I have a movie fan friend who sensibly argues that D.W. Griffith was an over
rated director and produced very few good movies. That he was rediscovered by
the Museum of Modern Art in the 1950's and promoted by them as the "father of
film" was simply an accident due to the fact that so much of the good film and
and work of good directors had not been seen in decades. There were at least a
half dozen directors making better films than him at the same time.
Having now seen some DeMille films made in the same time period as Griffith's
most important workand also having seen his very poor later work, I tend to
agree with my friend. DW's work is stagey, hokey, has not aged well, is overly
sentimental. There is not much that is original about DW's work which can't be
attributed to his great cameramen (his editing, if he did it, was excellent).
His two greatest films were weighed down with a hick mentality (racism in
Birth of a Nation and childish historical viewpoints in Intolerance). They
just are not very good films, once you get past the spectacle).
Does anyone else agree that DW needs to be reappraised as a "great" director?
tom7tom

-----== Posted via Deja News, The Leader in Internet Discussion ==-----
http://www.dejanews.com/   Now offering spam-free web-based newsreading

<<Does anyone else agree that DW needs to be reappraised as a "great"
director?>>

Not me. Of course, he was overpraised by some idiots and by some who had other
agendas, but his contributions are irrefutable.

It is hard to agree with someone who calls Griffith's ideas "childish" and then
goes on to champion the work of DeMille! As good as DeMille was (and Walsh and
Collins and others) does nothing to erode the importance of Griffith. Even if
you ignore his features, surely the Biographs remain influential. And, while it
is easy to find fault with "The Birth of a Nation", it is absolutely undeniable
that it was the single film which proved that feature films were viable and its
reputation and even infamy gave the single most important publicity the medium
had to that point. The emotional power of the film is unmatched in film
history.

Gene Stavis, School of Visual Arts - NYC

Many if not most of his films are heavily sentimental, but at his best
he has a flair that manages to pull the viewer along with them (e.g. WAY
DOWN EAST and ORPHANS OF THE STORM). Have you ever seen THE MOTHER AND
THE LAW or HEARTS OF THE WORLD or BROKEN BLOSSOMS or ISN'T LIFE
WONDERFUL?

Christopher Jacobs

Pretty ballsy to diss one of the pioneers of filmmaking.  Hey, it at
least shows you have your own opinion.  I do, however, very much
disagree with it.  Have you seen films like A Corner In Wheat, Death's
Marathon, or The Mothering Heart.  While I have seen only a fraction of
his Biograph films, having read up on them extensively, I think it is
safe to say that some of these films were far more sophisticated than
many of the other films of the time.  One weird tidbit is that 3 or 4
years before Birth of a Nation, he did a film that was critical of the
Ku Klux Klan.  That's not to defend what he did in Birth, or to say that
he didn't have racial prejudices, but it is noteworthy.  Look at the
close-ups in Muskateers of Pig Alley, the cutting in Death's Marathon,
etc.  I also think it wrong to claim that his cameraman was responsible
for anything that is great in his films.  Billy Bitzer was a great
cameraman, but he only shot was Griffith directed him to.  Anyway,
that's my feeble attempt to defend Griffith.  I'm sure others in the
group could do a far better job.

Mike

On Wed, 15 Apr 1998 tom7...@hotmail.com wrote:

*Some* Griffith films, by post-World War I standards, are indeed "stagey,
hokey, [and have] not aged well," but Griffith knew how to make even the
most maudlin material real and believable.  Look at _Way Down East_ for a
good example.  Modern feminists have praised Lillian Gish's assertive
portrayal of Anna Moore when she protests against the double sexual
standard to which she is subjected--a far cay from the stereotypes
surrounding Griffith *and* Miss Gish.

We *know* that Anna Moore will be rescued from the waterfall and
vindicated, but we like to see how it happens.  *That's* why
that rescue scene still draws whoops and cheers as wild as anything
Harrison Ford's or Bruce Willis's characters may do today.  Ditto for when
Miss Gish's Henriette Girard (in _Orphans of the Storm_) is saved from
losing her head . . .

