1922 Poll 2.0

[greennui]

Pick your favourite movies of 1922 (according to IMDB), up to 20 films.

20-film ballots must be ranked as follows (with point totals assigned):
Five tiers 5-4-3-2-1
Four tiers 4.5-3.5-2.5-1.5
Three tiers 5-3-1
Two tiers 4-2
One tier (aka unranked) 3

Ballot totals that aren't divisible by the number of tiers must be unranked. So 1, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19 film ballots are unranked.

[rischka]

dr mabuse the gambler
salome
the suram fortress
os faroleiros
nanook of the north
payday
cops
danse macabre
nosferatu
foolish wives
love's crucible
cinderella

[greennui]

Love’s Crucible 1922 Vem dömer Directed by Victor Sjöström
Salomé 1922 Directed by Charles Bryant, Alla Nazimova
Häxan 1922 Directed by Benjamin Christensen
Pictures from London 1922 Tavlor från London Directed by Julius Jaenzon
Sun and Shadow 1922 Sol y sombra Directed by Musidora, Jacques Lasseyne …

Nosferatu 1922 Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens Directed by F. W. Murnau
Danse macabre 1922 Directed by Dudley Murphy
’A Santanotte 1922 Directed by Elvira Notari
The Lighthouse Keepers 1922 Os Faroleiros Directed by Maurice Mariaud
Beautiful Netherlands: Zeist 1922 Mooi Nederland Zeist Directed by Willy Mullens

[Jürka]

my provisional ballot

[rischka]

LOL i wanna post that on bluesky as 'my new year's resolutions'

[Jürka]

'my new year's resolutions'

do that! one should step into the new year with a clear plan

[flip]

i really need to see more films from this year

Cops (Buster Keaton/Edward Cline)
The Toll of the Sea (Chester Franklin)
The Electric House (Buster Keaton/Edward Cline)

A Weakend Driver (Larry Semon)
The Show (Norman Taurog/Larry Semon)
Nosferatu (FW Murnau)

The Frogs Who Wanted a King (Wladyslaw Starewicz)
Grandma's Boy (Fred Newmeyer)
The Blacksmith (Buster Keaton/Malcolm St Clair)

Salome (Charles Bryant)
Day Dreams (Buster Keaton/Edward Cline)
Haxan (Benjamin Christensen)

When Knighthood Was in Flower (Robert Vignola)
Cinderella (Lotte Reiniger)
The Paleface (Buster Keaton/Edward Cline)

[Jürka]

timeless classic by Alexandre Dumbass...

[mae west]

'my new year's resolutions'

do that! one should step into the new year with a clear plan

you're delightful, Jiri!

[sally]

l’arlésienne - andré antoine
foolish wives - erich von stroheim
the lighthouse keepers - maurice mariaud
the woman from nowhere - louis delluc
the suram fortress - ivane perestiani
jocelyn - léon poirier
'a santanotte - elvira notari
cainà - gennaro righelli
la casa sotto la neve - gennaro righelli
the betrothed - mario bonnard
great expectations - aw sandberg
gypsies - karl anton
down to the sea in ships - elmer clifton
the three must-get-theres - max linder
phantom - f w murnau
nosferatu - f w murnau
dr mabuse, the gambler - fritz lang
salomé - charles bryant, alla nazimova


was really waiting for a nice restored version of vem dömer to appear but i guess that's never gonna happen

[wba]

Seen a mere 20 and didn't love most.

Murnau never did anything for me (though NOSFERATU is at least watchable, compared to PHANTOM)
È PICCERELLA by Notari sucks
the other Dreyer I've seen from '22 is middling at best
I don't remember anything anymore about the Tourneur I've watched
the one by Reiniger is nothing special
I don't recall the one by Disney
PAY DAY is one of Chaplin's weaker works, imo
MONTE CRISTO with Gilbert bored me to death
NANOOK is ok,
etc.
etc.

Even the Max Linder feature (which I've seen several times, and twice at the cinema) is nowhere close to being as great as BE MY WIFE or SEVEN YEARS BAD LUCK...


