The folk behind the Birds Eye View Film Festival , who on Sunday we caught screening an excellent slab of female-directed films (including the excellent Love You More, directed by Sam Taylor-Wood), have commissioned a selection of musicians to perform live soundtracks to a series of silent films as part of their Retrospective programme, which deals with “Screen Seductresses: Vamps, Vixens and Femmes Fetales“.
The programme started on March 7 with Bishi soundtracking Salome (Charles Bryant, 1923) – an adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s play of the same name starring lesbian icon Alla Nazimova. It will continue tonight, with screenings of A Fool There Was (Frank Powell, 1915) and The Vampire (Robert Vignola, 1913), a pair of films that see Theda Bara and Alice Hollister fight over the title of cinema’s first sex symbol as bewitching vampires. Those will be soundtracked by Broken Hearts Djs and pianist Jane Gardner.
Tomorrow, March 10, sees The Temptress (Fred Niblo, 1926), starring Greta Garbo as a melancholy vamp with a live accompaniment from classical cellist Natalie Clein. And perhaps the one that interests us most, Wednesday March 11 sports Louise Brooks in the classic Pandora’s Box (G.W. Pabst, 1929), with the Monroe Transfer’s entire seven-piece band soundtracking.
The programme finishes with Bridgette Helm, the star of Fritz Lang’s Metropolis, playing Alraune (Henrik Galeen, 1928), a legendary man-eater created as a result of a prostitute being artificially inseminated by the semen of a hanged man. That comes soundtracked by Alison Blunt, Hannah Marshal and Javier Carmona.
All soundtrack events take place at the BFI Southbank, London, and will coincide with a series of screenings and talks at the ICA – full listings can be found here.