*Keep in mind that we need to judge silent films not only from our own
perspective, but from that of the era in which they were made.  What
we might see as hokey and cliched was fresh and new when Griffith and
his contemporaries did it!*

Film, in its infancy, was just as exciting as the Internet is for us
today. Imagine what people thought of art titles, tinting, and two-strip
Technicolor--not to mention the basic language of film, the art of editing
and camera work which Griffith, more than any person in history, founded
and used. For people in the first part of this century, "primitive"
films like Griffith's Biograph shorts, or similar work by the likes of
Edison, Melies, or Hepworth, were just as exciting--and as important--as
the invention of Unix, hypertext, or the microprocessor itself!  Indeed,
in terms of technology, economics, and social impact, today's computer
industry offers us perhaps the closest modern parallel to the early film
industry.  And Griffith was and is every bit as important to film as Bill
Gates is to computers today!  Griffith, in fact, envisioned film-oriented
libraries where people could learn about anything they wanted through
film.  Does this sound a bit like the Net?

As James Agee very eloquently wrote, Griffith achieved what no
other known person had achieved.  Agee compared seeing Griffith's work to
seeing the first use of the wheel or lever, or the first use of language.
(I don't have the exact quote at hand tonight--does anyone else have it?)
No, Griffith, contrary to what his disciples, from Lillian Gish and Billy
Bitzer on down sometimes at least seemed to imply, did *not* do it alone,
but he certainly led the way in devising and institutionalizing the
language that formed the foundation for all film, not to mention
television and other forms of video, including Internet video!

Granted, Griffith's view of history--and of issues involving race, class,
gender, and the like--was often naive and, at worst,
distorted and just plain wrong.  No one with an IQ over one's shoe size
would agree with the racism, sexism, and pure historical misinformation
which pervades the likes of _The Birth of a Nation_, but no one can deny
its importance in film, cultural, and other history.  It forever changed
film from being perceived as a mere toy into a serious medium and social
force comparable in its impact and controversy to the Net today!

Yes, _Intolerance_, by today's standards, is simplistic and naive in
places, but it holds up, too, and always will, as an overwhelming work of
art comparable to a great symphony, or, better yet, a fugue.  Its message
is eternal--intolerance has crippled human understanding and progress
throughout history, but we *can* choose to stop letting history repeat
itself.  As Arnold Toynbee noted, sadly, "what we learn from history is
that we do not learn."  Griffith's _Intolerance_ seems to agree with
Toynbee here, but makes it clear that we *can* learn and act to assure a
better future.

Of course, in addition to these two great if flawed Griffith filmic
masterworks, you only need watch his Biograph shorts to see how quickly
his--and film's--language evolved.  From there, it was a short step to
_Judith of Bethulia_ and beyond . . . Griffith, IMO, was at his best in
such lyrical films as _Broken Blossoms_, a film which shakes and stuns
audiences into literal tears almost 80 years after it first did.

As is widely known, Griffith had a hard time modifying his films to fit
the popular tastes of the 1920s, struggling to recapture the success he
had in the 1910s.  However, his last film, _The Struggle_--a powerful
portrayal of alcoholism made 14 years before _The Lost Weekend_--is widely
praised today, while it was panned in 1931.  Meanwhile, his second-to-last
film, _Abraham Lincoln_ (1930), praised then, is today considered static
and stagey.

But his weaknesses--and he had many--cannot overshadow his great and
enduring contributions to the art of film.  Even Cecil B. de Mille--no
slouch in the self-esteem department--admitted that "Griffith had no
rivals.  He was the teacher of us all."

If you haven't, take a look at _The Films of D. W. Griffith_ by Edward
Wagenknecht and Anthony Slide for what I think the best--and most
balanced--book about Griffith's films.  The best biography I've seen of
him yet is Richard Schickel's _D. W. Griffith:  An American Life_.

Please let me know your reactions to all this!

Meanwhile, does anyone know of Leona Phillips, a Griffith superfan who
wrote a book called _D. W. Griffith:  Titan of the Film Art_?  It would be
great to have her in this newsgroup.

Keep watching those silents, keep thinking and researching, keep posting!

Scott Enk c):-)>=

s...@execpc.com

Broken Blossoms is one of my favorite Griffith films.  While some of the titles are sentimental and hokey, and Barthlemess is not really Asian, it is still a powerful film.  It took balls for Griffith to make a tragedy like this when the rest of the industry was putting out "feel-good" films.

On the other hand, the mark of a really good critical book on Griffith is how the writer handles the racism of Birth.  I think that the best that I've read is Chapter 4 of Scott Simmons' book The Films of D.W. Griffith.

