Ben Model, Undercrank Productions, and the joy of silent movies on disc

I started accompanying silent films in college. This was before home video—16mm screenings with no sound—so I volunteered, sat at the piano, and figured it had to be better than nothing. I thought I was on a track to be an independent comedy filmmaker, did office work, tech support, piano tuning, the usual. Around 30 years ago I hit a wall, realized silent film was my path of least resistance, leaned in, and got too busy with accompaniment for it not to be my living. I also began producing and booking my own shows—didn’t wait to be told here’s the date—because I’m very interested in what goes into making a show happen.

I had small piles of 16mm prints—either the only known copies or titles that didn’t circulate—and if they sat on my shelf, they were still kind of lost. In 2012 I put together three things: CreateSpace’s manufacture‑on‑demand for DVDs (one disc per order, no pallets in my apartment), Kickstarter for a meager budget, and my email list from years of accompanying. I called the series Accidentally Preserved—because these films survive thanks to 1920s home‑movie rental copies—brought in Marlene Weisman for professional artwork, did press, and it worked. The next one worked, and the next—rare comedies, Library of Congress material—and I just kept going.

I knew when going to press, if the artwork looks self‑published, that’s what it looks like to the customer. So I work with Marlene Weisman—tremendous genius as a graphic designer and collagist—so it looks professional and makes an impression. We treat these films like the big‑star releases they were; we don’t just take a trade ad and stick it on a case. The art sets the scene and tells people, This is something you should have heard of already.

We fill in the gaps. Once you’ve got your Buster Keaton, Charlie Chaplin, and Harold Lloyd features, you still want to see what else there was. We’re putting back on screens what people saw during the silent era while they waited for the new Doug Fairbanks. They’re not forgettable, just forgotten. Marcel Perez, Alice Howell, Marion Davies—everyone has an idea about Davies without having seen her films, and she’s as good as everyone thinks she isn’t. We work with archives and get these back to fans who want to see them.

Yes. People approached us. The Lon Chaney and the Frank Borzage discs were initiated by fellow film accompanists Jon Mirsalis and Andrew Simpson respectively—films they were passionate about, wanted to score, and they knew the bigger companies weren’t going to spend time on them. With the Francis Ford disc, Kathryn Fuller Seeley at the University of Texas at Austin contacted me for advice on producing a DVD; I said I’d release it and we worked together. These all fit our mindset: Oh my gosh, you mean this isn’t available? Everybody knows Seventh Heaven and Street Angel, but not the titles on the Borzage disc—and those two Borzage films survive because they were produced by Cosmopolitan Pictures, started by William Randolph Hearst to produce Marion’s films. That’s exactly the kind of rabbit hole we love.

That one wasn’t initiated by us. Mary Della Valle, who runs the Tom Tyler blog, knows what survives and who has it. She tried larger labels, got nowhere, then came to me about kickstarting a home‑video project. It fit our sweet spot—huge star to his audience, Captain Marvel name recognition, silent films no one could see—so we helped Mary run her Kickstarter, raised funds, and then waited out pandemic delays so archives could release the nitrate prints. We scanned, restored, I scored, Marlene did her magic, and the response has been so positive. Tyler’s screen presence lands, and the cinematography’s better than you expect for “B” westerns—the shack staging in The Man from Nevada is really inventive. We also noticed both films were written by a woman—Sally Winters. Western screenplays directed by J.P. McGowan in the 1920 written by a woman —which you don’t expect and was great to discover.

It doesn't usually have the effect people hope for. For 35 years I’ve heard, We hired a contemporary score so it’ll appeal to younger people, and a lot of the time it just tends to alienate fans of all ages. I’ve yet to silent films shows draw huge numbers of people in their 20s and 30s because someone’s breaking plates and dropping synthesizers down a flight of stairs. You’re watching something made in the teens or 20s—the music has to feel of that era or it’s a distraction. Early on I met people who did this, including a movie organist from the 1920s who became a friend and mentor, and I try to keep the sound inside that world so the picture plays the way it should.