So here's my extremely short ballot with only 3 favorites:

Der var engang "Once Upon a Time" (Carl Theodor Dreyer, Denmark)
Sotapolulla (Teuvo Pakkala, Finland)
The Electric House (Edward F. Cline, USA)

[sally]

the hourglass - fritz magnussen

always enjoy seeing olaf fønss ham it up, there's tons of lovely snowy scenes, and i'd forgotten how great the danes are at eye-contact

[mae west]

the hourglass - fritz magnussen

always enjoy seeing olaf fønss ham it up, there's tons of lovely snowy scenes, and i'd forgotten how great the danes are at eye-contact

Looks great, thanks!

[mae west]

Revisited a couple of Keatons. Cops is not a favourite, but gee whiz ain't The Electric House a hoot!

[sally]

have been googling a while but can't really find any writing about the implications of internal eye-contact on filmic space, anyone suggest anything?

was thinking in terms of space because after rewatching nosferatu, i watched adrian martin and cristina álvarez lópez's essay on murnau's 'wishful space' (some of their connections between shots elude me, but it framed my subsequent viewings i guess.....

https://mubi.com/en/notebook/posts/vide ... -nosferatu

[sally]

the white desert - ernst wendt

highly tense due to constant risk of death to the men and constant risk of rape to the women (1920s did NOT sugarcoat that stuff)

along with borzage's valley of silent men, that makes a snowy trilogy today

[Jürka]

The Frogs Who Wanted a King (Wladyslaw Starewicz)

[mae west]

Watched Timeglasset. Found it a slog, and eventually stopped caring about getting AI to translate the Danish intertitles for me. Anyone know the story of director Fritz Magnussen? He died in April 1920 but there were still four feature films to come under his name, two from 1921 and this last one from 1922 ? Did they rework footage from previous films or what?

[Lencho of the Apes]

Prelinarisomely:

Dr Mabuse The Gambler
Foolish Wives
Nanook Of The North

Nosferatu
Robin Hood (Dwan)
Salome (Bryant, Nazimova)

Cops
The Dresden Doll (Fleischer)
Haxan

Alexandra (Theo Frenkel)
Gypsies (Karl Anton)
The Man From Beyond (Burton King)

[St. Gloede]

Only 16 this time:

Dr. Mabuse, der Spieler - Ein Bild der Zeit / Dr. Mabuse, the Gambler (1922, Fritz Lang)
Foolish Wives (1922, Erich von Stroheim)
Salome (1922, Charles Bryant)
The Three Must-Get-Theres (1922, Max Linder)

Der Brennende Acker / Burning Soil (1922, F.W. Murnau)
Lucrezia Borgia (1922, Richard Oswald)
Nanook of the North (1922, Robert J Flaherty)
Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens (1922, F.W. Murnau)

Häxan (1922, Benjamin Christensen)
Othello (1922, Dimitri Buchowetzki)
Die Gezeichneten / Love One Another (1922, Carl Theodor Dreyer)
Der var engang / Once Upon a Time (1922, Carl Theodor Dreyer)

Oliver Twist (1922, Frank Lloyd)
The Toll of the Sea (1922, Chester M. Franklin)
Monte Cristo (1922, Emmett J. Flynn)
The Electric House (1922, Edward F. Cline, Buster Keaton)

[karl]

Probably final.

Although, come to think of it, Nosferatu remains one of the few "standards" I've never seen.



Love's Crucible (Sjöström)
Häxan (Christensen)
Love One Another (Dreyer)
Foolish Wives (Stroheim)

Anna Liisa (Puro & Snellman)
Phantom (Murnau)
Lorna Doone (Tourneur)
Nanook of the North (Flaherty)

The Three Must-Get-Theres (Linder)
Once upon a Time (Dreyer)
The Betrothed (Bonnard)
The Electric House (Cline & Keaton)

Pay Day (Chaplin)
Cops (Cline & Keaton)
The Paleface (Cline & Keaton)

[sally]

Watched Timeglasset. Found it a slog, and eventually stopped caring about getting AI to translate the Danish intertitles for me. Anyone know the story of director Fritz Magnussen? He died in April 1920 but there were still four feature films to come under his name, two from 1921 and this last one from 1922 ? Did they rework footage from previous films or what?

no clue but valdemar psilander kept chugging films out after his suicide in 1917, maybe death is no particular hindrance to danes?