Don't forget that Griffith was a product of his time.  His sentimental hokum was wildly popular up to Way Down East, put when the times changed in the 1920's, he couldn't change with them.  And to single out Griffith because of the racist Birth is unfair, because just about every movie about blacks during the silent period was racist.  Griffith just made a wildly entertaining film that made lots of money that was also racist.  African-American's were seldom shown on the silent screen, and when they were it was as gamblers or watermelon eaters or bit parts as railroad porters or maids.

While DeMille was a more "modern" director, his films were pretty hokey too.  In the twenties, he made a lot of wildly expensive, flashy morality tales that focused on materialism.  Also, how many talented actors and actresses (and directors) started their careers with Griffith, as compared to those who DeMille developed?

Griffith was overrated in the past, because he promoted himself well and the output of other talented directors like Maurice Tourneur was not available for reappraisal.

(Jon reaches for his nitroglycerin tablets due to the shock of seeing actual
discussion in this newsgroup...)  Well, Tom, tell us what you *really* think.
Don't hold back now!

I would put Griffith somewhere in between the two camps.  Not the greatest
director of all time, but certainly a major influence on the formative years of
film.  Actually, during his Biograph years, I think Griffith was head and
shoulders above everyone, but by 1923, he was already second-rank.  Another way
to say this is that if I had to list the 10 best films of 1911, they would all
be Griffith Biographs.  The 10 best films of 1912 would be Griffith Biographs.
The 10 best films of 1913 would be Griffith Biographs.  By 1917, I doubt
Griffith would have many films at all in the best 10 of that year or any after
it.  BROKEN BLOSSOMS and ORPHANS OF THE STORM are great films and would
qualify.  WAY DOWN EAST might.  But from 1923 on, he wouldn't hit the top 100
in any year.  Is he less important than DeMille.  No, probably not.  They had
different styles and made different contributions.

For those interested in Griffith alternatives, there is a nice little booklet
done by Richard Koszarski published as part of a 1976 Walker Art Center series
in Minneapolis.  It's called "The Rivals of D.W. Griffith" and you can
sometimes find it at used specialty bookshops like Larry Edmunds or at dealers
tables at film festivals.  It's a 60-page booklet with pictures and commentary
on some of the other major directors/producers working in the teens.  Very
interesting if you enjoy this era and have an interest in anyone other than
Griffith.
===============================
Jon Mirsalis
e-mail: Chaney...@aol.com
Jon's Film Sites: http://members.aol.com/ChaneyFan/jonfilm.htm
Lon Chaney Home Page: http://members.aol.com/ChaneyFan

In one film course I took, we were often shown films that were "historically
important" but unwatchable. These films were shown because they had
innovations, novelties, etc. But they were bad films.
DW's films are bad. It is no use insisting that they are great when very few
people can sit through Intolerance without feeling as if they are having root
canal done. And in order to get them to sit through Birth of a Nation, he had
to exploit some of the most explosive prejudices in our history. WHo couldn't
have done as much?
DW's last film shows what he clearly was-a victorian sentimentalist with an
eye for editing and the last minute rescue.
Way down east is way too long-filled with country bumpkin stereotypes that are
cartoonish. Broken Blossoms has its moments but is equally absurd in others.
His biograph shorts were all hit and miss affairs.
(crouching down to avoid the volley of tomatoes!)
tom7tom

In article <1998041604380401.AAA01...@ladder01.news.aol.com>,
  chaney...@aol.com (ChaneyFan) wrote:

DW's films are bad. It is no use insisting that they are great when very
few people can sit through Intolerance without feeling as if they are
having root canal done. And in order to get them to sit through Birth of
a Nation, he had to exploit some of the most explosive prejudices in our
history. WHo couldn't have done as much? DW's last film shows what he
clearly was-a victorian sentimentalist with an eye for editing and the
last minute rescue. Way down east is way too long-filled with country
bumpkin stereotypes that are cartoonish. Broken Blossoms has its moments
but is equally absurd in others. His biograph shorts were all hit and
miss affairs. (crouching down to avoid the volley of tomatoes!)
tom7tom

------------------------

Your broad generalizations are specious.  Just because the people in
your film course weren't fans doesn't mean that they are a good
representation of silent film fans.  I found Intolerance easier to sit
through than many short comedies.  Just curious, which films do you
consider "watchable"?

