In the late 1920s, Heigo became a benshi ( silent film narrator ) for Tokyo theaters showing foreign films, and quickly made a name for himself.

The Birth of a Nation ( originally called The Clansman ) is a 1915 silent drama film directed by D. W. Griffith and based on the novel and play The Clansman, both by Thomas Dixon, Jr. Griffith co-wrote the screenplay ( with Frank E. Woods ), and co-produced the film ( with Harry Aitken ).

" The film is noteworthy for its invocation of silent film techniques and an insistence on the jump-cut for effect.

* The Blot, a 1921 silent film

A silent film of one of these early streetcars in Berkeley can be seen at the Library of Congress website: " A Trip To Berkeley, California "

Sir Charles Spencer " Charlie " Chaplin, KBE ( 16 April 188925 December 1977 ) was an English comic actor, film director and composer best known for his work during the silent film era.

He was influenced by his predecessor, the French silent film comedian Max Linder, to whom he dedicated one of his films.

He therefore rejected the new Hollywood craze and proceeded to develop a silent film.

* From 1917 to 1918, silent film actor Billy West made more than 20 films as a comedian precisely imitating Chaplin's tramp character, makeup and costume.

Category: English silent film actors

One of the oldest genres in film, some of the very first silent movies were comedies.

The genre dates from the silent era, and the most famous examples of this type of film would be those produced by Monty Python.

In American film, the most prominent comic actors of the silent era were Charlie Chaplin ( although born in England, his success was principally in the U. S .), Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd.

During the 1930s, the silent film comedy was replaced by dialogue from film comedians such as the W. C. Fields and the Marx Brothers.

The comedian Charlie Chaplin was one of the last silent film hold-outs, and his films during the 1930s were devoid of dialogue, although they did employ sound effects.

* In 1927, a feature-length silent film Casey at the Bat was released, starring Wallace Beery, Ford Sterling, and ZaSu Pitts.

Cecil Blount DeMille ( August 12, 1881 – January 21, 1959 ) was an American film director and Academy Award-winning film producer in both silent and sound films.

DeMille remade his early hit The Squaw Man twice, once as a silent film The Squaw Man ( 1918 ) and then as a sound film The Squaw Man ( 1931 ).

* Cleopatra ( 1912 film ), a silent film created in 1912 by Helen Gardner

He directed dozens of silent films, including Paramount Pictures ' first production, The Squaw Man ( 1914 ), which was co-directed by Oscar Apfel, before coming into huge popularity during the late 1910s and early 1920s, when he reached the apex of his popularity with such films as Don't Change Your Husband ( 1919 ), The Ten Commandments ( 1923 ), and The King of Kings ( 1927 ).

It went on to become a silent movie of the same name, directed by Alfred Hitchcock and filmed in 1927.

* Aelita, a 1924 silent film directed by Yakov Protazanov based on Alexei Tolstoy's novel of the same name

Yasujirō Ozu directed Good Morning ( 1959 ) and Floating Weeds ( 1958 ), which was adapted from his earlier silent A Story of Floating Weeds ( 1934 ), and was shot by Rashomon / Sansho the Bailiff cinematographer Kazuo Miyagawa.

Over the next three years, Hawks directed his first eight films ( six silent, two " talkies ").

* Phantom ( 1922 film ), a silent movie directed by F. W. Murnau

In 1990 Charles Lane directed and starred in Sidewalk Stories, a low budget salute to sentimental silent comedies particularly Charlie Chaplin's The Kid.

The 2007 Australian film Dr Plonk, was a silent comedy directed by Rolf de Heer.

The 2011 French film The Artist, written and directed by Michel Hazanavicius, plays as a silent film and is set in Hollywood during the silent era.

The campaigns began with a series of adverts based on the 1986 French film Jean de Florette, directed by the British duo Anthea Benton and Vaughan Arnell, moving on to other genres including war movies, silent comedy and even surrealism.

Best known as the director of Dracula ( 1931 ), the cult classic Freaks ( 1932 ), and classic silent film collaborations with Lon Chaney, Browning directed many movies in a wide range of genres.

One of the earliest adaptations was a silent movie directed by Walter Lang, Alice Through a Looking Glass, in 1928.

* 1915: A silent film version was directed by Sidney Olcott and starred Mary Pickford.

Building on its later popularity in the nineteenth and early twentieth-century ethnic routines of the American vaudeville house, the style was explored extensively during the " golden era " of black and white, silent movies directed by figures Mack Sennett and Hal Roach and featuring such notables as Charlie Chaplin, Laurel and Hardy, the Marx Brothers, the Keystone Kops, Gumball ( TV series ) the Three Stooges and El Chavo.

* Lady Audley's Secret ( aka Secrets of Society ) 1915 ( USA, black and white, silent, directed by Marshall Farnum )

* Lady Audley's Secret 1920 ( UK, black and white, silent, directed by Jack Denton )

The Last Laugh () is a German 1924 silent film directed by German director F. W. Murnau from a screenplay written by Carl Mayer.

He starred in two silent films directed by Alfred Hitchcock, The Lodger and Downhill, both in 1927.

In 1917, the band made the first appearance of a jazz band in a motion picture, a silent movie entitled, The Good for Nothing ( 1917 ), directed by Carlyle Blackwell, who also played the lead role as Jack Burkshaw.

* Hua Mulan Joins the Army ( 1927 film ) – a Chinese silent film released by the Tianyi Film Company and directed by Li Pingqian.

Wings is a 1927 silent film about World War I fighter pilots, produced by Lucien Hubbard, directed by William A. Wellman and released by Paramount Pictures.

Although Ford had made many Westerns in the silent film era, he had never previously directed a sound Western.

Ford had not directed a western since the silent days, the most notable of which had been The Iron Horse ( 1924 ).