Living in the Era of Silent Films
By David Kan
I woke from the bed to find the sun shining in from the window, and remembered that
I had an appointment at the theatre later on in the morning. I got up from the bed just
as I heard my friend call. I picked up the phone and he told me that we would be
watching a film.
I arrived at the theatre a bit early and could not help but notice the posters
outside the theatre advertising new “subtitles” in the film. Also I saw what seemed
like an orchestra arriving at the rear entrance of the theatre and they were quickly
hustled in to the building. My friend arrived and we bought tickets and went to find
our seats. I saw the orchestra I had seen a few minutes earlier positioned next to the
stage and wondered what they were there for. The film finally started but a few
minutes into the film I realized that there was no sound but as I started to ask what
was wrong, I heard the orchestra playing to the music and subtitles appeared on the
screen whenever there was dialogue. However the audience was constantly noisy so
they drowned out the noise of the orchestra. Meanwhile every time when there was
dialogue, the screen would turn black and words would be shown, before returning
back to the film. This meant the scenes and plot seemed to be cut, making the film
seems strange. The film ended and people soon filed away.
In my opinion the silent films allows actors to be more focused on acting rather
than what they say. The audience has to interpret what the actors want to express
through their actions, thus silent films emphasizes on brilliant actors. However silent
films rely on the orchestra which is sometimes not very reliable so there are places for
mistakes and more room for error.