Mike

In article <6h2a9c$fl...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>,

David B. Pearson
DG: Excerpts from Griffith's Greatest Films
http://www.uno.edu/~drcom/Griffith

-----== Posted via Deja News, The Leader in Internet Discussion ==-----
http://www.dejanews.com/   Now offering spam-free web-based newsreading

There is, in fact, an exhaustive reexamination and reappraisal of Griffth going
on right now and it will continue for several years.
Starting with last year's Pordenone silent film festival, ALL of Griffith's
surviving films are being screened by and for the world's film scholars and
writers in the order they were produced.
One response of those present for the screening of all of 1908 this past
october was that only by seeing all of these films could one realize what it
must have been like for him to relentlessly grind out one film (sausages he
called them) after another. The fact that he could be creative and clever and
innovative with so many of them is truly remarkable. Grifith did as much to
transform the movies in those early years as he did with BOAN and other later
films.  

I suspect that in the end, there will be a very interesting "new" and more
solidly based view of Griffith and his contributions. But he will always be
regarded as one of the eariest great masters of the craft --even if his
once-popular films don't provoke the same enthusiasm today that they once did.
Several people here have mentioned "A Corner in Wheat" and I'd like to add
something which I experienced a few years ago as an example of the fact that
Griffith's best work does still have the power to move even modern audiences.
A group of early films were screened for an audience at the Univeristy of
Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. The audience was mostly young college students
who were obviously there for a good time/laugh. They started laughing the
second the first introductory title went up on the screen. And continued
laughing-- until A Corner in Wheat was shown. There was a half hearted laugh
during the first shot. Then silence, in fact a stillness, while the rest of the
film ran. They were completely engrossed. At the end there was applause (!)
It's not for nothing that this film is considered a masterpiece.
In the end, in spite of much valid criticism,  Griffith will always be judged
on his considerable body of excellent work, not on his failures.
Joe Eckhardt

I'm happy that his work is still around. Not lost, not in a archive in Slobonia
where it can't be touched.  We know his work so there is no guessing of what
film might have been.
I wish we had that luxury with all directors.
I have seen a lot of D.W.'s work and I know Jon will agree, it helps to see
Birth of Nation etc. on a large screen with a talented organist at the
keyboard.  Otherwise crank up the fps so you can say you have seen it.

D.W. (coincidence?) Atkinson

D.W. Atkinson

http://members.aol.com/Cinesation

Yes, I agree with Mike.  And of course the *real* question is: in your film
course where you saw INTOLERANCE, which tinted 35mm print did you see and which
orchestra accompanied it live?

I assume of course you have the sense not to judge a film like this based on
seeing a b/w 16mm in dead silence or (gasp!) even worse, a video tape of it.
This is like taking an Art History course where all the images are presented to
the class in 3rd generation b/w photocopies.
===============================
Jon Mirsalis
e-mail: Chaney...@aol.com
Jon's Film Sites: http://members.aol.com/ChaneyFan/jonfilm.htm
Lon Chaney Home Page: http://members.aol.com/ChaneyFan

   Show me another director who was *moving* the camera like
Griffith was in the teens. Hell, in the early 20s other Hollywood
films were still not moving the camera. See Alan Dwan's ROBIN
HOOD for example (a good movie) - not a single moving shot in
the film.
   The oddity of Griffith was that he combined a great sense of
technical and stylistic innovation with a very old-fashioned, Victorian
sensibility. It's one of the great ironies of cinema history that THE
BIRTH OF A NATION, the film that brought movies to another level
in style, was reactionary in content.
   There's been a little bit of a backlash against Griffith as innovator
lately. But as good as directors like Tourneur or DeMille could be,
they just didn't have the impact on the *craft* of filmmaking that
Griffith did. The man practically invented the art of film editing.

Dashiell

When I first saw INTOLERANCE I was 17 and was blown away by it. As a
high school senior I thought it was one of the greatest films I had ever
seen silent or sound (and I'd only seen a few silents by that time). A
film collector friend in his 20s showed me his 8mm print, synchronizing
records on his stereo throughout the film. I now have seen enough other
films and other Griffith to readjust my assessment of it in relation to
what else was going on and what else he did, but it remains impressive
and is still ahead of its time in concept. Since then I have also
acquired my own 16mm tinted print from MoMA, which I have run for small
but INTERESTED groups including college-age people (not film class
students looking for "a easy A"), who have been equally impressed.

