SCFZ

Choose your favorite films from 1912 (according to IMDb).

– Each person votes for up to 20 movies. Do not feel compelled to fill the maximum allowable number, if you're enthusiastic about fewer than twenty.
– Do not rank the films except the number 1, it gets two points..

Users are urged to post their provisional lists as soon as possible so that others may use them for recommendations. You may, of course, revise your lists at any point prior to the deadline.

Ballots posted by people who do not participate in other parts of the forum will not be counted.

Next year will be announced early, on July 20.
Deadline for 1912 lists will be Thursday, Aug 1st at approximately 1 PM Pacific Time.

Seen, loved:
Le coeur et l'argent - Feuillade
The Land Beyond The Sunset - Harold Shaw
Onesime, Horloger - Jean Durand





Everything known to be available online:

1812 - Goncharov
Abraham's Sacrifice
Absalom
Algie, the Miner - Guy Blache
The Ball-Player And The Bandit
Bandits En Automobile - 29 m
A Beast At Bay - Griffith
Bjørnetæmmeren - Alfred Lind 41 m
Broncho Billy And The Schoolmistrss
The Burglar's Dilemma - Griffith
The Cameraman's Revenge
Canned Harmony
Le Chevaliere Des Neiges
Children Who Labor
A Christmas accident
Cleopatra -
Le coeur et l'argent - Feuillade
The Confederate Ironclad -
La Conquet Du Pole - Melies 30 m
The Copper Beeches
Cupid Through Padlocks - Allan Dwan
A Cure For Pokeritis
A Dash Through The Clouds
Departure Of A Grand Old Man - Protazanov 30 m
The Distant Relative - Allan Dwan
Dr Jekyll And Mr. Hyde
The Eternal Mother - Griffith
Falling Leaves - Guy Blache
The Female Of The Species - Griffith
Den flyvende cirkus - Alfred Lind 46 m
For His Son - Griffith
Friends
From the Manger to the Cross 70 m
From The Submerged - Theodore Wharton
The Furs (Mack Sennett
Het geheim van het staal - Alfred Machin
The Girl And Her Trust - Griffith
The Girl in the Arm-Chair - Alice Guy
Godasse Fumist
La Hantise/The Obsession - Feuillade
Helen's Marriage
Help! Help!
His Mother
Hope, a Red Cross Seal Story - Charles Brabin
Hot Stuff
The Inner Circle - Griffith
The Invaders - Francis Ford 40 m
Iola's Promise - Griffith
Katchem Kate
The Land Beyond The Sunset - Harold Shaw
The Lesser Evil - Griffith
The Lieutenant's Last Fight - Ince
The Life Of Buffalo Bill 33 m
Das Mädchen ohne Vaterland - Urban Gad 33 m
La maison des lions - Louis Feuillade
Making an American Citizen - Alice Guy
Man's Calling - Allan Dwan
The Massacre - Griffith 30 m
Max jongleur par amour
Max Reprend Sa Liberte/Troubles Of A Grass-Widower
The Mender Of Nets - Griffith
The Miracle - Carre, Karton 63 m
De molens die juichen en weenen/Mills, Joy, Sorrow - Alfred Machin
The Musgrave Treasure
The Musketers Of Pig Alley - Griffith
Le mystère des roches de Kador - Léonce Perret 43 m
Le Nain/The Dwarf - Feuillade
Napoleon 27 m
The New York Hat - Griffith
Oh Those Eyes
One Is Business The Other Crime - Griffith
Onésime et l'étudiante - Durand
Onesime Et Le Nourisson De La Nourrice Indigne - Jean Durand
Onesime, Horloger - Jean Durand
The Painted Lady - Griffith
Parsifal - Caserini 50 m
The Peasant's Lot 30 m
Petticoat Camp
The Portrait Of The Lady Anne
Raggio Di Sole
Razborchivaya Nevesta - Pyotr Chardynin
Revenge Is Sweet - Charles Seay
Saved FromThe Titanic - Arnaud
The Skeleton
A Spanish Dilemma
The Sunbeam - Griffith
Supersticion Andaluza - de Chomon 12 m
A Terrible Lesson - Alice Guy
Tomboy Bessie
The Tourists
Trädgårdsmästaren/The Gardener? - Victor Sjöström 23 m
Two Little Rangers - Alice Guy
An Unseen Enemy - Griffith
The Usurer's Grip - Brabin
The Water Nymph
A wife of the hills
de wigwam - ivens
The Wooden Athelete

uh...

the musketeers of pig alley (griffith)
l'âme des moulins (machin)
the mystery of the rocks of kador (perret)

to see:
? (not sure what i'll have time for anyway)

1912 and 1918 - yes please!

