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100 year old 'Lost' film, found. William Gillette in 'Sherlock Holmes'

H. Clyde Disney

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Last Oct. a copy of William Gillette's 1916 film 'Sherlock Holmes' was found in France. The film was thought to be lost. In the months since the film has been restored. The first showing in the US will be at the end of May. The venue; The San Francisco Silent film festival. Hopefully this highly awaited film will then be made available to the Public. Made in 1916 the film will be in the public domain I would believe.

I know that the silent film purists restoring the film will undoubtedly make conservative decisions all along this process. That is rightly how it should be. I, however am not a film purist. What I am is a great fan of Sherlock Holmes. Books, Films, Radio shows. Every form of media Holmes has been in I appreciate.

I would hope that the film could be brought to the point where the broadest audience would enjoy this film. At the least a good Foley sound track should be added, along with an appealing music score. The worst thing would be for some rinky tink piano music to be added with the idea to make it sound like a campy old silent film.

Perhaps some narration by Dr. Watson. Also there was a radio show made of the play by Gillette in 1936, that is still available. Colorization? Perhaps. Many things could be done. My interest would be to see it at it s highest potential.

It could be an invitation for real Tackyness... or a genuine artistic enhancement. Anyone interested in a discussion of this? By the way, BBC has posted a short clip of this film on their website, if you want to take a glance at it. I has a remarkably modern feel.
 

That One Guy

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I've enjoyed a fair few silent films, although I will happily acknowledge that it's a fairly stylised form of film. Without seeing how strongly this particular film is stylised it's tricky to say what can be done with it; however, bearing in mind that this is a form of film where actors often had eyeshadow and white facepowder applied (along with other makeup) in order to heighten the contrast of their facial features and play up their emotions in an impressionistic sense, it may not necessarily match the tone to try and apply what we now think of as a traditional foley sound effect track.

Personally, I feel that adding a foley track with sound effects would clash very badly with it being a silent film - and it's not something you can easily work around by ADR either, because the footage of people speaking almost certainly wouldn't be available. A narration track ostensibly from Dr. Watson acting as a sort of framing device might work quite nicely, though.

Having looked at the clip on the BBC site (here, for those with access) it's not the worst example of such effects, although I suspect that the actor playing Professor Moriarty has make-up applied - something about the look of him reminds me a bit of Werner Krauss in The Cabinet of Dr Caligari (even though that film wasn't made until several years later).

I'm with you on the score, though - effort and inventiveness are key to a good score for a silent film, and can make or break the film's effectiveness.
 

TV's Frink

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Thread moved to Movies. The News Forum is for fanediting-related news from around the web.
 

Vultural

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I have watched a lot of Silent.
I am all for audio commentary tracks - multiple tracks if available.
I am all for multiple music tracks, though only Criterion seems to do that. (ref: Pandora's Box)
Adding foley or special sound effects is a mistake, taking viewers out of the silent ambiance.
1928's Lonesome features a dialogue sequence that is jarring and out of context.
To be blunt, only a small percentage of modern audiences have interest in, or appreciation of, Silent cinema.
To most, they are slow, they are boring, and they are black n white.
Might as well kiss off Noir and Pre-Code, as well.
The masses will not be interested, and pandering to the wad will only alienate the buffs.
 
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