Oldest film you've seen at a cinema?

LordoftheDance · 28-05-2009, 08:51

Prompted by the 'Zulu' discussion over on the HD thread, what's the oldest film you've had the fortune to catch on the big screen?

Mine was F.W.Murnau's Nosferatu (1922), which was then followed by the Herzog remake (which I didn't enjoy half as much).

My second favourite I saw at the same cinema (and 2nd oldest film I've seen there) was Charles Laughton's Night of the Hunter (1955) which was a fantastic experience.

Alan George · 28-05-2009, 09:09

Growing up in 50's-60's West London, there were three types of local cinema; ABC, Rank (Rank always seemed more posh) & the independent re-run cinema's. I saw all the old John Wayne westerns there, & the first two Tarzans, & King Kong. I would think the oldest films I saw were at Saturday Morning Pictures (as we called it), some very old movies shown there.

Captain_Howdy666 · 28-05-2009, 09:11

I think mine is The Young And Innocent. I saw this in St. Albans last year or the year before. They had a crime and punishment week and as part of this had three Hitchcock movies back to back. The others being Psycho & Rear Window. The Young And Innocent was actually a replacement for The Lady Vanishes as they couldn't source a print for it in time.

I saw The Big Sleep at The Rex in Berkhamsted two weeks ago. That's the next oldest I've seen.

I would love to see The Maltese Falcon on the big screen at some point, that would be amazing.

bosque · 28-05-2009, 09:36

The Scala at King's Cross used to show loads of old movies, I saw Pabst's Pandora's Box there back in the early 80s.

Wowbagger · 28-05-2009, 09:50

Birth of a Nation and the slightly more modern Intolerance (1916), at the formerly splendid Tyneside Cinema, Newcastle, sometime in the early 70s.

Boink! · 28-05-2009, 10:20

Not strictly a cinema, put a film projection at a hall during the Edinburgh Comedy Festival with a live band performing music to Buster Keaton's 1923 Our Hospitality.

Livius · 28-05-2009, 11:11

A few Hitchcock reissues (very common in Greece in the summer) the oldest of which would be The Lady Vanishes.

Apart from that:

Dial M for Murder
Stage Fright
Strangers on a Train
North by Northwest
Rear Window

Other (non-Hitchcocks) of note include,

Gone With The Wind - must have been a reissue in 1979.
The Wild Bunch
The Third Man

Guest 42261 · 28-05-2009, 11:19

Metropolis (1927) and The Pharaoh's Wife (1922) - both with live musical accompaniment

SimonI · 28-05-2009, 11:33

Metropolis for me too; most recent old film was Paths of glory on at the Belmont in Aberdeen.

anephric · 28-05-2009, 11:44

Birth of a Nation, Broken Blossoms, Metropolis, Nosferatu, Sunrise, A Page of Madness, M, Blackmail, Strike!, Potemkin. A few others I forget.

LordoftheDance · 28-05-2009, 11:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by SimonI

Metropolis for me too; most recent old film was Paths of glory on at the Belmont in Aberdeen.

Ooooh, I'd kill to see Paths of Glory on the big screen, you lucky fella.

Guest 56823 · 28-05-2009, 11:59

Some of the silent movies I've seen at the cinema were Nosferatu, Greed, The Gold Rush, Sunrise, The Crowd, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligary, The Man Who Laughed, The Wind, Diary of a Lost Girl, Metropolis, The Joyless Street, Pandora's Box, People on Sunday and Piccadilli. The oldest films I've seen were a programe of Melies shorts going back to the late 19th century and a programme of vintage pornography starting around 1908.

Recently I've been going to a screenings at the Barbican's silent films and music series which show silent movies with new scores and live music accompaniment which I'd highly recommend if you live in London. The last two films I saw there were The Last Laugh (1924) and Erotikon (1929).

Boink! · 28-05-2009, 13:10

Quote:

Originally Posted by Todd Tomorrow

... and a programme of vintage pornography starting around 1908.

Wait.. What?

Guest 56823 · 28-05-2009, 13:13

Quote:

Originally Posted by Boink!

Wait.. What?

Yup, it's has been around for as long as there has been film. I can't remember what the compilation film was called, but it's available on DVD. I saw it in an art house cinema in the mid-90s and you had to sign a membership form to see it. I'm at work now, so I'd rather not google it.

Boink! · 28-05-2009, 13:42

Pr0n has always embraced all new emerging technologies, hasn't it?

Raigmore · 28-05-2009, 14:25

I am sure that I saw Intolerance in 1966 before my 11th birthday. The pregnant woman scenes are still vivid in my mind but at that age, the film went completely over my head.

Wowbagger · 28-05-2009, 14:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by Todd Tomorrow

and a programme of vintage pornography starting around 1908.

Hmm. I wonder if I'm thinking of the same thing... in the 70s again the Tyneside screened a double bill - Woody Allen's 'Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex etc...' was coupled (excuse me) with a compilation of adult entertainment dating from the early 1900s. I was sure I had remembered the name of it but neither imdb nor a quick google throw anything up.

Guest 12934 · 28-05-2009, 14:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by marshy2004

Metropolis (1927) and The Pharaoh's Wife (1922) - both with live musical accompaniment

Mine is Battleship Potemkin (1925) also with live music.

Guest 56823 · 28-05-2009, 15:33

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wowbagger

Hmm. I wonder if I'm thinking of the same thing... in the 70s again the Tyneside screened a double bill - Woody Allen's 'Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex etc...' was coupled (excuse me) with a compilation of adult entertainment dating from the early 1900s. I was sure I had remembered the name of it but neither imdb nor a quick google throw anything up.

Nope, this one was released much later. I said mid-90s, but actually it's more like six or seven years ago. It was released in art house and repertory cinemas and it was a feature film which was made up of stag films found in the attic of a collector in France. Because this wasn't just erotica but hardcore you had to sign a membership form for the cinema to get round censorship or ratings issues.

Guest 52093 · 28-05-2009, 15:47

The oldest film I've seen in a cinema was also the occasion of my first ever cinema trip. I saw Disney's Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs (1937) on re-release in the early 70's. It's a shame that vhs then dvd killed off the annual cinema re-release of a Disney classic, they're always welcome on the big screen.