Christopher Jacobs
http://www.und.nodak.edu/instruct/cjacobs/Reviews.htm

Just to clarify something that Christopher Jacobs quoted:

Mike

I have seen Intolerance six times. After each viewing, I was told that my
negative reactions were due to seeing a bad print. So, dutifully, I would
seek out another print. I found an excellent print in a university library.
Again, I was unimpressed. DW supporters told me that I had to see a REALLY
good print. I recently saw the Kino release. I saw no significant difference
in film quality between that one and the University library version. It
remains an unwatchable film. Even acquaintances who dearly love silent
movies and will sit through almost anything from the teens and
twenties, find little in Intolerance to hold their attention and cannot
get through what seems like an eternity of gratuitous crosscutting of
stagey scenarios.
I agree that DW had a strong intuitive feel for editing in some of his films.
In other films, though, it is clear that DW has no idea when to call
"Cut!" The long country bumpkin episodes in many of his films (Way down
East is just one of many examples) are simply crude cartoonish depictions
that make his films leadfooted and would have ended up on the editing room
floor of someone who truly understood pacing. How unfortunate that his best
editing is put to the service of racism (the ride of the Klan IS impressive).
I can assure you that the film class I took was filled with students deeply
interested in film. We spoke about Keaton, Lang, Hitchcock, etc, as earlier
generations spoke of Dickens, Fielding and so forth. While many directors
gained new fans as a result of that class, the teacher was often at a loss to
convince us, after viewing his work, that his films were enjoyable or
interesting when they plainly were not.

tom7tom

article <3536FE12.6...@badlands.nodak.edu>,
  Christopher Jacobs <chjac...@badlands.nodak.edu> wrote:

I think we are reaching a cultural impasse where, lacking any
grounding in any of the past not obviously necessary for bare bones
survival in a rapidly changing world, future generations will lack an
understanding of ANYTHING from before their time. And they won;t
really need to.

Knowing just a little about silent film at the time, I personally
found my first viewing of INTOLERANCE to be fascinating and thrilling,
both for its sheer scale of spectacle and production, and for its
dramatic impact. I was about sixteen I think, and hardly a film
scholar. I admit to not having the same taste as the mass public then,
and probably do much less so today.

----------------------------
Secret Cinema website:
http://www.voicenet.com/~jschwart

You thought Broken Blossoms was absurd? Hmm.  
And yes, Way Down East's comic elements were menat to be cartoonish (although
when they play was written - cartoons (comic strips) and films were probably
equaly
"in depth". Say can we call the stereotyping of NewEnglanders  racism too?*

No accounting for taste, but to take a nod from the Sennett thread; I'd rather
watch a DW Griffith film than a Jim Carney film...

Steven Rowe   * comment meant rhetoricaly

There weren't many, but there were a few. SECOND IN COMMAND (1915)
directed by William J. Bowman and photographed by William Alder, has
almost non-stop tracking and dolly shots, so much so that it can be
distracting--although the film as a whole is not particularly
engrossing. Possibly it was an experiment to see the effect of a camera
that won't stay still (cf. TITANIC today), a technique exploited mainly
in long-shots by the Italian CABIRIA (1914). Even TRAFFIC IN SOULS
(1913) has some moving camera shots and amazingly sophisticated editing,
but again is not as compelling as most Griffith of the period. (Even THE
GREAT TRAIN ROBBERY mounted the camera on a moving train for one shot in
1903 and also panned and tilted to follow the actors.)

Christopher Jacobs

A few people like Griffith and (later) John Ford have been deified by many in
the academic film community.  They were superb directors who made major
contributions to the art form.  But frankly, they are simply well-known,
well-studied filmmakers and get a disproportionate share of attention.   Many
others of the same era were doing similarly impressive films.  Why carp?  There
are lots of great silent films and lots of great silent filmmakers.
===============================
Jon Mirsalis
e-mail: Chaney...@aol.com
Jon's Film Sites: http://members.aol.com/ChaneyFan/jonfilm.htm
Lon Chaney Home Page: http://members.aol.com/ChaneyFan

So I think you have just answered my thread from yesterday.  It sounds like the
best you have ever seen is a 16mm dupe print, or maybe the Kino video???  And
you are judging the film based on that?

Let's put this in perspective:  In the year 2080, a film discussion group
(alt.movies.non-holographic, done then with cerebral implants) is discussing
the merits of a very old classic film.  The conversation goes something like
this:

Zeek:  Is it just me, or do you guys think TITANIC (1997) is a crashing bore?
I mean, they say that film had matured by the late 20th century, but I just
can't believe this thing won an Oscar (the old award they gave before the
Zonkwog Honor became the top media award).