Absolutely. With silent film especially, what circulated for decades looked the way it did because of photochemical limits and the wear and tear of many runs on16mm classroom projectors. Now 4K scans of nitrate, digital clean‑up, and stabilization show people what silent film is supposed to look like. Not that awful old movie filter—dust, scratches, jitter—that’s just a print run through a school projector for 60 years. When you start from good elements—like the Edward Everett Horton shorts from preservation negatives—and clean them properly, it can look better than initial release and you see why the art form was so brilliant.

The Artist came awfully close. They shot at 22 fps based on cranking research, but late silent exhibition in the US was often faster than 24—say 28–30—so you miss that speed‑up. Chapter nine in my book goes deep on this. We all enjoyed it, it won awards, but it didn’t move turnout for other silent films and didn’t spark new silent features. Maybe if The Artist had told a contemporary story—a silent, black‑and‑white film set now, with the physical compensation the language needs—it might’ve had more impact. The language isn’t dead, but you have to know how to speak it.

The Bat didn’t circulate for 30 years. It was restored photochemically by the UCLA Film & Television Archive about 35 years ago and nobody booked it—I don’t know why. When we went through it we kept saying, Oh my god, this is fantastic. Look at this shot. Look at that shot. It really plays. And yes, the Batman connection helps, but the movie itself is a blast to see looking this good.

It’s not a dead language—as long as you know how to speak it. A lot of new silents get made; they kind of resemble silent films, but they’re not quite all there. You need the right syntax and grammar for it to be understood—and the physical stuff: undercranking and the compensation for that late‑silent speed‑up. You can even shoot on video; just build for that pace with the undercranking and physical compensation and it’ll play. I hope people making new silent films use my book as a handbook.

The Silent Film Universe, published June. Silent movies are way more fun than you think, and I break down the visual language and, more importantly, our interaction with it—how we fill in what’s deliberately left out. That’s why you can show Safety Last anywhere to anyone: fear of heights, trouble with a boss, wanting to impress someone—you bring yourself into it. I wrote it for diehards and for people who’ve only seen a couple of Chaplin shorts. I also hope people making new silent films use it as a handbook—like any language, you need the right syntax and grammar for it to be understood.

Absolutely. There was this euphoria—oh my gosh, it’s so easy to get all this stuff—and then the how much money are we making off this part kicks in. With classic and older film the throttle gets tighter and tighter. It’s easy to stream something, but the economics aren’t the same as last year’s Netflix shows. It’s like when cable came in: hundreds of channels and so much programming—and now we have 2,000 channels and 500 of each are the exact same show. Ease of accessibility hasn’t guaranteed quality or diversity. Two, three years ago there were all those Is streaming the answer? articles; now everybody gets it: if you want to see something that doesn’t have Superman in it, you need a working Blu‑ray player and a couple of walls of shelf space. Even on streaming, things cycle out, licenses expire, or you travel to France and the license is only for England. So, hang on to your Blu‑rays.

Audience preservation. People who get it bring people who haven’t yet gotten it to shows or to their home cinema to see what wonder there is in this art form. It’s not for everybody, but the people who get it, get it—and they help grow the next audience. And it’s always heartening to meet folks who aren’t in their 60s or 70s with shelves of Blu‑rays; when they see a good restoration on a screen, with music that feels of the era, the light goes on.

Alive and well. My distributor handles manufacturing and fulfillment; every year I ask, Is this the last year? and last time they said, We’re installing new equipment. We release everything on DVD and Blu‑ray; 10–15% of sales are still DVD—even on Kickstarters—so we keep both. Streaming’s fine, but the buffet for classic, independent, and art‑house is smaller and things disappear or geo‑lock. Keep a working Blu‑ray player and some shelves. If one company stops making players, I can see a vinyl‑style rebound—someone steps in. It’s not going away anytime soon. Viva physical media.