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Voidsville Follies

Works featuring "forsaken" (30)

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Showing 21-30 of 30 works

The End of the World (Verdens Undergan)

August Blom (director)
Louis Larsen (cinematographer)
Otto Rung (writer)
Ebba Thomsen (lead)
Olaf Fønss (lead)
Johanne Fritz-Petersen (lead)
Nordisk (production)

Language: Silent, Danish and English titles, released in Apr 1916
Minutes: 77

Denmark punked out of The Great War, and so missed out on the Great Debut of two of modern technology's Great Weapons of Mass Death and Misery from the air: bombing of cities, and clouds of poison gas. Sniffing out the profit potential from Denmark's movie fans who'd pay to get a taste of that action in their own hoods (safely), Nordisk's exploitation film division went into overdrive and came up with a winner and released it on April Fool's Day. Grounded in an engaging story of class and family struggle with a healthy dose of hiss-worthy villainy, executed with strong performances (aided by authenticity of masses of nonprofessionals), and crowned with credible special effects and stunning cinematography revealed in this excellent restoration, this deserves greater recognition.

Featured elements:

: action; animal act; breaking class; business; corruption; crime; dance; death scene; family; fighting; flashback; forsaken; gold digger; home invasion; infidelity; manipulator; melodrama; newsroom; patriarchy; prison; religion; revenge; romance; sci-fi; servitude; shipwreck; state of emergency; suspense; swindling; treachery; uprising; wage slavery

The Fire (Il fuoco (la favilla - la vampa - la cenere))

Giovanni Pastrone (director)
Segundo de Chomón (cinematographer)
Gabriele D'Annunzio (author)
Pina Menichelli (lead)
Febo Mari (lead/writer)
Itala (production)

Language: Silent, Italian titles, English subtitles, released in Apr 1916
Minutes: 50

A privileged poetess plucks a peasant painter from his mundane seclusion, flying him to the height of passion in their brief encounter. A tale of role reversal that breathes new life into a classic “femme fatale theme” (a.k.a., “misogynistic influence” that may be better left dead) by using creative cinematography and careful choreography of the poetess' movements. The result explodes with a visual extravagance within its minimalist domain and, like the painter, the viewer is seduced into an unquenchable thirst for more.

Featured elements:

: abstraction; abuse; agent of discontent; alienation; alter ego; animal act; automobile; baptism of fire; breaking class; diva mode; femme fatale; forsaken; gender-bender; infidelity; manipulator; obsession; psycho; servitude; sexuality; tragic artist; unrequited love

Tigre Reale

Giovanni Pastrone (director)
Segundo de Chomón (cinematographer)
Giovanni Tomatis (cinematographer)
Giovanni Verga (author)
Pina Menichelli (lead)
Alberto Nepoti (lead)
Febo Mari (lead)
Gabriel Moreau (lead)
Itala (production)

Language: Silent, Italian titles, English subtitles, released in Nov 1916
Minutes: 77

Never again utter the phrase “Drama Queen” until you've watched this diva single-handedly transform a threadbare story into a symphony of sensual expression.

Featured elements:

: alienation; animal act; breaking class; diva mode; flashback; forbidden love; forsaken; infidelity; manipulator; melodrama; music; neglected spouse; rescue; revenge; servitude; suicide

The Curse of Quon Gwon

Marian E. Wong (director/lead/writer)

Language: Silent, released in 1916, month unknown
Minutes: 36

Featuring rich costumes and the conflict between tradition and modernism (a theme that, 10-20 years later, would become a staple of the Shanghai film industry), it's a pity so little remains of this.

Featured elements:

: abuse; alienation; family; forsaken; melodrama; modernism

The Dying Swan (Умирающий лебедь)

Yevgeny Bauer (director)
Boris Zavelev (cinematographer)
Zoya Barantsevich (writer)
Vera Karalli (lead)
Aleksandr Kheruvimov (lead)
Vitold Polonsky (lead)
Andrey Gromov (lead)
Khanzhonkov (production)

Language: Silent, Russian titles, English subtitles, released in Jan 1917
Minutes: 49

“There is no need for words if your soul is singing” - the lawyer told her...

