Silent night…

And no, it’s not Christmas yet so if the famous Christmas song started playing in your head, press on pause (for seven weeks). Today, I would like to share another Silent night special with you. Now that autumn has arrived and winter is coming, you may want to increase your movie nights with blankets and some hot chocolate.

If you are watching a movie, spoken dialogues and not-muted gestures play an essential part in your movie experience.
So, you are either:
– laughing and enjoying the movie (because humor and great spoken dialogues make the world go round)
– not laughing and enjoying the movie (because life is not always fun and games, which is being shown in this movie)
– not laughing and enjoying the movie (which is why you are distracting yourself right now on the world wide web, social media or your beloved smartphone).

When you think about movies these days, sound and spoken conversation are important elements which can totally break or make your movie experience. What is Pirates of the Caribbean without the hilarious dialogues of Captain Jack Sparrow for example? And who doesn’t remember the iconic words “Bond. James Bond”? As common as it is right now, hundred years ago speaking in movies was totally not normal. However, music has ruled our lives since various centuries and also silent movies could not run without some good music.

Silent movies were usually accompanied by instrumental music: from cheerful and energetic to fearful or sad. Anything was possible as long as it fitted the mood of the movie setting. Back in those days it was even more important to have nonverbal magic, perfectly performed muted gestures and thrilling intertitles. Intertitles were used as a medium to transfer dialogues in silent movies. Over(re)acting was also totally fine, as long as it positively boosted the movie setting. As a viewer you had to pay even more attention to all the nonverbal elements of the movie, or else you wouldn’t know what the heck was going on!

I must say: as a retro-meets-present blogger who grew up with the “normal” movie cinema of spoken dialogues, I believed that watching a silent movie was a little step too far. But: if you never try, you never know right ;-). So I tried it yesterday. And I laughed. Because it was seriously hilarious. Charlie Chaplin in the lead role also helped a lot.

However the duration of the movie was 14 minutes.
I am taking baby steps here.

If you are also curious: come and take some baby steps with me. Below you can watch the movie Laughing Gas starring Charlie Chaplin.

Enjoy the silence…