Productions
The Hunchback of Notre Dame is a French Gothic novel written by Victor Hugo in 1831. Set during a time of French cultural upheaval in 15th-century Paris, the novel champions the preservation of Gothic architecture, particularly the iconic bell towers of Notre Dame. While the 1923 silent film is often regarded as Universal’s original monster movie, the drama focuses more on the tragic romance between Quasimodo and the Romani* street dancer Esmeralda as they evade the obsessive lust of Archdeacon Claude Frollo.
The 1923 silent film was shot on elaborate Hollywood sets, completely recreating 1482 Paris with a staggering budget of $1,250,000 and a cast of 2,500 extras—an unprecedented production for its time. It was the first film adaptation of Hugo’s novel and featured Lon Chaney as Quasimodo. Chaney, who would later portray the Phantom in the 1925 silent film The Phantom of the Opera, was famously known as “The Man of a Thousand Faces.” To create Quasimodo’s distinctive appearance, he reportedly used walnuts to stretch his cheeks beneath his makeup.
Since the 1923 silent film, the novel has inspired numerous stage and screen adaptations, most notably Disney’s 1996 animated musical, which features the acclaimed song “God Help the Outcasts.”
The Phantom of the Opera is a 1925 American silent horror film adapted from Gaston Leroux’s 1910 novel Le Fantôme de l’Opéra, directed by Rupert Julian and starring Lon Chaney in the title role of the deformed Phantom who haunts the Paris Opera House, causing murder and mayhem in an attempt to make the woman he is infatuated with a star. Long before the hit Broadway musical, the film was released on September 6, 1925, premiering at the Astor Theatre in New York and then re-released with some dialog, a live recording of Faust opera pieces synced to a new soundtrack, a fresh edit, and some colorization in 1929. The black and white portions of the film are original to 1925 and the original 1929 overdubbed dialog will be synced with this viewing. The last surviving cast member was Carla Laemmle (who died in 2014), who played a small role as a “prima ballerina” in the film when she was about 15.
Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror (German: Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens), or simply Nosferatu, is a 1922 German Expressionist horror film, directed by F. W. Murnau, starring Max Schreck as the vampire Count Orlok. The film, shot in 1921 and released in 1922, was an unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1897); the Stoker Estate had refused permission. Various names and other details were changed from the novel: for instance, vampire became Nosferatu, and Count Dracula became Count Orlok. Stoker’s heirs sued over the adaptation, and a court ruling ordered that all copies of the film be destroyed. However, a few prints of Nosferatu survived, and the film came to be regarded as an influential masterpiece of cinema. The film was released in the United States on 3 June 1929, seven years after its original premiere in Germany.
The Kid is considered one of the greatest films of the silent-film era and was written, produced, directed by, and starring Charlie Chaplin. It was the first feature length film directed by Chaplin and the main character was his already popular “Little Tramp”. The Tramp (played by Chaplin) rescues a baby who was reluctantly abandoned by a distressed mother and successfully raises him for a number of years. When the mother eventually attempts to retrieve the child (Jackie Coogan, age 6), the Tramp and his young protégé embark on a desperate attempt to escape. In this feature film, Charlie Chaplin demonstrated sensitivity and compassion that would be hallmarks of his future work. It also changed the face of cinematic comedy by not only delivering chortles by the bucket load, but also entwining them with pathos, creating a classic, heartwarming story that will have tears of laughter and affection meeting on the same cheeks. The restoration of this picture is made possible by Janus Films.