Il Cinema Ritrovato

[colinr0380]

FWIW, multiple people have told me that, aside from some hot tickets (e.g. The Devils, I expect), you mostly won't have trouble getting into things.

I was curious about this reading the report out of Cannes in the latest Sight & Sound, where it was described as the major event of the whole festival - is the buzz around The Devils getting the chance to see it on the big screen, the restored section, or people unfamiliar with the film excited at getting the chance to see it for the first time? Or a mix of all three? I would be amazed at the idea of getting to experience that piece of work with an audience completely unfamiliar with the film!

[senseabove]

Swing High Swing Low is in the public domain and given the outre blackface gag it’s probably not high on any boutique’s list for rescue, though I wouldn’t be surprised if Universal eventually put it out themselves if they have a new master for it

Is the LoC’s print missing a reel, or are you mixing SH,SL up with another film with an outre blackface gag? There was no such gag that I saw. (A legit question because there were supposedly three reels blown up from 16mm, but I only counted two.)

[domino harvey]

Here’s my description of the scene from the Lombard thread

Swing High, Swing Low (Mitchell Leisen 1937)
Trumpeter Fred MacMurray and Lombard fall in love in Panama and work in clubs til MacMurray finds and loses success to alcoholism. I knew I was in trouble when one of the first gags in this movie was Lombard leaving a beauty shop client in curlers for too long, which causes the woman’s hair to dry up into dreadlocks that when coupled with her mud mask made her look like a blackface performer out of vaudeville. Hilarious? Admittedly I am not impartial, but MacMurray’s character is such a self-furthering piece of shit in the last act that I could not possibly care about him finding redemption, and felt nothing but pity for poor Lombard having to stick by her man due to the necessities of the hackneyed narrative. A relative lowpoint from this period for Lombard, but one soon to be topped by her next matchup with MacMurray… (R1 Public Domain)