Gaslight Follies

I can't believe that anyone would think this was funny. This movie adds new meaning to the word smarmy. At least the so-called witty commentators ended up nobodies while the people they lambasted are still remembered. The part that was supposed to be a homage to the silent stars was made ridiculous by who was left out: Paulette Goddard, Harry Langdon, Charlie Chase, Theda Bara and Buster Keaton! Take my advice and search out the silent classics to watch and not this.

This starts off as a wonderful excuse to indulge in some cinema nostalgia but sadly as it stops reflecting the stories of the past and starts presenting the dramas to us directly, it rather falls off a cliff. The opening section of this quartered feature illustrates some of the stars of the silent screen - some of the most unlikely and some of the most famous before taking us on quite an interesting and informative look through some of the early newsreels that deal with some fairly embryonic science and some of the world's great and good. The third and fourth parts are still in the same vein, but the Victorian Melodrama "the Drunkard" must have (I hope) looked far better on stage and finally a rehash of "East Lynne" - a silent movie made in the middle of the Great War that tells of familial discord in rather a cloying and sentimental fashion, but with a curiously sarcastic style of updated narration. It's a curio, this amalgam, and as such can prove to be engaging at times = if only because it showcases the long forgotten acts that drew in crowds to Vaudeville theatre and cinema alike. It's not good, no - but fans of cinema will get enough out of it to make it worth a watch.