1929 poll 2.0

[sally]

i just watched (and liked) this, though it's 1928 on imdb, 1929 on letterboxd, not sure whether to include it on my ballot...

Just ran into the same problem when double-checking my 1975 ballot. Which should we go for? or ?

we have this debate every so often when the year attribution gets particularly erratic, maybe thoxans wants to arbitrate now it's his realm? i think we last decided that you could use whichever you preferred, but then not everyone else is going to view or vote for a particular film in that year...

[Holymanm]

Seen 2 from this year, wouldn't vote for either. Yuh-oh!

[arkheia]

Absolutely massive year, gonna have to try to explore it further

Provisional Final Ballot (20 films)
decided to bump Sunny Side Up into my list.

Lucky Star (Frank Borzage)
The Lighthouse Keepers (Jean Grémillon)
The Love Parade (Ernst Lubitsch)
Thunderbolt (Josef von Sternberg)
Arsenal (Alexander Dovzhenko)
Man with a Movie Camera (Dziga Vertov)
Applause (Rouben Mamoulian)
Big Business (James W. Horne / Leo McCarey)
Big News (Gregory La Cava)
Autumn Mists (Dmitri Kirsanoff)
Pandora’s Box (G.W. Pabst)
Un Chien Andalou (Luis Buñuel)
A dança dos paroxismos (Jorge Brum do Canto)
H2O (Ralph Steiner)
The Living Corpse (Fedor Ozep)
Regen (Joris Ivens / Manaus Franken)
In Spring (Mikhail Kaufman)
The New Babylon (Grigori Kozintsev / Leonid Trauberg)
Fue no shiratama [Undying Pearl] (Hiroshi Shimizu)
Sunny Side Up (David Butler)

[---]

top-heavy, but falls off fast


A Cottage on Dartmoor (Anthony Asquith, 1929)
Man with a Movie Camera (Dziga Vertov, 1929)
King of the Rodeo (Henry MacRae, 1929)

Applause (Rouben Mamoulian, 1929)
Fraulein Else (Paul Czinner, 1929)
The Living Corpse (Fyodor Otsep, 1929)

A Throw of Dice (Franz Osten, 1929)
Rain (Joris Ivens/Mannus Franken, 1929)
Impressions of the Old Marseille Harbor (László Moholy-Nagy, 1929)

For Your Beautiful Eyes (Henri Storck, 1929)
The Cocoanuts (Robert Florey/Joseph Santley, 1929)
The Lighthouse Keepers (Jean Grémillon, 1929)

"Un Chien Andalou" (Luis Buñuel, 1929)
Blackmail (Alfred Hitchcock, 1929)
Spite Marriage (Edward Sedgwick/Buster Keaton, 1929)

[---]

KING OF THE RODEO is an odd one. It's very niche, I guess, like who tf is Henry MacRae? The only people who've watched it according to Lboxd are PUNQ and I, which I think says it all...

Chicago is involved in the plot (honestly can't remember, they're either going to Chicago or the main character is from Chicago), which is why I saw it, in Chicago, on 35mm, with a live organ score, one Saturday morning, for like $7 or something (I miss Chicago)... but then the really odd thing is that immediately after it finished I went to a DIFFERENT cinema to watch a Hitchcock double-bill, and first up was Blackmail, ANOTHER 1929 film. I'm not sure if I've ever elsewise seen two films back-to-back in different cinemas from the same yr (except for like current yr or whatever)

[Lencho of the Apes]

Everything on my prelim list has been gone over already; I'll just cast a quick proto-vote for Pour Tes Beaux Yeux and mention an unnoticed dada revelry:

Histoire De Detective - Charles Dekeukelaire

[karl]

Just noticed that no English subtitles are available...and someone already translated that interview on kg lol. Maybe it'll be the first subtitle project I'll embark on.

If you do, I'll get my better 75% to help me translate one of the currently unsubtitled Soviet films from this year. There are plenty of 'em!

[sally]

not entirely relevant but due to my love of the lighthouse keepers and finis terrae, whilst video-calling my father a couple of months ago got cajoled into an online auction (he's obsessed) and now my house is full of tat from 1920's finistère (plus an 1835 print of a shipwreck where everyone seems to have lost their clothes) and i mostly just regret buying it all

[Evelyn Library P.I.]

All aboard for 1929 poll viewing! My first was the little Japanese animated short Taro’s Toy Train. It's charming for the chug-a-chug-a-choo-choo fan.

[Searchlike]

Provisional list:

Mount Fuji – The Movement of Clouds (Masanao Abe) check the Resources sub-forum
Un Chien Andalou (Luis Buñuel)
Liberty (Leo McCarey)
Big Business (James W. Horne & Leo McCarey)
Lucky Star (Frank Borzage)

[rischka]

Just noticed that no English subtitles are available...and someone already translated that interview on kg lol. Maybe it'll be the first subtitle project I'll embark on.

