Silent Film Analysis

Today, most movie goers categorize ‘silent films’ into one genre and discard the stark differences that make Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat, The Great Train Robbery, and Broken Blossoms vastly dissimilar. In my opinion, these films clearly illustrate the evolution from silent film projection on a cafe wall to the birth of the hollywood that we know today. The profound contrast is most apparent in their stories, their performances, and the emotional response each film invokes. Collectively these films provide viewers with a clear perspective on how early film progressed from silent stills into what we call today, The Classical hollywood “silent” film era. Arrival of a Train at La Ciota,the first projected and enlarged 35mm film short, inadvertently

Arrival of a Train at La Ciota, produced by the Lumiere brothers, used actors that may of well of been ‘real people '. Today, we may even categorize this acting style of that of an ‘extra’. The Great Train Robbery employed individual artists to portray characters in the film. For the first time we see the beginning of the hollywood studio system including a featured star Gilbert M. 'Broncho Billy ' Anderson. In sum, the Porter flick showcased thirteen dramatic actors that played multiple different roles. In addition, the actors did not receive acting credits portraying an insight into one major difference during this time. The precedence of film before actor. As we know, this precedence quickly reversed as the movie star is now the driving attraction and the change was noticeable as early as Griffith’s Broken Blossoms. Distinctive to the film, Griffith administers a acting style that is as essential if not more to the film as the storyline is. The film would not be the same without Lillian Gish, which is in direct contrast to the other two films where the actors could be easily interchangeable. Different from today’s films, Gish and Barthelmess acting style were similar to that of stage acting with enormous and purposeful expressions. Specifically, Battling Burrows played by Donald Crisp exercises a large, almost non sensical acting style which is undeniably a result