NFPF News

THE RED MARK at the San Francisco Silent Film Festival

The fastest way out of the penal colony of Nouméa, as seen in The Red Mark (1928), preserved by and screening at the San Francisco Silent Festival.

On Sunday, April 14th the San Francisco Silent Film Festival will the premiere the new restoration of The Red Mark (1928), a prison-set potboiler preserved with NFPF support.

Directed by James Cruze, best known for epics The Covered Wagon (1923) and Old Ironsides (1926), the film is a set on the South Seas prison island of Nouméa. Its governor is De Nou (Gustav von Seyffertitz), who loves nothing more than sending a inmate to the guillotine. Pickpocket Bibi Ri (Gaston Glass) has won his freedom and refuses to leave the island without his girl (Nina Quartero), but she has caught the creepy, jealous eye of De Nou...

"A powerful story, though not a pretty one," was the judgment of Motion Picture … Read more

Four NFPF-Preserved Films Unspooling at the San Francisco Silent Film Festival

Norma Shearer going mad in Man and Wife (1923), preserved by UCLA Film & Television Archive.

Next week the 26th installment of the San Francisco Silent Film Festival opens in San Francisco’s Castro Theatre. Four of the films have been preserved through grants administered by the National Film Preservation Foundation.

On Thursday, July 13, Doll Messengers of Friendship (1929) will screen during the free “Amazing Tales from the Archives” program. This short film commemorates a doll exchange between the U.S. and Japan that was initiated by the Committee on World Friendship Among Children. 58 dolls commissioned by the Japanese government from master doll makers toured the U.S. and were acclaimed as works of art. Doll Messengers of Friendship was screened at the local doll exchange ceremonies that comprised the tour. The surviving 9-minute … Read more

Go “Below the Surface” at the San Francisco Silent Film Festival!

Below the Surface (1920).

After a two-year break the San Francisco Silent Film Festival roars back to life on May 5th. This 25th anniversary edition lasts until May 11 and is jam-packed with films. Among these treasures is Below the Surface (1920), preserved by the Festival through the support of the National Film Preservation Foundation. The premiere of the restoration occurs on Friday, May 6, at 2pm, and we hope you can make it.

Below the Surface was the follow-up to the notorious revenge melodrama Behind the Door (1919). It reunites producer Thomas Ince, director Irvin Willat, star Hobart Bosworth, and cinematographer J.O. Taylor (later to film King Kong). Both films have action aboard submarines and a macabre shipboard denouement. In Below the Surface Bosworth plays a diver in small-town Maine who’s assisted by his loyal son (Lloyd Hughes). Their relationship is … Read more

“Amazing Tales from the Archives” at the San Francisco Silent Film Festival

Vice takes its toll in Opium (1919).

On Thursday, May 2, the National Film Preservation Foundation will co-present “Amazing Tales from the Archives” at the San Francisco Silent Festival. This free lecture program, begun in 2006, features archivists from around the world presenting field reports on new and exciting preservation projects. This year audiences will enjoy four presentations from leading film preservationists and scholars.

Starting from the formative years of cinema, researcher Thierry Lecointe and SFSFF President Robert Byrne will reveal cinematic discoveries from turn-of-the-century flipbooks. Next, Munich Filmmuseum director Stefan Drössler will guide the audience through the restoration of Opium (1919). Directed by Robert Reinert and starring Werner Krauss and Conrad Veidt, this exotic, hallucinatory tale of addiction and betrayal among doctors … Read more

"Soft Shoes" at the San Francisco Silent Film Festival

Starting May 30th the San Francisco Silent Film Festival will celebrate its 20th anniversary with five days of programs showcasing silent classics from around the world. The NFPF is honored to have played a part in the celebration by supporting the preservation of Soft Shoes (1925), which screens May 31 with live musical accompaniment by Donald Sosin.

"Harry Carey is willing to risk an eye as Lillian Rich adjusts her stocking" in Soft Shoes (1925). Photo and text from Exhibitor’s Trade Review, March 14, 1925.

Directed by Lloyd Ingraham and photographed by Sol Polito, Soft Shoes was part of a series of Westerns produced by Hunt Stromberg and starring Harry Carey. Set in 1925, the semi-comedic story involves small-town western sheriff Pat Halahan (Carey) visiting San Francisco and apprehending the alluring burglar Faith O’Day (Lillian Rich), who had attempted to rob his hotel room. … Read more