Featured elements:

: abstraction; afterlife; alienation; backstage; dance; dance-ballet; death scene; foreshadowing; forsaken; humanoids; obsession; psycho; tragic artist; unrequited love

Coney Island

Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle (director/lead/writer)
George Peters (cinematographer)
Al St. John (lead)
Buster Keaton (lead)
Luke the Dog (lead)
Comique (production)

Language: Silent, English titles, released in Oct 1917
Minutes: 25

The boys get a taste of their own philandering medicine when they all flip over a hardcore player (Buster flips backward). The result, of course, is endless slapstick battles - and the first time the kid in the crew gets the gal.

Featured elements:

: animal act; comedy; crazy cops; cross-dressing; fighting; forsaken; gender-bender; infidelity; male bonding; metatheatre; prison; rescue; slapstick; treachery

Out West

Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle (director/lead/writer)
George Peters (cinematographer)
Natalie Talmadge (writer)
Al St. John (lead)
Buster Keaton (lead)
Alice Lake (lead)
Joe Keaton (lead)
Comique (production)

Language: Silent, English titles, released in Jan 1918
Minutes: 20

A parody of the conventions of Wild West movies - clearly a slapdash attempt to capitalize on the box-office success of 1974's Blazing Saddles.

Featured elements:

: action; animal act; antihero; comedy; cowboys; dark comedy; death scene; ethnic stereotype; forsaken; gambling; parody; redemption; rescue; slapstick; torture; train; tramp; unstoppable menace; white savior; white supremacy; zero to hero

Be Silent, My Sorrow, Be Silent (Молчи, грусть, молчи)

Pyotr Chardynin (director/lead)
Vladimir Siversen (cinematographer)
Vera Kholodnaya (lead)
Vitold Polonsky (lead)
Olga Rakhmanova (lead)
Kharitonov (production)

Language: Silent, Russian titles, English subtitles, released in May 1918
Minutes: 45

Apparently, an attempt to address class conflict in the standard weepy melodramatic format (complete with violin). While the fragments that remain do not provide a convincing critique (compare with Child of the Big City (1914)), it's still more substantial than other surviving works by this director.

Featured elements:

: addiction; backstage; breaking class; circus; flashback; forsaken; gambling; gold digger; melodrama; metatheatre; music; poverty; prejudice; servitude; sugar daddy; treachery

Carmen/Gypsy Blood

Ernst Lubitsch (director)
Alfred Hansen (cinematographer)
Hanns Kräly (writer)
Prosper Mérimée (author)
Pola Negri (lead)
Harry Liedtke (lead)
PAGU (production)

Language: Silent, English titles, released in Dec 1918
Minutes: 80

The power of a Carmen production derives from a hot Carmen and a tortured Don José. This version is only semi-powered: we see a tortured José, but this Carmen has nothing that could make a good man fall. So, a heavy dose of suspension of belief is required to get through this, yet in the end it wasn't worth the effort.

Featured elements:

: Bizet's Carmen; bookends; dance; dance-flamenco; death scene; ethnic stereotype; femme fatale; forsaken; music; obsession; prison

The Peach Girl (桃花泣血記)

Bu Wan-Cang/蔔萬蒼 (director/writer)
Huang Shao-Fen/黃紹芬 (cinematographer)
Ruan Ling-Yu/阮玲玉 (lead)
Jin Yan/金焰 (lead)
Wang Gui-Lin/王桂林 (lead)
Li S.Y./李時苑 (lead)
Lily Chow Lee-Lee/周麗麗 (lead)
Liu Ji-Qun/劉繼群 (lead)
Lianhua (production)

Language: Silent, Chinese and English titles, released in 1931, month unknown
Minutes: 95

Naive but willing farm girl falls for rich but dysfunctional adult crack baby who calls her 'chaste' but treats her like a slut. But the affair is opposed by his strictly orthodox but stoned-out junkie mom in this clichéd but engaging hyper-tragicum that proves that contradictions are the spice of life.

Featured elements:

: addiction; breaking class; death scene; family; fighting; forbidden love; foreshadowing; forsaken; melodrama; pathos; prejudice; romance; unemployment; unplanned parenthood

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Showing 21-30 of 30 works

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