Can We Talk 2

Silent Films

         The lousy summer of TV continues. Tonight TCM was running silent films. I thought the one with Charlie Chaplin and Marie Dressler was riveting. I couldn't take my eyes away. There was action only, no subtitles. You really can't carry on a conversation or leaf through a magazine. You have to pay attention. The movements and facial expressions were exaggerated of necessity.

         The first one, the only one I sat for, was made in 1915. The second one was in 1914. I was fascinated to think of people of that era going to the movies. Many had survived the Civil War. Some may have been on cattle drives or attended Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show. These black and white films with the monotonous piano music would have been ultra modern to them. It was before the Great War. Some of The Wild Bunch and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid were still around. Wyatt Earp was still alive. Some hadn't gotten accustomed to automobiles yet, or outhouses for that matter, but they were seeing airplanes and going to the picture shows.

         It's fun to look at the old stuff and figure out what was going on at that time, what life was like. A movie about that time period, made in that time period is like a time capsule. You can see the costumes, the house furnishings, the dances, hair styles, the manners: it's a little slice of culture. Think about what was going on in history, who was alive at that time, and you have a wonderful picture.