I'll watch some more before casting a final ballot, but some preliminary recommendations for those looking for recommendations:

Arthème avale sa clarinette (Ernest Servaès, France) - Very playful, simple comedy that's just my vibration
Bellezze italiche: Lagune e paesaggi (Pietro Marelli, Italy) - This is 1911 on Letterboxd, but 1912 on IMDB. Underseen jewel that I highly recommend seeking out - you can find it on Vimeo
The Conquest of the Pole (Melies, France)
The Girl and Her Trust (Griffith, USA)
The Painted Lady (Griffith, USA)
An Unseen Enemy (Griffith, USA)

1. "The Sunbeam" (D. W. Griffith, 1912)

"Falling Leaves" (Alice Guy-Blaché, 1912)

le coeur et l'argent - feuillade
the cameraman's revenge - starewicz
bandits en automobile - jasset
the new york hat - griffith
the land beyond the sunset - shaw
musketeers of pig alley - griffith
trädgårdsmästaren/the gardener- sjöström
die arme jenny - gad/asta nielsen
das mädchen ohne vaterland - gad/asta nielsen
falling leaves - alice guy-blaché
de wigwam - ivens

The Cameraman's Revenge (Wladyslaw Starewicz)

Metamorphoses (Segundo de Chomon)
Le Garde-Meubles Automatique (Romeo Bosetti)
Cagliostro's Folding Screen (Segundo de Chomon)
L'Iris Fantastique (Segundo de Chomon)
The New York Hat (DW Griffith)
The Beautiful Leukanida (Wladyslaw Starewicz)

1. Le bellezze d'Italia, trittico di visioni pittoresche (Pietro Marelli)

Superstition andalouse (Segundo de Chomón)
Le coeur et l'argent (Louis Feuillade, Léonce Perret)
L'âme des moulins (Alfred Machin)
The Ascent of the Matterhorn (1912) (Mario Piacenza)
Parsifal (Mario Caserini)
Tripoli (Piero Marelli)
Gérone, la Venise espagnole (Segundo de Chomón)
The Girl and Her Trust (D.W. Griffith)
The Land Beyond the Sunset (Harold M. Shaw)

don't know much about history, don't know much about 1912...

seen some 15 films, 3 of which are personal favorites


Final List

01. Das Madchen ohne Vaterland "A Romany Spy" (Urban Gad, Germany)
02. Dodsspring til hest fra cirkuskuple "The Great Circus Catastrophe" (Eduard Schnedler-Sorensen, Denmark)
03. The Musketeers of Pig Alley (David Wark Griffith, USA)

the cameraman's revenge - starewicz
musketeers of pig alley - griffith
the girl and her trust - griffith
Le bellezze d'Italia - marelli
Le coeur et l'argent - feuillade
Bandits en automobile - jasset
The Land Beyond the Sunset
Le mystère des roches de Kador

Bandits en automobile - Victorin-Hippolyte Jasset

I don't want to get into the whole gangster-prototype/Pig Alley thing right now (at least not till I rewatch MoPA).. but surely nothing can be more gangster than this gangster thing. More shallow and superficial than Feuillade… but somehow more modern too. I'm blown away. AND it provides circumstantial evidence toward my unprovable hypothesis about Feuillade being a primary influence within the Mexican film industry.

By the way, there are several landscape-based Italian movies with similar titles from 1911 and 1913 -- the only one that I'm sure imdb attributes to 1912 is Bellezze italiche: Lagune e paesaggi … which I think Evelyn mentioned but isn't the same as the one other people promoted, I think. [/that guy]

Oh, thanks for catching that Lencho... Didn't clue in that they made a bunch of them - the one I've seen is the same as the one everyone else is logging, Le bellezze d'Italia, trittico di visioni pittoresche, which appears to not have a corresponding IMDB page at all; Letterboxd links it with the IMDB for Lagune e paesaggi but I take it that's not the same film. And, given all the sources for the IMDB-less trittico di visioni pittoresche say 1911, I shan't be voting for it in a 1912 poll after all... Still beyond lovely to look at though!

also: Bandits en automobile looks awesome !

1. Die arme Jenny - Urban Gad

The Cameraman's Revenge - Wladyslaw Starewicz
Musketeers of Pig Alley - D.W. Griffith
De wigwam - Joris Ivens
Snokhach - Aleksandr Ivanov-Gai, Pyotr Chardynin

adding die arme jenny, le coeur et l'argent and bandits in automobile! clearly someone had done a lot of thinking on the intersection of automobiles and crime. great chase sequence. love how the cars are literally motorized buggies at this point. thx lencho! is this perhaps the origin of the mexican film serial automovil gris from 1919

Diving deep into 1912, might not have time for 1918. Early and silent cinema shall be my next big film preoccupation, I think. Such fascinating historical documents!

