT MARQUEE and FILMS OF THE GOLDEN AGE. I have even had a book on Laurel and Hardy published by Bear Manor Media. It's available for purchase if anyone is interested at http://www.bearmanormedia.com/index.php ... uct_id=249
I am also a member of the New York City chapter of the Laurel and Hardy organization the Sons of the Desert. It is such a thrill to see these classic comedies there with an audience and joining in the laughter!


Keep up the great work with NitrateVille.com!

Welcome, RayVal! I'm a subscriber to Films of the Golden Age, so I'm sure I must have read some of your articles.

I've been here for a while but have never properly introduced myself. My name is Midge, I'm a retired television studio technician, and I live in San Francisco with my husband. I'm located on the higher end of the geezer spectrum, but I from reading the other introductions I can see that a few of you have me beat.

Like many other members, I discovered classic movies as a child. I was a latchkey kid in the 1950's before there was a word for it. After school and on weekends I entertained myself for hours in front of the TV, which in those days used to program a lot of old black and white movies and classic cartoons.

I remember seeing the Laurel and Hardy shorts, Our Gang comedies, The Jazz Singer, King Kong, the Shirley Temple musicals and the Mickey Rooney-Judy Garland musicals. (I was so disappointed when I found out that Mickey and Judy were not married in real life! ) Everything about those old movies -- the funny-looking cars, the elaborate women's fashions, double-breasted suits, the marcelled hairstyles, the Noo Yawk accents -- seemed exotic to a girl from the California suburbs. Our high school library had copies of A Pictorial History of the Silent Screen and A Pictorial History of the Talkies, which I pored over for hours when I should have been doing research or studying.

As a young adult I moved to New York City, which had some wonderful revival theaters in those days. I feel lucky to have seen many classic films for the first time as they were meant to be seen -- on the big screen. I also began reading everything about classic movies I could get my hands on, especially biographies of the stars. I now have a book collection of about 200 titles.

While I was in New York I worked for a small commercial film producer. One of my bosses had hired Joan Crawford for a public service announcement, and they had remained friends. One day she took him to lunch at 21. When he came back to the office, he described how she picked up up in a limo and that she was dressed in green from head to toe, including gloves and a hat. He referred to her as "JC." Our office fridge stocked only Pepsi, no Coke was allowed.

I once spoke to Miss Crawford herself. It was only long enough to take a message for my boss, but it's an experience I will never forget. I was utterly charmed by her. She had the loveliest speaking voice I have ever heard and was gracious to me, a mere secretary, who (much to my everlasting regret) didn't even have the presence of mind to address her as "Miss Crawford." I've been a Joan Crawford fan ever since.

It was difficult for me to accept Christina Crawford's portrayal of Joan in the book Mommie Dearest, and I felt even more repulsed by the film. The Joan Crawford who was so kind to me on the telephone was nothing like the screaming cartoonish harridan portrayed by Faye Dunaway.

This site seems to have attracted quite a few serious movie lovers and some movie insiders, and I have greatly enjoyed reading all of your posts.

Not that it matters, but I'm also quite the J.R.R. Tolkien fan, and managed to release the original 1944 version of the movie "The Lord Of The Rings" just before Peter Jackson could release his.

It's here, if interested: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUf8reRSImk" target="_blank" target="_blank" target="_blank" target="_blank" target="_blank

Cool! I saw this a few years back and it cracked me up no end, really well done. Many of the choices-- Welles as Harry Lime as Saruman-- were quite inspired...

My favourite was Lorre as Gollum.

HAHA! This was hilarious!

I'm Melanie, and I've been interested in silent movies for many years. I think the first one I saw was Keaton's The Cameraman when I was a kid -- to my surprise, it was funny, not stupid and boring the way I thought "old movies" were supposed to be.

I became such a fan of silents after a while that I thought about becoming a film restorer. Then I found out how much chemistry is involved, and decided to write about them instead . If interested, you can check out The Silent Treatment (http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/130716), a mystery about a young woman who finds a presumed lost silent film and witnesses on it the murder of a famous actor.

My favorite silents are usually in the German Expressionism genre ... something about the moodiness and stylized settings that appeals to my imagination. It's rare that I get to talk about movies like this with my peers (just turned 31, and work as a hairstylist), so I'm glad I found this forum!

Hello! I am Leslie Eckhardt. I post here under the name earlytalkie, under which I have posted 100 (as of this date) reviews on IMBD. I love silent and early sound films and obscure TV series which I grew up with. I became interested in "earlytalkies" when I rented VHS copies of Whoopee! and King of Jazz in 1987 from a terrific store called Metro-Golden-Memories here in Chicago. (Sadly, this store went out of business in the late 90s). I currently own 429 DVDs including several DVD-Rs purchased from private individuals from ioffer. I purchased from 4 different sellers and have never been dissapointed. True, the quality may not be quite as good as a studio release, but they are very watchable and the only way I can see some of these films. I always say I have enough on DVD, then something comes along that I cannot resist. I guess I should join DVDs Anonymus!

Hello, I am Nicholas, 27 years of age and I stumbled upon this place via the Cinesation website. I discovered classic films about two years ago and it has become my passion, my life. The films that drew me in were those of Alfred Hitchcock, then came the Marx Brothers, somewhere along the line came Charley Chase, which led me into the world of silent comedy and the rest is history haha. My favorite films are those of the 1930s, particularly the early thirties, but I can enjoy most anything and love discovering new films, actors & actresses, directors, etc. It would be a waste of time to just name all of my favorites so I will just mention a few of them: Wheeler & Woolsey, Bessie Love, W.C. Fields, Dorothy Mackaill, Alice White, Clark & McCullough, Joan Fontaine, Fay Wray, Robert Montgomery, Clara Bow, Irene Dunne, Lupe Velez and Laurel & Hardy. I explore pretty much all genres of film but would say my favorites are Pre-Code films and comedies. I am going to be attending Cinesation 2012, my first film festival of any kind and I am looking forward to it very much. I love watching films (obviously) and discussing them as well. I am very happy to find a place as wonderful as Nitrateville. I look forward to meeting everyone and discussing classic film. And I look forward to learning so much from the residents here.

Hello, NitrateVillains!

I have been lurking this site since the Nita Naldi masthead (I discovered this site thanks to Silents are Golden), and I decided to go ahead and create an account. My absolute favorite era of classic film is the silent era, but I also like classic talkies, too, especially Pre-Code. My tastes in music vary wildly, I love the Doors, Steppenwolf and Helen Kane. I am 13 years old and I've been a silent film fan since I first "discovered" Clara Bow at age 11, and my favorite "photoplayers" are Clara, Buster Keaton, and Harold Lloyd, but I'm also a fairly recent Colleen Moore, Florence La Badie and Olive Thomas convert as well.

This seems like a great site, can't wait to get started.

Greetings ,
My name's Caroline and I'm living in the swiss mountains.
I'm reading your posts for quite a while since I've often stumbled across Nitrateville while looking for informations, mostly for my blog on silent movies (in french). ... I'm pretty curious and watching any type of movies but I admit a weakness for silent ones, noir and westerns (from the 20s to the 50s mostly)
So long!