If you do, I'll get my better 75% to help me translate one of the currently unsubtitled Soviet films from this year. There are plenty of 'em!

yes everyone translate all the films please! i'll open a pot for the kingdom of rye edit: done!

currently watching blackmail (sound version)

[greennui]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Z8mSwzSQQk

[sally]

Cool! The only '29 film I haven't been able to locate yet is The Gypsy Charmer.

https://elonet.finna.fi/Record/kavi.elo ... uva_117463

[greennui]

Cool! The only '29 film I haven't been able to locate yet is The Gypsy Charmer.

https://elonet.finna.fi/Record/kavi.elo ... uva_117463

[rischka]

someone already added to the pot for kingdom of rye people are interested in yr work rasmus

blackmail was sharp. i hate to think of how hitch must have terrorized that poor woman. also the sound version has a song. this was all so creepy



i haven't seen the silent version but i will. they all sounded dubbed at the beginning but after a bit it didn't bother me too much

[sally]

couple of 29s that won't make my list

protazanov's ranks and people - 3 chekhov stories, death of a petty official the only episode i really liked, but the soviets are winning cinematography & set design in 29 so far

jean durand's la femme rêvée (someone let the poor guy make the westerns he obviously wants to) this was bad & boring, and whereas abwege got the sexy dancing bang on, this uh, i dunno, it's like they were trying to say something...but what?

[arkheia]

Decided to check out Sunny Side Up without really knowing what it was - turns out to be a fairly charming early musical talkie with Janet Gaynor and Charles Farrell. Probably not one to make my list but worth a recommendation all the same.

Wrote a little bit about it on Letterboxd here



Next up I think it's time I watch the other Gaynor/Farrell joint of '29, Borzage's last silent Lucky Star...

[rischka]

lucky star will probably still be my #1 jus sayin. i might rewatch it to make sure

why aren't any of otsep's films restored?? even pudovkin is upset about this



on to fragment of an empire in my weekend festival du montage

then i promise i'll do the cup films i've really meant to see that konchalovsky for years

[Angel]

My ballot at icmforum just a few months a go:

One (talkie) ranked
1. Dynamite

The rest (silent) unranked
Asphalt
Die weiße Hölle vom Piz Palü (The White Hell of Pitz Palu)
Die wunderbare Lüge der Nina Petrowna (The Wonderful Lies of Nina Petrovna)
Erotikon (Seduction)
Hjärtats triumf (The Triumph of the Heart)
Jenseits der Straße - Eine Tragödie des Alltags (Harbor Drift)
La femme et le pantin (The Woman and the Puppet)
La merveilleuse vie de Jeanne d'Arc (Saint Joan the Maid)
Lady of the Pavements
Laila
Les nouveaux messieurs (The New Gentlemen)
Lucky Star
Mutter Krausens Fahrt ins Glück (Mother Krause's Journey to Happiness)
Oblomok imperii (Fragment of an Empire)
Peau de pêche (Peach Skin)
The Informer
The Way of Lost Souls
Where East Is East
Wild Orchids

Deliberately excluded (IMDb/TSPDT/S&S top 500)
Chelovek s kino-apparatom
Die Büchse der Pandora
Un chien andalou

Wanted
Hearts in Dixie
Sunny Side Up
The Dance of Life
Tokai kokyogaku
Trent's Last Case

[...]

Watched almost all of Peau de pêche, looks fab, some really nice scenes too, but the kid's resemblance to a young Anthony Perkins isn't doing any favors for his mother fixation in the film.

[greennui]

Prisoner Number Seven (Lajos Lázár/Paul Sugar) - Had it's moments. Not sure if it will make my final list tho. Watched the recently restored version with 30 minutes of new footage, some of it being scandalous scenes featuring the actress/dancer "El Dura".













Kudos to Lissy Arna for being hot in three different countries during '29 (Prisoner Number Seven (Hungary), Harbour Drift (Germany), Triumph of the Heart (Sweden).

[sally]

the way of lost souls

think i actually threw up a bit in my mouth watching her highest happiness ironing his shirts (fuck you prostitute movies and all the inadequate saviour-men that droolingly make/watch them) so was massively pleased when he called her a whore at the end (wake up love) and compared to elisabeth bergner in czinner's other 29 this was bang your head on the wall acting, but as rohmer says in a little short i coincidentally watched beforehand



it really really is.

[---]

That still + "harbour drift" ?

Moi thinking moi have some good ol ROMANCE AT DA DOCKS vies out 29 for moi catch

[sally]

well that still is from rohmer's changing landscapes (1964) - the way of lost souls is too crappy quality to really get any screenshots from (restored, it would be gorgeous) and it's more of a port than a dock (what's the difference between port, dock & harbour in terms of sleazy movie romance?) but maybe that will suffice...

[---]

Shiiiit maybe I should rewatch Changing Landscapes, I don't have partic fond memories of it but that still+text is straight heat

[sally]

i loved changing landscapes! (but then i'm a sucker for that old-fashioned images illustrating text thing)

also i don't want to give the impression i was disparaging the way of lost souls, or that it's your stock tart with a heart movie - as per greennui, the ending is iconic (am firmly convinced she went to join louis le prince) need to see more czinner but they all seem to be pretty ropey available prints

[greennui]

Very iconic! Would say it's my favourite ending of 1929 but then Eternal Love has got a scorcher as well, tough pick.

[rischka]

The most interesting thing in fragment of an empire is the weird theremin score?

[arkheia]

Lucky Star was really something else, poignant and emotionally swaying like only Borzage films are.
Further notes on LB



Blue Express (Ilya Trauberg) - LB notes

Also decided to peep some Soviet-era revolutionary action, here a group of Chinese workers revolt against the English army and seize control of a train. Strong use of montage and exciting stuff overall, but would need to reflect on it a little longer to decide whether to add it to my ballot.

[arkheia]

lucky star will probably still be my #1 jus sayin. i might rewatch it to make sure

Yep, it'd probably be near the top of mine too, although I think I'll save myself the difficulty of picking favorites this time around and just not rank my ballot...