The 4th Short Film Hall of Fame

It was shot here in Newfoundland. The actors (as well as the writer/director) are all Newfoundlanders.

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Do most people where you live sound like the accents in the movie? I was surprised by how distinctly unique the accents sounded.

Believe it or not, the accents in the film are fairly subtle in comparison to some of the outport dialects around here. But yes, most people do in fact sound like that.

We were a Dominion of the British Empire until 1949, and due to the isolated living conditions on the island, those old accents have been very well preserved.

Thanks Cosmic...I find it interesting how isolation can preserve accents like on the island....which then makes me wonder what English will sound like in the future after a couple of generations are born with mobile technology. I wonder if one day all accents will be blended into something new?

I'm kind of terrified that the future of communication will be emojis or something.


(Just practising so I can communicate with future generations).

Never Weaken (1921)
Dir. Fred Newmeyer

I only know about Harold Lloyd thanks to Safety Last! being covered briefly in a class I took about the history of American cinema. I meant to look into this other films and shorts, but completely forgot about it until now. While I don't condone the flippant attitude this film has regarding suicide, as a whole this short was very enjoyable. Lloyd has a rather unassuming and sort of nerdy look to him, which makes the physical strength necessary to pull off his stunts all the more impressive to watch.

Mystery of the Leaping Fish (1916)
Dir. John Emerson

I would've loved to see this with a different accompanying musical score. The film was visually interesting, and I was intrigued by the story at the start, but since most of the music was absolutely horrible, it really ruined my enjoyment of the film. While Coke Ennyday was amusing enough for the first few scenes, he began to try my patience about halfway through. I'm wondering now if maybe the music didn't sour me towards what was on screen. I didn't want to watch the film truly silently, but that might actually have been the better choice.

And with that I have seen all the shorts. I probably won't send my list tonight though, since I have no idea how I'm going to rank these haha.

I think I'll include Animal Beatbox and Bomb on my list just in case Dani changes her mind.

I'm with you, Cosmic, it is NOT an easy voting process for this one - which is pretty frickin cool!!

and @Citizen Rules I had COMPLETELY forgotten about Chuck and Bob when watching the Ventriloquist -- EXCELLENT reference!

and glad to hear you enjoyed Pop Goes The Easel, @Camo!!
A little trivia bit since you remarked on the slapping sounds; they actually DID slap each other, they didn't fake that part. Though they did aim away from the eyes when poking. There was an interview with Larry Fine and he remarked that there was so much of it, that at early point their faces had become so calloused, they couldn't feel the slaps any more.

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The Mystery of the Leaping Fish

I saw this once before and it was a very long time ago. I didn't remember much about it except that I think it was supposed to be poking fun at the Sherlock Holmes character (hence, the style of clothing, smoking a pipe and his love of cocaine). It is an enjoyable bit of film. I forgot how he gets instantly high with the shot of cocaine. It is always interesting to see Douglas Fairbanks in a non-swashbuckling role. I was never a big fan of his, but this film is good.


Pop Goes the Easel

It has been so long since I have seen this one. It has actually been years since I watched any of The Three Stooges. I grew up with them. Maybe that is why I don't mind them (a couple of my brothers were big fans). There are some pretty funny lines in it, as I think there are in most of their films. And it was quite interesting to see them in color. I think this is one of the better colorized films that I have seen in quite awhile. I just have to add that I have always enjoyed Curly's hand movement he stretches out his arm. Why I do? I have no idea. But it always makes me smile.


Franz Kafka's A Country Doctor

Truth be told, this was not my sort of thing. I didn't care for the animation. And the story really did nothing for me. Of course, I am not one who is into anything that Kafka has ever written. So maybe that hinders any positive thoughts that I may have had about this. It just wasn't my cup of tea.


Flankers

I thought this was a really well made film. It was another one that I felt had the quality of a feature length film. I loved the look of it. I loved the dark, gloominess about it. It almost felt as if it had this heaviness to it of isolation. I liked that a lot. But then again, I always prefer the look of dark and gloomy over bright and sunny. I have a question. Why did the fire start? Did I miss something? I don't think I did, but I wasn't 100% sure. And I didn't know how far back I should've gone in the film to see what happened - if they even showed what happened. But they didn't, did they?


