Hello my little carts before the horse, I’ve still got a ton of editing to do so here are some original, silent Surrealist and Dada films. Toodle pip!
Entr’acte (1924)
Directed by Rene Clair (though multiple people worked on the project), this was first shown during the intermission of a Swedish ballet at the Theater of Champs Elysées in Paris. Erik Satie provided the music for this and the ballet on the night.
Jujiro (1928)
Directed by Teinosuke Kinugasa, Jujiro (Crossroads) was the most successful Japanese export to the West before Rashomon. Kinugasa belonged to the Dada and Surrealist influenced art collective Shinkankakuha (New Sensationalists).
I couldn’t find a copy with English subtitles, sorry!
The Life and Death of 9413 A Hollywood Extra (1928)
I’m fascinated by the dark side of Hollywood (aren’t we all?) so this might be my favourite. Directed by Robert Florey and Slavko Vorkapić, the film was inspired by Florey’s own Hollywood experiences and features early use of Vorkapić’s film-making invention, the montage. Made in America, it was very successful.
The Seashell And The Clergyman (1928)
Touted now as the first surrealist film, Germaine Dulac’s film was overshadowed at the time by Un Chien Andalou, made a year later, and was not well received. Dulac’s films often featured feminist themes.
Emak Bakia (1926)
Man Ray is one of my favourite surrealists, possibly because of his amazing fashion photos. Kiki of Montparnasse (Alice Prin) makes an appearance, the artist’s model, nightclub singer, memoirist, painter and all round fabulous 1920s bohemian. Emak Bakia means Leave Me Alone in Basque.
Good day my little ships that no-one remembers putting in a bottle, you were just there one day, watching from the mantelpiece. I’ve been reading about fascinating women and long to share them with you. I don’t know why I’ve focused so much on women, it was purely accidental.
Billie is one of those people that so many stories have been told about, nobody really knows what’s true. The fact that she enjoyed a good yarn didn’t help matters, much of her autobiography is fiction. How she must have chuckled. Anyway, this intensive biography is filled with first hand interviews and great research, and delves right into the Billie in the soft squishy centre. True, terrible things happened to her and she lived in a time even more racist than now, but she was a tough lady and certainly not a victim.
Billie Holiday singing Strange Fruit, a disturbing nightmare of a song about lynching:
Belle Epoque courtesan Liane de Pougy kept a diary from 1919 to 1941. It’s an enjoyable insight into one woman’s thoughts, but unfortunately it’s no unexpurgated Anais Nin. She began writing after she was already married to a Romanian Prince and her naughtiness was mostly behind her, but stick with it as she often drifts into reminiscence.
Not that her life is completely uninteresting at the time of writing. She was good friends with poet Max Jacobs, artist and filmmaker Jean Cocteau and writer Marcel Proust among others, and had unfinished business with more than one woman. But, if it’s juicy stuff you’re after, I recommend Anais Nin.
“Look at this communication from mamma, all on account of a wine stained dress. Sometimes I get so bored and sick for you…it helps then…and afterwards I’m just more bored and sicker for you – and ashamed.”
This biography tries to capture Zelda Fitzgerald, wife of F Scott, in all her volatile, complicated glory. She at once wanted independence and to be looked after, to make art but was afraid to try for real, to live wildly and to have Scott to herself. She was a fascinating, complicated woman and one many confused but passionate people can relate to now. She encapsulated something about the twenties, the new speed with which the young travelled, but also the lows that followed when some deeper need inside yourself is left unfulfilled.
After the disappointment of Memoirs of a Geisha I wanted to read a true account of one of Japan’s living art dolls. until recently it was a world shrouded in secrecy, ramping up the curiosity of outsiders and leading to gossip. I’m sure sex work was a part of life for some Geisha, but I don’t think it was the rule. Perhaps it depended on the individual and circumstance.
I loved this book, it felt as though she’d popped round for tea and a chat. The characters are vivid as are descriptions of Japan undergoing a dramatic change from the old feudal system to the modern country it is now, and the details of gruelling practice and homesickness capture what a crazily disciplined life this was.
Mineko pops up in an interview during this TV spot:
I turned the pages like a mad woman during this book. Perhaps it was my former career as an artist’s model, or maybe her vulnerability that made me want to protect her, but the model who posed as Ophelia among others seemed very real and somehow modern.
Trapped by her love of artist Rossetti despite his commitment to free love, addicted to morphine and possibly anorexic, she was as much a doomed tragic heroine as Ophelia. Lucinda’s writing is objective and looks at scenarios from all points of view. She doesn’t make excuses for Lizzie’s sometimes unreasonable behaviour but doesn’t condemn her either, thus we can appreciate her as a well-rounded, exasperating but lovely human being.
Despite radiating the sixties from her very pores, there was also something fabulously twenties about Edie Sedgwick. The way she held her cigarette, her Holly Golightly mannerisms, her ability to dive into the dark side with an innocent mischief.
This is probably the perfect book about Edie because it’s filled with people who were actually there. Everyone has their own perspective and, rather than chop and change to fit an easy narrative, it’s all there. This brings us Edie the person, not the angel other books project. Yes, she was magnetic, but she also stole from friends and had a wildly selfish side. Far from putting us off, it allows us to enjoy and learn about her as a whole instead of a flickering, unobtainable image on a screen.
A collage of pictures and footage over tapes she made in the psychiatric unit for her last film Ciao Manhattan:
Good day my little vegetarian popsicles! I watched and enjoyed the first series of Z: The Beginning Of Everything. It’s no Mad Men or The Wire but it’s entertaining and I’m fascinated by the era (as you may have noticed) and the Fitzgeralds.
Zelda just hanging out
Zelda had only one novel published, Save Me The Last Waltz, and you can read a short story of hers here from before she met Scott. I’d also recommend her sort of biography. However I was unable to find any documentaries on Zelda herself, though that might change since she’s had something of a media renaissance lately. With that in mind here are some other fabulous 1920s ladies.
Josephine Baker was THE iconic lady of 1920s Paris. Dancer, singer, artist’s muse and activist, she paved the way for other black superstars and never gave up, despite some terrible treatment in her native America.
Clara Bow was all but forgotten until recent times, but in her day she was as popular as Marilyn Monroe. The refreshingly honest and brash New Yorker was never accepted into the Hollywood elite and sought solace in her fans, turning her back on the town once and for all after a series of scandals. For another documentary about her click here.
Louise Brooks was one of the most chic women to grace the silent pictures. She, too, suffered a fall once sound hit due to studio bosses using it as a threat: “stop embarrassing us by going out with lots of men or we’ll tell everyone your voice was horrible,” but she turned out to be a fantastic writer.
Intense and brooding onscreen, Anna May Wong would be forever cast as the exotic ‘other,’ imitated by white women at Hollywood parties she was unable to attend herself. Anna didn’t let that stop her though, and wasn’t afraid to try new mediums like ‘television.’
Though I don’t have a documentary about Dorothy Parker I couldn’t let her go unmentioned. As you might be able to tell from my live video of her story But The One On The Right and my post of various others reading her work, I’m a big fan.
However you can’t have Dorothy without mentioning The Algonquin Round Table and I did find a documentary on that. The mention of her is fairly brief but you get the spirit of her life in New York as a wit and poet along with equally vibrant characters. If you’re interested there’s a biopic called Mrs Parker and the Vicious Circle. It’s flawed but still quite interesting.
Ta dah! So put on your party frock and mix some gin (or lemonade, up to you) and enjoy!
Madeleine Swann 