Filmmakers had been experimenting with Technicolor since the heyday of the Silent era, in which a two-tone process was used. The Black Pirate, directed by Albert Parker and starring Douglas Fairbanks, was the third movie and first feature to experiment with two-tone Technicolor, using two film strips to create vibrant palettes on the screen. more ›

Russian director Dziga Vertov's 1929 experimental film Man With a Movie Camera (aka The Man With the Movie Camera) is something of a masterpiece of silent film. Shot largely in Odessa with support from the Ukrainian film studio VUFKU, Vertov captures the dawn to dusk minutiae of citizens in the post-Bolshevik revolution Soviet Union. more ›

Movies from the silent era may not have had synchronized soundtracks but they were never silent either. House musicians at each theater would always play alongside the movie, performing either a specially composed score or improvising one. That tradition continues with the Sound of Silent Film Festival. Unspooling at the Chopin Theatre April 1-3, it features a number of silent shorts all featuring newly composed scores by Chicago composers performed live. more ›

Ninety years after its release, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari is regarded as one of the first horror films to reach a wide audience, one of the most well-known silent movies of all time, and a benchmark of early German expressionism. Tomorrow night's screening of the film isn't the first time the Silent Film Society of Chicago has featured it in a program. What makes this screening stand out is the score being performed by Jay Warren (the photoplay nom de guerre of SFSC President Dennis Wolkowicz) and theremin accompaniment from Professor J. Pierce. more ›

This Wednesday night Symphony Center will host the world premiere of the silent film Louis, a collaboration by Chicago native David Pritzker and Academy Award-winning cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond (Close Encounters of the Third Kind), with music performed live by Wynton Marsalis and his band. more ›

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