- Blog
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Hollywood Babylon – a two-part aside
Crime, sex, addiction, murder and suicide – the golden age of the movies — Cinema is a mature form. Cinema is also, of course, the least mature form there’s ever been. It’s art but it’s also sex and crime and addiction and untimely death. We now know that Hollywood in the 1920s was the absolute…
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Dudes in the woods
Robin Hood is a Mediaeval superhero. He doesn’t care much about emancipation, but he loves to skip through the trees. — Gross is every year’s top-grossing movie, since 1913, reviewed. — DOUGLAS FAIRBANKS IN ROBIN HOOD, ALLAN DWAN, DOUGLAS FAIRBANKS PICTURES, 1922, 127 MINUTES. U.S. GROSS: $2,500,000. There’s something cynical about this film. It’s as…
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Learning from old movies
GROSS is my first Substack thing. It’s film reviews, which I hope are funny and interesting and unpretentious. — It’s also my personal low-effort way to learn about the whole span of cinema history. I’m watching every top-grossing film since 1913 and writing them up in a Substack newsletter. I’ve been doing it for a…
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Always lots of accidental art at the hospital
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Chaps in trouble
We’ve got to 1919. The officer class over-reaches itself and gets stuck on the ice. It’s a disaster but it all works out in the end. — Every year’s top-grossing movie, since 1913, reviewed. Part seven. — SOUTH: SIR ERNEST SHACKLETON’S GLORIOUS EPIC OF THE ANTARCTIC, FRANK HURLEY, IMPERIAL TRANS-ANTARCTIC FILM SYNDICATE, 1919, 80 MINUTES.…
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A 1918 double bill: pathos and perfect slapstick followed by a mind-expanding account of the Russian revolution
Mabel Normand and Vladimir Lenin, together at last — I’m watching every year’s top-grossing movie, since 1913. You can get these chronological reviews in your inbox over here. — MICKEY, F. RICHARD JONES, MABEL NORMAND FEATURE FILM COMPANY, 1918, 93 MINUTES.ANNIVERSARY OF THE REVOLUTION, DZIGA VERTOV, MOSCOW FILM COMMITTEE, 1918, 119 MINUTES. So, in the…
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A fairytale, a comedy, a fantasy – and a Disney princess 20 years before Snow White
Mary Pickford was famed for playing childlike parts, flighty young women with spirit. In 1917’s The Poor Little Rich Girl, she broke new ground by playing an actual child. — I’m watching every year’s top-grossing movie, since 1913. You can get these chronological reviews in your inbox over here. — 1917. THE POOR LITTLE RICH…
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This review turned into a disquisition on underwater storytelling
This adaptation of Jules Verne’s great submarine romance was the top-grossing film of 1916 – and it wasn’t even the first movie version — 20,000 LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA, STUART PATON AND THE WILLIAMSON BROTHERS, UNIVERSAL PICTURES, 1916 — UPDATE, 11 October 2023. I found an absolutely gorgeous restoration of 20,000 Leagues, also on YouTube.…
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Technofeudalism, neofeudalism, political capitalism and old-fashioned capitalism
It is possible for geniuses to explain things in ways that non-geniuses can understand but sometimes they need to switch formats to do it. — Microverses: Observations from a Shattered Present – a book by Dylan Riley I’ve spent a stupid amount of time trying to understand Marxism – political science in general, in fact.…