Under Full Sail: Silent Cinema on the High Seas Box Set: 4/14/09

[NoirFan]

Info from Amazon:

Discover a time when the truest adventure had the wind at your back and an infinite horizon all around. UNDER FULL SAIL: SILENT CINEMA ON THE HIGH SEAS proudly collects five breathtaking films that preserve the romance, grandeur and allure of windjammers sailing open waters, exquisitely photographed in the style of the time.

The Yankee Clipper (1927), produced by Cecil B. DeMille and directed by Rupert Julian, restored to the most complete version available since the film s release, is a feature-length melodrama recreating the real-life race from Foo Chow to Boston for the China tea trade. The gorgeous production filmed at sea for six weeks aboard the 1856 wooden square-rigger Indiana with stars William Boyd, Elinor Fair and Frank Junior Coghlan. Renowned organist Dennis James, in his solo DVD premiere, accompanies the film on an original-installation 1928 Wurlitzer pipe organ, recorded at Seattle s Paramount Theatre.

Around the Horn in a Square Rigger (1933) was filmed by noted sailor and author Alan Villiers documenting the record-breaking 83-day voyage of the 1902 barque Parma from Australia to England in the 1933 Grain Race. Villiers writes, We wanted to make a picture that would capture some of the stirring beauty of these ships, that would perpetuate, in the realm of shadows at least, something of the glory of their wanderings ... some glimmer of understanding of the attraction which they hold over those who sail in them. Music by Eric Beheim.

The Square Rigger (1932), an early sound short filmed as part of Fox's Magic Carpet of Movietone, shows life aboard the schoolship Dar Pomorza, The White Frigate. Built in 1909 as the Prinzess Eitel Friedrich, it was ceded from Germany to France as a prize of World War I, and was later donated to the Polish State Maritime School in 1930 where it served 50 years and trained more than 13,000 cadets.

Ship Ahoy (1928) is a unique record of the conditions and traditions of the North American lumber trade featuring an unidentified schooner equipped with a fore and aft rig as it transports lumber from the Carolinas up the coast to a northern port. Music by Eric Beheim.

The collection is rounded off with a ten-minute sequence from Down to the Sea in Ships (1922) documenting an authentic whale hunt from the 1878 wooden ship Wanderer out of New Bedford, Massachusetts. The camera- men risk their lives to capture practices unchanged since Herman Melville immortalized them in Moby Dick. Music by Dennis James.

DVD bonus features include an audio reminiscence by Frank Junior Coghlan about the filming of The Yankee Clipper. An enclosed booklet includes detailed program notes by film scholar and U.S. Navy marine engineer John E. Stone and an essay about the scoring of The Yankee Clipper by organist Dennis James.

List price: $29.95

This looks like a fun collection, Flicker Alley always put a nice effort into their releases. I didn't see any mention of this set on their website yet.

[Damfino]

Sounds great, but why not include the complete Down to the Sea in Ships?

I have seen Dennis James perform at the San Francisco Silent Film Festival before, he is one of the few great ones at this rare talent.

[NoirFan]

DVD Beaver

[Sondheim]

Looks great - I'll definitely be buying this in the next few months along with the other Flicker Alley releases I've been meaning to get (mainly the Gance silents and the Melies boxset.) It's great to see a small company like this putting such care and effort into editions of such relatively unknown titles.

[JesseCuster8]

I just wanted to drop the word for any potentinal SoCal DVDtalkers that Flicker Alley has invited Frank Coghlan of "Yankee Clipper" fame to sign copies of the new DVD at the Shrine Auditorium's comic book convention a week from today. (He also played Billy Batson in the 1941 "Captain Marvel" serial). Details are at www.flickeralley.com or www.comicbookscifi.com. Hope to see some of you there!

[NoirFan]

Originally Posted by Sondheim

Looks great - I'll definitely be buying this in the next few months along with the other Flicker Alley releases I've been meaning to get (mainly the Gance silents and the Melies boxset.) It's great to see a small company like this putting such care and effort into editions of such relatively unknown titles.

FA also released a beautifully tinted edition of Murnau's Phantom, though the intertitles are unfortunately in English.