Simanaitis Says
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NOT SO SILENT
MY FAVORITE TURNER CLASSIC MOVIES are from the pre-Code Thirties, though I confess to enjoying the occasional silent film. Indeed, a couple of the latter are real keepers having been mentioned here at SimanaitisSays: Fritz Lang’s Metropolis, is a 1927 sci-fi classic that featured “The 1921 Rumpler Tropfenwagen—Aero Wonder and Movie Star.” And “A Real Lulu of a Silent Flick” celebrated Die Büchse der Pandora, Pandora’s Box, 1929, which I enjoy as a precursor to a favorite opera, Alban Berg’s Lulu.
All this meandering led me back into Lenny Liston’s magnificent (795-page) The Cinema in Flux.
The Cinema in Flux: The Evolution of Motion Picture Technology from the Magic Latern to the Digitial Age, by Lenny Lipton, Springer, 2021.
Lenny Lipton spoke of three eras of cinema: Glass (e.g., magic lanterns), Celluloid, and Digital. The earliest celluloids were pre-talkies, but Lenny preferred the term “Silent Sound.” Here are tidbits gleaned from Chapter 25 of Cinema in Flux.
Silent Sound. Lenny wrote, “During the first three decades of the so-called silent cinema, theatrical exhibition was often accompanied by live sound but the first celluloid exhibition, Edison’s peepshow Kinetophone, introduced the concept of using a phonograph to accompany the image (but without synchronization)….”
“Live sound for magic lantern shows,” Lenny wrote, “may have begun even before the Phantasmagoria performances in the late seventeenth century, using music, narration, and sound effects. While we don’t know with certitude the extend of the use of sound during the magic lantern era, it is reasonable to assume it was widespread, a technique that continued into the twentieth century when lecturers accompanied photographic slide projections.”
Anything But Silent. Lenny quotes cinema historians about silent cinema being anything but silent: “Before 1928,” one observed, “movies were customarily accompanied by one or more of the following: sound effects; music played by live performers; live singers; speakers; or actors; and phonographic records.”
Lenny also cited what must have made for an entertaining movie experience: “For twenty years,” another authority wrote, “audience had shouted out what they thought characters were saying…the audience was ready to add sound effects: a ‘bang’ for a shot, plaintive weeping for sorrow, and feet drumming on the theater floor for scenes of pursuit.”
Sounds like fun.
Vaudeville. Lenny recounts, “Beginning, in 1896, and for the following decade, the major venue for cinema production was the vaudeville theatre, a nationwide circuit of about 200 theater that offered shows made up of variety acts that circulated from theater to theater on a regular basis.”
“In these theaters,” Lenny conjectured, “the celluloid cinema was, at first, considered to be another act by the theater managers and the public and reviewed as such in newspapers. A good assumption is that the orchestra played for the projected film shorts just as it would have accompanied any other act….”
Indeed, at one point the 35-mm shorts were considered “chasers” to clear the house for the next show. Eventually, though, cinema became the main attraction—and vaudeville began its swan song.
Talking Picture Play. Lenny described what came to be known as the “talking picture play,” accompanied by troupes of pianists, projectionists, and monologists. One of these lead lecturers was Leroy Carleton, “the most famous of his time or perhaps of any other,” Lenny said. “In America he was known by name to one and all; the only contender who comes to mind [much later] is Mel Blanc, who was celebrated for performing the voice of Bugs Bunny.”
“In Japan,” Lenny recounted, “the counterpart of America’s lecturer was the benshi, who sat beside the screen and dominated the performance becoming a bigger box office attraction than the film.”
Ephemeral Sound? Lenny cites Terry Ramsaye, whose 868-page book A Million and One Nights, 1926, was the standard of early celluloid cinema. Ramsaye opined, “The talking pictures of 1895 had the brief life of novelty, and in their short day, only a matter of weeks, ran down the scale of diminishing interest which has characterized every subsequent advent of a talking-picture effect.”
Both Lenny and I might counter with Al Jolson’s “You ain’t heard nothin’ yet.” ds
© Dennis Simanaitis, SimanaitisSays.com, 2023
Simanaitis Says 
A few quick recollections:
A lot of early theaters were set up for stage and musical live performances, and often featured ornate pipe organs. Such was the vintage Alexandria, VA theater which ran a special showing of the first Academy Award winning Best Picture, “Wings.” Their Grand Barton accompanied with the complete score, including a mood setting intro, and a departing theme … few left the theater until the last note.
Then there were the brief forays into other sensory accompaniment, including vibrating seats for horror movies, monster very low frequency speakers for tactile rumbles, mostly in volcano flicks or a Pearl Harbor attack movie.
My wife and I enjoyed less crowded weekday afternoon matinees, and only when seated for the then new E.T. did we find the theater filling with elementary school kids on a planned trip. Initially put off, once the movie started, it became magic. Most of the movie is without dialogue, and Spielburg let the action and SFX carry the story, usually with an understated score. The unexpected reactions from the youngsters turned to be a delightful accompaniment, taking us back to our Saturday movie days with squeals, shrieks and sobbing far better enhancing the mood than canned laughter artists could ever aspire to.
I’d meant to mention the brief foray into the piped in “Smell-O-Vision” spraying in floral scents, etc. as appropriate. Hopefully never used in swamp or musky wildlife movies.