tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5228314939015275941.post3755511439529572535..comments2024-03-21T17:54:04.910-04:00Comments on Silent Volume: Reflections: Scare TacticsChris Edwardshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02511805377064572471noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5228314939015275941.post-46681056314811030262009-03-23T11:48:00.000-04:002009-03-23T11:48:00.000-04:00Sounds like a positive evening--too bad the Nosfer...Sounds like a positive evening--too bad the Nosferatu program couldn't have had even a minute of preamble to set things up so well.<BR/><BR/>We take for granted the motivations of modern actors--maybe part of the problem is that we don't do the same for actors of the past?Chris Edwardshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02511805377064572471noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5228314939015275941.post-508509927910142112009-03-21T08:19:00.000-04:002009-03-21T08:19:00.000-04:00Audience laughter:Several years ago, when the only...Audience laughter:<BR/><BR/>Several years ago, when the only way to see these films was on 16mm, a college asked me to show Lon Chaney in THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA.<BR/><BR/>"Don't be upset but these kids are going to laugh all the way through it," the instructors told me when I got there.<BR/><BR/>"Not today," I replied.<BR/><BR/>Then I introduced the film.<BR/><BR/>I told them how Lon Chaney, the star of the film, had parents who were deaf mutes. As a result he had learned pantomime so he could communicate with them.<BR/><BR/>I explained that at that time anyone who had any kind of thing that set them apart, such as being left-handed (from which comes the word "sinister"), having a shock of white through our hair, or our eyebrows meet over our nose or being deaf or mute or both, being homosexual or... was looked at as a child of the devil.<BR/><BR/>As a result Lon Chaney grew up knowing what it is like to be viewed by people as a monster.<BR/><BR/>Then I told them the back story of THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA; how Erik had been born with a face so hideous his mother made him wear a mask from birth.<BR/><BR/>I added that while most people see The Phantom as the monster I see the girl as the one without a soul.<BR/><BR/>The Phantom hears in her voice a quality no one else discerns. He helps her; becomes her teacher (at no cost to her) and develops the gift that he, alone, knew was in her.<BR/><BR/>She imagines the face behind the mask to be as beautiful as the soul that is guiding her. <BR/><BR/>Despite all warnings (brought on by The Phantom's painful awareness of the effect of his deformity) she rips off the mask.<BR/><BR/>When she sees his face, it is, "Goodbye, honey and I am keeping the money."<BR/><BR/>"This film," I ended, "is the story of everyone of us who has ever had our heart broken. I created the music score you will hear with it. That is how I have presented it."<BR/><BR/>The lights went down.<BR/><BR/>I began the film.<BR/><BR/>There was not a single wrong response heard during its course. <BR/><BR/>No mocking laughter. <BR/><BR/>Just the pure silence of an enraptured audience.<BR/><BR/>There were five hundred teenagers in that audience.<BR/><BR/>When the film ended they rose as one body and applauded for nearly ten minutes.<BR/><BR/>As they walked by me on the way out they stopped to thank me for what I had said while adding they had just had the greatest film experience of their lives.<BR/><BR/>Said their teachers, "They have never done that before. I wonder why they are doing it now."Reg Hartthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18057603622387137160noreply@blogger.com