The House of Small Cubes

Why? Why must something this depressing be nominated in anything? I think it is just to put me in a deep funk afterwards. I thought it was very good. I thought the concept was clever. But, boy, did I feel down after watching it!


A Dog's Life

The music was a funny choice for the film in the beginning and then it went all silent. Which I was able to handle, of course. I always get a kick out of what good little actors dogs are. I've seen this one before. I enjoyed it, of course, as I do all Chaplin films. It had been so long since I had seen it that I didn't really remember how it ended. I forgot how funny he looks when he is planting those seeds. By the way, that is his brother Sydney Chaplin as the man working the lunch wagon - where Charlie eats all of the food.


Everything Will Be OK

I really liked this one. I was afraid neiba went and nominated another depressing film for me to watch. But in the end, I was wrong! I liked the narration. I liked the story. I liked the little observations in the film. There were some pretty funny lines in it. I enjoyed this one a lot.


The Rink

Another one that I have seen before that I really enjoy. I love to watch the many situations that arise, and how they handle them, all while on roller skates. It is a pretty good film. It makes me jealous of Chaplin, though, I never could skate that smoothly. And, just as a nonsense side thought, Edna Purviance's hair looked so bad towards the end. It looked so messy. Yes, that bothered me - especially since she was supposed to be a little dressed up. Just thought I would mention that.


Never Weaken

My nomination, and I have seen this one countless times. I never tire of it. I always wish Harold Lloyd would get more recognition that he does because I do think he is underrated as a comedic actor. I am just going to admit this now. I think Charlie Chaplin is very, very good. Even though I think he is very, very good, I think Buster Keaton is better. Even though I think Buster Keaton is better, I enjoy Harold Lloyd the most. I just much prefer his films over the others. Of course, his being my #1 silent film crush kind of helps the preference. I think he is so cute. ANYWAY......THE FILM!! This one is my favorite of the short films of his. I love it from beginning to end. I enjoy the way that he obtains the patients for the doctor. I do enjoy the suicide scene (I do get a kick out of the things that happen to prevent him from doing so). He only attempts it to be dramatic, but it is quite obvious that he doesn't want to die, which is shown in the scene on the scaffold. I think it is a clever, enjoyable little film that I loved being able to show off here.




Alright. I am done. @neiba I will send in a list by the end of the week. I have to really think about how I want to rank these because they really are so varied - almost unfair competition, in a way. So I really want to make sure that I have my list the way that I want it to be.

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I became insane, with long intervals of horrible sanity - Edgar Allan Poe

Spoilers for Flankers below.
It is actually shown. The wife asks her husband to watch a pot she has on the stove while she gets bedding ready for their guest. He is unable to keep an eye on the pot because he has to help locate the spare cot in one of their sheds. The camera lingers on the pot as he walks away.

Edit: I just skipped through the video, and found that this happens somewhere around the 6 minute mark if anyone was curious enough to go back and see.

Agreed...the music score that I heard was annoying. Of course that's not an original score as the scores were originally all played live in the theater. Though some silent films had scores written for them, that are then duplicated on the film, I think that's a rarity. I just turned the sound way down as the score was distracting.

Ed, are you a fan of Soap? I seen Jay Johnson 'Chuck' perform live on a cruise ship a few years ago. Totally funny! I was so excited when I seen his photo on the marquee, I'm like it's Chuck and Bob!!!

The new digital colorization process looks really good. I believe a number of their films have been restored and colorized. Shirley Temple's too. Their the same company that colorized My Man Godfrey.

I just watched the last two shorts and will send in my list shortly.

Envelope (Aleksey Nuzhny, 2012) @gbgoodies

Loved it, I wish this was a full movie, it would so be the type of film that I love to watch. Question: I noticed Kevin Spacey starred and produced a number of short films, is there a reason why? Does he have a project in the works? or?