[sally]

oh and i watched all 6 hours of emanuel gregers' japhet - mildly lost with the lack of subs so skim-read the novel in one night only to find that the films introduced non-existent (and silly) side-plots, to use up, i'm assuming, some budget on maritime ships and pointless racist depictions of natives that screamed early 1910s.

but the main takeaway was that i'd always wondered why carlo wieth got so popular....6 hours of distraction by the 'bulge', and i have my answer...

[Lencho of the Apes]

I'm always alert to characters in white pants, but it doesn't usually pay off to this extent.

[cinesmith]

FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION

I have no clue if any of you have seen or were aware of the loss of the
only film to star both Gloria Swanson AND Rudolph Valentino
but it was Sam Wood's 'Beyond The Rocks'
This was considered 'LOST' until it was located in a dead man's vast collection of films in the Netherlands as of 2003.
Restored in 2005. I literally just found all of this out last night and had to share.


The doc on the crazy guy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a5UEZszAWwQ&t=2s

A short bit on the restoration
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Y7CPvtg6O4

The completed film with English subs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=il6SNmMZ7Cg&t=5s

edit: Gahh! This is NOT the restored print...

[Lencho of the Apes]

Zippy+Yow-4069788614.JPG (151.65 KiB) Viewed 4157 times

[rischka]

cute dog lots of snow

[mae west]

Finally watched a Von Stroheim. Foolish Wives, wow! Is this the origin of the idea of the director as auteur? I think so... The production is the first big case I can think of director artist vs. studio, and the movie itself is a text that's almost impossible to approach as anything other than an E.V.S. work of art—indeed, a movie about E.V.S. conning Carl Laemmle out of a million dollars in the name of (con) art. Masterpiece.

Also is the cockatoo jump scare in Citizen Kane perhaps an allusion to the opening of Foolish Wives? A reach, maybe...

[mae west]

Also more general updates on my viewings: I've realized that I've properly speaking seen woefully few movies of the '10s and '20s. My tallies don't look terrible when shorts are included, but I'd seen something like 5 or fewer features from 1922 prior to the poll. As someone who aspires to know a thing or two about the history of film style and genre trends and so forth, that's a mammoth gap! (On the plus side, it's exciting to realize I might have more basics to learn about how movies were like back then.)

One lesson I've learned so far: I think I can finally begin to understand why Harold Lloyd's aw-shucks cutesy features were such a hit. I was nonplussed by Dr. Jack, the kind of saccharine hokum to make you sick to your stomach. But now that I've seen a few more normal features of 1922, I have a better sense of how a movie like Dr. Jack might stand out among the crowd. In addition to Dr. Jack, I've recently watched Shadows, The Toll of the Sea, and Beauty's Worth, and Dr. Jack is clearly superior to all three of them for narrative engagement—more interesting characterization and visual ideas, a sense of playfulness and fun. For 1922, it's a good time at the movies. (Perhaps not so much for 1932, my home base, but that's anachronistic.) I'd still probably rate Toll best of all four of those for its historical interest: a teenage Anna May Wong crying next to pastel flowers pressed in celluloid.

[cinesmith]

I'd seen something like 5 or fewer features from 1922 prior to the poll.

ditto. I'm quickly trying to dig through the year's releases in hope of correcting this.
It's especially slow going as so many shorts/cartoons and non-feature length items are in the mix.
Right now, LBX lists 1294 titles but right off the bat. Two of these are merely a split version of Lang's 'Mabuse the Gambler' plus a litany of other news reels and footage of the British Royalty visiting various parts of India and such. It's not quite the easiest of rosters to skim through.