Hacker Cinema
Safety Last!
1923 · Film · 73 min
Directed by Fred C. Newmeyer, Sam Taylor
When a store clerk organizes a contest to climb the outside of a tall building, circumstances force him to make the perilous climb himself.
3 positive2 neutralfrom 5 commenters
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6 comments on Hacker News
Some things I found to be 'new'...
Harold Lloyd Safety Last is a comedy silent film that I sat with 2000 other people to watch about a decade ago. There was an orchestra in the pit playing the music that was composed for the film. Talk about laughing until you cried. Magic evening.
Nitin Sawhney has written and performed new music for silent movies from India and Japan. Again performed to full concert halls producing quite a novel experience. A throw of the dice was quite something.
Philip Jeck and Gavin Bryars' The Sinking of the Titanic played with a small 1917 style dance band. Projected visuals cut from contemporary newsreel film of huge ocean liners and crowds playing against Jeck's turntable based improvisations. A magic and elegiac evening.
The common thread for me is performance I think.
Anyone looking to get into silent film, I'd strongly recommend comedies (including, and perhaps especially, Chaplin and Keaton) as a good starting point. I've gotten to the point that I can truly enjoy a lot of silent dramas, but IMO the comedies are far more approachable for a modern audience. Good gateway drug.
Just off the more famous films (The Great Dictator and Modern Times and maybe City Lights for Chaplin, or The General for Keaton, say) I'd recommend The Kid for Chaplin, and Sherlock, Jr. for Keaton. And of course both made numerous short films, in addition to their features. Though the very-famous ones are all great, too—I especially love City Lights, personally.
Been meaning to check out Harold Lloyd (responsible for one of the most enduring and imitated images in Hollowood, the guy hanging on the clock on the side of a building, featured in Safety Last) but haven't made it to him yet. I bet he "reads" pretty well to a modern viewer, too.
[EDIT] Some beginner drama recommendations, for those who feel ready:
Metropolis (duh... though it's a bit on the long side, maybe skip if you can't tolerate longer movies, and it's maybe a bit belabored for modern sensibilities)
The Passion of Joan of Arc (just... damn. This is a perfect movie.)
L'Âge D'or (The Golden Age—but, uh, maybe just if you appreciate things a bit more art house)
Le Voyage dans la Lune (A Trip to the Moon—it's short, and, if one plays with various accompanying soundtrack options, including some more modern ones, one may find it transcendently good)
M (yes Fritz Lang made this very short list twice, because fuck you this movie is amazing, this is maybe the most modern-feeling of this whole bunch)
The reddit thread has some interesting speculation and links, along with the usual garbage. Summarizing a few of the better parts...
The photographer in that first picture may not be Ebbets. This is apparently him:
https://www.ebbetsphoto-graphics.com/page/home/#/page/home/
https://www.ebbetsphoto-graphics.com/page/about-the-artist/#/page/about-the-artist/
Credit to /u/notbob1959 for some detective work:
https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/comments/nn4q4j/heres_a_photo_of_the_photographer_charles_c/gzsrfye/
WaPo has a good article, and Wikipedia has some more info:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2019/09/01/one-most-iconic-photos-american-workers-is-not-what-it-seems/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunch_atop_a_Skyscraper
More high steel photos here:
https://historydaily.org/charles-ebbets-lunchtime-atop-a-skyscraper
https://www.metalocus.es/en/news/lunch-atop-a-skyscraper-story-behind-1932-photo
Some of these photos use the same camera trick that Harold Lloyd used in Safety Last!. The camera angle makes it look like it would be a direct fall to street level, when in fact there is a solid floor below, just out of the camera's view:
http://www.westerncostumeresearch.com/western-costume-research-blog/filming-safety-last-1923/
https://silentlocations.com/2012/02/29/how-harold-lloyd-filmed-safety-last/
That's not to say any of this wasn't dangerous! Just perhaps not quite as dangerous as they look.
I've seen the vast bulk of the films. Intolerance you definitely need to watch as a period piece. It's a pretty good example although something like Safety Last or The General would be easier to watch examples.Don't really disagree on "Yankee Doodle Dandy." Isn't a lot on the list I seriously disagree with although there are period favorites I'd probably skip and different films I'd include.
Harold Lloyd is another silent film comedy great who is probably not nearly as well known today as he should be. Recognized for, among other things, doing pretty crazy stunt work by himself (although probably his most iconic image from Safety Last! was a trick shot).
It’s common to make allowances when watching cinema from previous eras to make allowances for the times. With Safety Last, though, it is hard to see how one could possibly make a better version today. The restrictions such as the lack of sound, the black and white and the utter lack of post-production are completely embraced to make something you couldn’t make another way, and the pacing is razor-tight even by modern standards.