MoMA’s fourth annual Silent Movie Week offers an uncommonly strong lineup of major films by major directors, including masterpieces by D. W. Griffith, Buster Keaton, Charles Chaplin, Raoul Walsh, Ernst Lubitsch, John Ford, and F. W. Murnau. For those unfamiliar with the sublime beauties of silent filmmaking, there could hardly be a better introduction. For those already familiar with the form, these newly restored editions offer a new level of experience.
It’s a tribute to the perspicacity of Iris Barry, MoMA’s first film curator in the 1930s, that six of the seven films featured in this year’s program are MoMA restorations (and the seventh, Sunrise, was restored by our friends at the San Francisco Film Preserve using some elements from MoMA). At a time when no other museums were collecting films as works of art, Barry toured the world and acquired original prints of a great many silent and early sound classics. In many cases, these prints remain the best source material for these important works today.
All seven programs have live musical accompaniment. The series opens with D. W. Griffith’s Way Down East, accompanied by a 10-piece orchestra performing the original 1920 score—composed and compiled by William Frederick Peters and Louis Silvers under Griffith’s supervision—in a deeply researched reconstruction by musicologist Gillian B. Anderson. The presentation of John Ford’s 3 Bad Men marks the premiere of a newly recorded orchestral score composed and conducted by Timothy Brock. Other features will be accompanied by MoMA’s rotating cast of world-class silent film accompanists, Makia Matsumura, Ben Model, and Donald Sosin.
Organized by Dave Kehr, Curator, and Steve Macfarlane, Department Assistant, Department of Film.
Film at MoMA is made possible by CHANEL.
Additional support is provided by the Annual Film Fund. Leadership support for the Annual Film Fund is provided by The Contemporary Arts Council of The Museum of Modern Art, Agnes Gund through The International Council of The Museum of Modern Art, the Association of Independent Commercial Producers (AICP), and The Young Patrons Council of The Museum of Modern Art.
Funding for film restorations is provided by the Lillian Gish Fund for Preservation.
