Reading Room

Out of the Vaults: American Aristocracy (1916) (opens goldenglobes.com in a new tab)

Essay examining Fairbanks' early starring vehicle satirizing American nouveau riche and social pretension.

Golden Globes

On American Aristocracy

People on Sunday (opens criterion.com in a new tab)

Criterion release with essay on this Weimar-era film by young filmmakers including Siodmak and Ulmer.

Criterion Collection

On People on Sunday

The Unholy Three - San Francisco Silent Film Festival (opens silentfilm.org in a new tab)

Festival resource on Browning's unique approach to grotesque cinema.

On The Unholy Three

City Lights (1931) (opens criterion.com in a new tab)

Criterion release with comprehensive essay on this greatest achievement of Chaplin's career.

Criterion Collection

On City Lights

One A.M. (7 August 1916) (opens chaplinfilmbyfilm.wordpress.com in a new tab)

Detailed examination of Chaplin's unique drunken solo performance and interaction with inanimate objects.

Chaplin: Film by Film

On One A.M.

A Farewell to Arms: a greater film than Hemingway knew — BFI (opens bfi.org.uk in a new tab)

Critical essay examining Frank Borzage's 1932 adaptation and how it differs from Hemingway's vision.

On A Farewell to Arms

'Beauty in the lap of horror': the Gothic appeal of Erich von Stroheim in Blind Husbands (1919) — Humanities and Social Sciences Communications (opens nature.com in a new tab)

Academic essay examining Stroheim's Gothic aesthetics and complex seducer character in his directorial debut.

On Blind Husbands

Caught in a Cabaret (27 April 1914) (opens chaplinfilmbyfilm.wordpress.com in a new tab)

Critical essay on Chaplin's early comic performance and character development.

Chaplin: Film by Film

On Caught in a Cabaret

La fée aux choux | film by Guy-Blachê (opens britannica.com in a new tab)

Encyclopedia entry on Alice Guy-Blachê's pioneering narrative film, the first fiction film ever made.

Britannica

On The Cabbage-Patch Fairy

A History of Screenwriting – The Cabbage Fairy (La Fée aux Choux) (opens rosannewelch.com in a new tab)

Scholarly analysis of the film's significance as the first narrative film and its pioneering screenwriting.

On Screenwriting and Media with Dr. Rosanne Welch

On The Cabbage-Patch Fairy

Thoughts On: Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm (opens silentology.wordpress.com in a new tab)

Analysis of Mary Pickford's performance in this literary adaptation examining collaboration with director Marshall Neilan.

Silent-ology

On Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm

Mother (1926) - Writers Without Money (opens writerswithoutmoney.com in a new tab)

Critical perspective on Soviet cinema's approach to revolutionary narrative.

Writers Without Money

On Mother

Beginner's Guide to Alfred Hitchcock: Juno and the Paycock (1930) (opens talkfilmsociety.com in a new tab)

Guide to Hitchcock's adaptation of Sean O'Casey's play and his frustrations with theatrical material.

Talk Film Society

On Juno and the Paycock

The Disappearance of the Working Class from the Cinematic Screen — Widok. Theories and Practices of Visual Culture (opens pismowidok.org in a new tab)

Scholarly article examining the representation of working-class labor in early cinema and its historical significance.

On Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory

Watch the Film That Invented Cinema: Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory in Lyon (1895) (opens openculture.com in a new tab)

Educational analysis of the film's historical importance as a foundational work of cinema history.

Open Culture

On Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory

The First Horror Film, Georges Méliès' The Haunted Castle (1896) (opens openculture.com in a new tab)

Analysis of Méliès' pioneering horror film and its technical innovations in stop-motion effects.

Open Culture

On Le manoir du diable

Fun Facts And Murky Legends About 'The Arrival Of The Train At La Ciotat Station' (1896) (opens silentology.wordpress.com in a new tab)

Critical examination of legends surrounding the film and analysis of its composition and reception.

Silent-ology

On The Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat

Thoughts On: 'The Four Troublesome Heads' (1898) (opens silentology.wordpress.com in a new tab)

Critical analysis of Méliès' pioneering use of multiple exposure and substitution splicing techniques.

Silent-ology

On The Four Troublesome Heads

WEEK 10: Juno And The Paycock (1930) (opens weeklyhitch.wordpress.com in a new tab)

Analysis of Hitchcock's second talkie and its theatrical staginess in cinematic adaptation.

Weekly Hitch

On Juno and the Paycock

BFI Screenonline: As Seen Through A Telescope (1900) (opens screenonline.org.uk in a new tab)

Critical analysis of George Albert Smith's innovative use of point-of-view cinematography and film grammar.

BFI Screenonline

On As Seen Through a Telescope

The Astronomer's Dream (opens grokipedia.com in a new tab)

Comprehensive entry on Méliès' film examining dream sequences and proto-surrealist visual techniques.

Grokipedia

On The Astronomer's Dream

To the stars and beyond: movies dream of outer space, 1898-1910 — Silent Please (opens silentsplease.wordpress.com in a new tab)

Scholarly essay placing the film within the context of early science fiction cinema.

On The Astronomer's Dream

The Enchanted Drawing: Blackton's Early Animation (opens themarginalian.org in a new tab)

Analysis of J. Stuart Blackton's pioneering proto-animation techniques and their influence on cinema.

The Marginalian

On The Enchanted Drawing

Earth (Alexander Dovzhenko, 1930) – The Films in My Life (opens oncriterion.wordpress.com in a new tab)

Analysis of this controversial film's poetic approach to collectivization and Soviet modernization.

On Criterion

On Earth