Italo-Turkish War propaganda, Tra le pinete di Rodi. The Savoia Film company logo (a white insignia with a medieval knight on warpath and warcry 'Avanti') appears with hand-coloured curtains of green and red on either side, collectively producing both the film company trademark and Italy's tricolour national flag.

Oi, Rischka -- I didn't see your question until just now. El Automovil Gris (1919) was a docudrama about some guys in a real automovil gris that did those things in MexDF in 1917/18. Just a telling coincidence that the bad dudes in France used a car of the same color.

It does however tie in to my fantasy/hypothesis about Feuillade-type movies being an important part of the Mexfilm sensibility. I have no proof of anything (to research it conscientiously I would have to go back and look at detailed records of what was exhibited in Mexico City and in outlying regions plus dig into US serials of the period enough to get a feel for their content) but my intuition tells me that the paranoid Feuillade-mood was a convenient thing for people to project their anxieties about political instability + constant turmoil onto. As circumstantial evidence: Automovil Gris serial, two 1926-27 silent features produced in Veracruz (two of I think only three that have survived reasonably intact) that went all in on Feuilladism and gangsterie and then persistent returns to Feuillade narrative tropes in the 40s and 50s, mostly in bottom-tier charro/westerns.

Lencho_of_the_Apes wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2019 3:43 pm Oi, Rischka -- I didn't see your question until just now. El Automovil Gris (1919) was a docudrama about some guys in a real automovil gris that did those things in MexDF in 1917/18. Just a telling coincidence that the bad dudes in France used a car of the same color.

It does however tie in to my fantasy/hypothesis about Feuillade-type movies being an important part of the Mexfilm sensibility. I have no proof of anything (to research it conscientiously I would have to go back and look at detailed records of what was exhibited in Mexico City and in outlying regions plus dig into US serials of the period enough to get a feel for their content) but my intuition tells me that the paranoid Feuillade-mood was a convenient thing for people to project their anxieties about political instability + constant turmoil onto. As circumstantial evidence: Automovil Gris serial, two 1926-27 silent features produced in Veracruz (two of I think only three that have survived reasonably intact) that went all in on Feuilladism and gangsterie and then persistent returns to Feuillade narrative tropes in the 40s and 50s, mostly in bottom-tier charro/westerns.

thx lencho! yeah i thought i had read the later film was based on a real case. automovil gris when 99% of cars were black? thought it was worth investigating. you'd think criminals wouldn't want to stand out

"At night all cars are gray," maybe.

GOOD POINT

The Land Beyond the Sunset

The Cameraman’s Revenge
Falling Leaves
The Mills in Joy and Sorrow
The Massacre
The Musketeers of Pig Alley
The Girl and Her Trust

The Ascent of the Matterhorn (1912) - Short documentary showing a couple of fellas strolling up the mountain. Nothing majorly exciting but it was a nice restored print (same vimeo page as the Le bellezze d'Italia short, def need to scroll through that page some more). https://vimeo.com/user23575894

Das Mädchen ohne Vaterland
De molens die juichen en weenen
Le coeur et l'argent
Le mystère des roches de Kador
The Musketeers of Pig Alley

To see before the deadline
Richard III

Some quick shout-outs for things I've watched for the game:

Le mystère des roches de Kador was rather excellent, thanks Brian a.o.
The Intruders - Ince and The Lieutenant's Last Fight - Francis Ford were smartly-made, ahead-of-the-curve Westerns, both had nuanced and thoughtful attitudes toward Native American issues. Lieutenant was basically-sorta-almost the same movie as Anthony Mann's Devil's Doorway/1950.

Parsifal (1912, Mario Caserini) - Pageantry from the Italian costume drama boom of the early 1910s. Not great plot-wise, but there's very handsome tinting, costumes galore, outdoor locales. and a strong emphasis on scale. There are some neat special effects as well, most memorably one in which servants see Parsifal in a circular mirror akin to a magician's looking glass or a lanterna magica slide.

FYI Lencho and others interested: A new 1912 Victorin Jasset film was just uploaded to YouTube by EYE Film Musuem an hour ago (!) Search 'Aux feux de la rampe' on YouTube to find.

Some stills from Aux feux de la rampe (1912, Jasset). No Bandits, but the lighting is incredible Jasset really was the Rembrandt of cinema.

Que jolie! I'm on that like a thing or a quality that's on things! Thanks, Evelyn!

But no usable titles, damn. Guess I'll wait and see if that Spanish channel picks it up.

Lencho_of_the_Apes wrote: ↑Thu Jul 25, 2019 2:20 pm Que jolie! I'm on that like a thing or a quality that's on things! Thanks, Evelyn!

But no usable titles, damn. Guess I'll wait and see if that Spanish channel picks it up.

Lol! You're most welcome ! Bless EYE Film Museum, even if I can never understand what their intertitles say...