where ping writes words
Release Date:
March 2, 1914
Studio:
Keystone
Director:
George Nichols
Also Starring:
Virginia Kirtley
Peggy Pearce
Roscoe Arbuckle
Mabel Normand
Ford Sterling
Tramp:
Yes
Worth Watching?
Maybe!
My character was different and unfamiliar to the American, and even unfamiliar to myself. But with the clothes on I felt he was a reality, a living person. In fact he ignited all sorts of crazy ideas that I would never have dreamt of…
Chaplin, My Autobiography
The nominees for this year’s Academy Awards will be announced tomorrow morning. Rather than try to predict the actual lists of nominees for each category, I thought I’d try something I’ve seen from other blogs and make some assorted predictions along with my sense of their likelihood. So I did that, and then realized that in this particular year it probably would have been easier to just predict the actual nominations. Oops!
So here are miscellaneous items I’ll be watching out for to see how the storylines develop. I think of it as 50%+ being things I’m actually predicting will happen and <50% being things I think are unlikely to happen but would be interested to see. If my instincts are correct, about 5 or 6 of these should come true Tuesday morning. That’s math. I took a statistics class once.
Here we go!
Release Date:
February 28, 1914
Studio:
Keystone
Director:
Henry Lehrmann
Also Starring:
Ford Sterling
Chester Conklin
Emma Clifton
Edward Nolan
Tramp:
Yes
Worth Watching?
Eh…
The films are successful agitations, successful explorations of elaborate visual possibilities; if laughter once accompanied them, it has to have been the laughter of breathlessness.
Walter Kerr, The SIlent Clowns
Release Date:
February 19, 1914
Studio:
Keystone
Director:
Ford Sterling
Also Starring:
Ford Sterling
Mack Swain
Edgar Kennedy
Tramp:
No
Worth Watching?
No
I went from set to set watching the companies at work. They all seemed to be imitating Ford Sterling. This worried me, because his style did not suit me.
Chaplin, My Autobiography
Release Date:
February 9, 1914
Studio:
Keystone
Director:
Mabel Normand
Also Starring:
Mabel Normand
Frank D. Williams
Chester Conklin
Alice Davenport
Tramp:
YES!
Worth Watching?
Sure
I had no idea of the character. But the moment I was dressed, the clothes and the makeup made me feel the person he was. I began to know him, and by the time I walked on stage he was fully born.
Chaplin, My Autobiography
Release Date:
February 7, 1914
Studio:
Keystone
Director:
Henry Lehrman
Also Starring:
Henry Lehrman
Frank D. Williams
Tramp:
YES!
Worth Watching?
As a historical novelty
He is elbowing his way into immortality. … And he is doing it by calling attention to the camera as camera. He would do this throughout his career, using the instrument as a means of establishing a direct and openly acknowledged relationship between himself and his audience. In fact he is, with this film, establishing himself as one among the audience, one among those who are astonished by this new mechanical marvel … He looked at the camera and went through it, joining the rest of us.
Walter Kerr, The Silent Clowns
Release Date:
February 12, 1914
Studio:
Keystone
Director:
Henry Lehrman
Also Starring:
Henry Lehrman
Chester Conklin
Minta Durfee
Virginia Kirtley
Tramp:
No
Worth Watching?
As a historical novelty
Had I seen a Keystone comedy? asked Mr Kessel. Of course, I had seen several, but I did not tell him that I thought they were a crude mélange of rough and rumble.
Chaplin, My Autobiography
Anyone who followed me on Twitter in 2021 probably noticed more posts about Mickey Mouse cartoons than a normal adult should make.
I’m not sure I ever fully explained what I was doing. On January 1 of that year, I watched the first Mickey short, Steamboat Willy. On December 31 I watched the most recent, Get a Horse! The goal was to watch every single Disney short in between. All 487.
It drove me mad.
Bad news: I’m gonna do it again. I’ve been interested in early 20th century history lately. It was a tumultuous period in world history. Centuries-old empires collapsed. Technology revolutionized the ways we communicate, entertain, and kill. While monarchies fell and republics and fascist states took their place, there was still one king everyone bowed to.