EZoog:  I think you're missing the point Zeek.  The version we have today is
missing the iceberg sequence and the color has been artificially recreated
after the original faded.  It was a painstaking job, but at least they've
restored the film to almost it's original 2 hr and 15 min length.

Zeek:  Yeh, but it just isn't exciting!

EZoog:  Are you watching this on the 2 cm wristband display or a kingsize 9 x
16 cm LCD palm viewer?

Zeek:  Well, OK, I've only seen it on the 2 cm, and I can't actually tell Kate
Winslow from Lennert DeCipria, but the boat looks so tiny, I just don't
understand why they couldn't have used a hovercraft and lifted the damn thing
out of the water before it sank.  Were these people stupid back then or
something?

CyberZone:  I'd like to butt in here and point out that the current extant
version has these awful computerized recreations where they re-image the
characters for the missing scenes.  It looks really fake.

Gen-QGal: Well, I don't know how you guys can watch these 2-D movies anyway.
Once HoloVision came in, they should have just burned these old color films and
reclaimed the valuable acetate.

MoonBoy: My grandfather said he saw it when it came out and said it was really
something.  This was back when they actually ran films in big arenas called
movie theaters and you'd, like, sit with 100s of strangers you didn't know and
watch it.

Gen-QGal: Ewwww!  Gross!  Gag me with a LaserPerm!

MoonBoy:  Yeh, sounds kinky.  But by grandad said it was immense.  I mean, when
the ship went down the picture was like 80 meters high, and even in 2D it was a
tremendously exciting experience.

CyberZone:  Get out!  No way!

MoonBoy:  No, really.  My grandad said that the way we watch films now, on
little tiny LCD screens, with tiny speakers, watching alone in our Zen Boxes is
nothing at all like what the original movie experience was.  He said it is
almost impossible today to recreate the experience of what it must have been
like to see these old films in beautiful prints, the way they were intended to
be shown.

Zeek:  Well, I still think it's a rotten movie.

MoonBoy:  You know, my grandad said that some people thought that when it came
out too, but we still can't judge it ourselves today seeing the poor quality,
cut, partially reconstructed versions with the crummy inserted re-imaged scenes
that are available.

EZoog:  I hear that down on earth there's a private collector that actually has
the complete 2 hr 40 min version on the original 53mm film they used to use
before everything went to OptoDisc.  I'd sure love to see that print some day,
but since the Copyright Re-Extension Act of 2015, it won't go p.d. until 2122
so we may never get to see it.

CyberZone:  Say, not to change the subject, but I'm really interested in that
pre-holo era and wondered if anyone had ever seen SCHINDLER'S LIST or THE COLOR
PURPLE, two of the rare films directed by one of my favorite directors, Steven
Spielberg.

MoonBoy:  No.  Unfortunately these are both lost.
===============================
Jon Mirsalis
e-mail: Chaney...@aol.com
Jon's Film Sites: http://members.aol.com/ChaneyFan/jonfilm.htm
Lon Chaney Home Page: http://members.aol.com/ChaneyFan

I appreciate the difference between 16mm & 35mm (though I have seen
underlit home 35mm theaters that looked no better than video). It just
seems that a lot of posters on this newgroup (actually not usually
you, Jon) are very snobbish in their posts about film gauges. The post
where someone bragged about his original print of SUNRISE took the
cake for this trend, though if it was in fact not true then it was a
brilliant parody of 35mm snobbery. I'm glad I've seen all of the 16mm
and even 8mm dupe prints of silents that I've watched over the years,
rather than waiting for a pristine 35mm screening to come along (with
an orchestra yet...get serious!). The tone of these posts resmbles the
tone of posts worrying about the current perspective on Griffith, and
smacks of a politically correct way to view films.

Obviously it is easier to appreciate older films when seeing them
under optimum conditions and as close as to the original presentation
as possible. But I would suggest that if someone seriously studying
film couldn't imagine the perspective of original audiences a little,
then he is not going to be a very good student of film.

Of course, Jon, if you want to throw away your 16mm collection you
know where to reach me.

- Jay Schwartz

----------------------------
Secret Cinema website:
http://www.voicenet.com/~jschwart

----------------------------
Secret Cinema website:
http://www.voicenet.com/~jschwart