Giant God Warrior Appears in Tokyo (2012) @resopamenic

I was moved by the narrative, the gentle sound of the girls voice and the poignant things she said really touched me. The writing was lyrically beautiful with a reflective personal truth. I'm very glad to have watched it. I thought the cinematography was amazing, but the visual effect for me was hampered by the appearance of the giant warrior god. I wish they would have choose to depict the god as a moving dark shadow or cloud, something that wasn't so obvious looking. Still a great nom!

Thanks for reminding me that I didn't send my list after.

I better do that shortly before I forget again.

In 2011, Kevin Spacey's production company, Trigger Street Productions, teamed up with Jameson Irish Whiskey to create Jameson First Shot. It's a competition for up-and-coming filmmakers to work with A-list actors. Kevin Spacey was the first actor in 2012, followed by Willem Dafoe in 2013, Uma Thurman in 2014, Adrien Brody in 2015, and Maggie Gyllenhaal in 2016. The next actor scheduled is Dominic West for this year's competition.

Here's a link to more info about it:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trigge...son_First_Shot

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If I answer a game thread correctly, just skip my turn and continue with the game.
OPEN FLOOR.

Thanks for pointing that out. I see it now, but it just never registered with me how it could've possibly have happened.

And I remember how good that colorization of that film was, too. I wonder how many companies there are out there doing this because this may be the best of them. Of what I have seen, theirs looks the best.

I agree. I think that would've been much better. Either way, though, I thought it was a pretty good film.

Legend Films


http://www.legendfilms.net/index.html

The Rink - I haven't seen many Chaplin films and/or shorts, so after enjoying "A Dog's Life", I had high hopes for this short. For about the first 10 minutes, I thought I was watching the wrong short because it didn't have anything to do with a rink, but eventually it started to make sense. Overall this was a fun short, but it's not as good as "A Dog's Life". I thought it was strange that adults were having a skating party because that seems more like a kids thing to do, but maybe in the early 1900's it was normal for adults to have skating parties.

The Mystery of the Leaping Fish - The story was okay, but the title cards went by too fast, sometimes making it hard to read them, and Douglas Fairbanks bouncing around all the time was kind of distracting.

The Three Stooges "Pop goes the Easel" - I've never been a fan of The Three Stooges, and this didn't change my opinion of them. I don't like when they do stupid things, like throwing black paint all over the painting to fix one small spot, and when they hit, poke, kick, etc. each other, I like them even less. However having said that, this wasn't the worst of their shorts that I've seen over the years.

The Cameraman's Revenge - I tried to get past the fact that I was watching dead bugs on screen, but it wasn't easy. Having said that, this was an interesting concept, and a pretty good story, but the different color tints made it hard to see with some of the darker colors.

Everything will be OK - I didn't really "get" this type of film when I watched "It's Such a Beautiful Day" a while back, and I still don't really "get" this one either. It feels like I'm just watching some guy who has strange thoughts all the time. The combination of very basic animation and images is interesting, but the story is weird. But for the most part, it held my interest, so it was an okay watch.

Franz Kafka's A Country Doctor - This one didn't do much for me. I didn't care much for the animation, and I thought the story was a bit creepy.

Giant God Warrior Appears in Tokyo - I liked this one, except for one small part where it looked like someone abandoned a dog in a playground. It bothered me that someone would leave their pet attached there to die alone. But other than that, I thought this was interesting.

Flankers - I thought the short itself was pretty good, but I didn't like that there was no reason given for why those people seemed to hate each other right from the beginning of the short.

I mentioned this when I wrote about Flankers because I knew no one else would be familiar with the history of the area:

Early the film, they briefly mention an argument over fishing areas. If I recall correctly, they specifically state that the guys from up the shore are suspected to have been stealing from their lobster/crab baskets. It is also implied a number of times that Pete previously had violent run-ins with people from their community, though it's not specified if these particular fisherman were involved or not. To Pete and his friends, it doesn't matter.

Where's Neiba? It's been over a month since he's last posted. Is this Hof still on?