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The Great White Silence (1924) [REPOST]

Posted By: Notsaint
The Great White Silence (1924) [REPOST]

The Great White Silence (1924)
DVD9 | VIDEO_TS | PAL | 4:3 | 720x576 | 4600 kbps | 6.9Gb
Audio: English AC3 2.0 @ 320 Kbps | Subtitles: English Intertitles
01:44:00 | UK | Documentary

The official record of Captain Scott's legendary expedition to the South Pole restored by the BFI and presented , with live musical performance from Simon Fisher Turner

Director: Herbert G. Ponting
Cast: Robert Falcon Scott, Herbert G. Ponting

The Great White Silence (1924) [REPOST]

The Great White Silence (1924) [REPOST]


In 1910, Captain Robert Falcon Scott led what he hoped would be the first successful team to reach the South Pole. But the expedition also had a complex (and completely genuine) scientific brief. Scott's decision to include a cameraman in his expedition team was a remarkable one for its time, and it is thanks to his vision - and to Herbert Ponting's superb eye - that, a century later, we have an astonishing visual account of his tragic quest.

The media rights to the photographs and footage contributed very substantially to the expedition's funding. Scott and Ponting had sold footage rights to Gaumont, who in November 1911 released the first set of films sent back by Ponting (before the assault on the Pole) under the title With Captain Scott to the South Pole. This was followed by two further instalments in 1912. After the news of Scott's death reached England on 11 February 1913, a respectful period was allowed to elapse before Gaumont's re-release of the material as The Undying Story of Captain Scott.

Ponting made the best of the disastrous situation by buying back the rights from Gaumont and embarking on a gruelling lecture tour, which included Buckingham Palace and troops during the Great War. The silent feature The Great White Silence, released in 1924, served as a eulogy to Scott and freed Ponting from having to accompany and commentate on the footage personally. A later version, with sound, was subsequently released as 90 Degrees South (1933).

The Great White Silence built on Ponting's lecture, introducing intertitles, as well as his own stills, maps, portraits and paintings, to create a narrative of the tragic events. He even filmed some novel sequences using models and stop-motion photography to show the various journeys of the polar teams. The final film was tinted and toned to express lighting effects. Ponting had the foresight to film Scott, Edward Wilson, 'Taff' Evans and Henry Bowers (interestingly, the same men, with Lawrence Oates, were to form the - as yet unselected - polar team) manhauling the sledge and cooking and sleeping in their tent, just as they were to do for real on the way to and from the Pole. He could not have predicted the tragic denouement - the team's discovery that Amundsen had beaten them to the Pole, and their terrible end in unseasonably cold weather just 11 miles short of the food and fuel depot.
~ Bryony Dixon

The Great White Silence (1924) [REPOST]

The Great White Silence (1924) [REPOST]


I have just seen this film at the cinema and it was wonderful. It was made in 1924 so the commentary is in written words on the screen, like the old silent movies. The first half is an account of the journey to Antarctica and then a light hearted wild life documentary about the gulls, seals and penguins. The journey starts with the whaler, Terra Nova, setting off from New Zealand and includes wonderful footage of members of the crew taking a turn at Irish and Russian dancing. When the boat is crashing through enormous waves, you almost feel the lurching sensation. The first glimpse of an enormous iceberg is breath taking. We see the bow of the boat breaking through the ice, and then we see how Ponting filmed it, lying precariously on a wooden frame hanging off the side of the boat.

We then see the expedition men setting up camp, using dogs and Siberian ponies to pull the sleighs. Current writing about Scott's journey to the South Pole tends to emphasise the flaws in the operation: the ponies were ill or unsuitable, the men didn't know how to ski etc. but this is a wonderfully cheerful and optimistic view of the start of the expedition where all seems to be going to plan.

About two thirds of the way through the film, (and just when you are beginning to tire a little of the penguins), there is a shift of tone and the story of the race to the Pole begins. Ponting uses maps and animated models aswell as still shots of the five men who went all the way to the South Pole. There is footage of the men hauling the sledges and then setting up camp for the night: cooking up the beef soup, drying out their layers of damp socks and wriggling into their fur sleeping bags. It feels quite incredible to see this on film.

For anyone with an interest in this expedition, the footage of the stormy sea, the Great Ice Barrier, Mount Erebus billowing smoke, and the men themselves brings the story to life in a way that books can't do. I'm so glad that it is being issued on DVD.
~ PB

The Great White Silence (1924) [REPOST]

The Great White Silence (1924) [REPOST]


Part of the thrill watching Herbert Ponting's extraordinary record of Captain Scott's doomed race to the South Pole is knowing that its original audiences must have been watching at least some of these sights on film for the first time: killer whales, their dorsal fins menacing up from the sea; querulous penguins; fearsome crystal cliffs of ice. Ponting was the expedition's official photographer, and the BFI has spent years beautifully restoring his footage – which he edited into this silent feature film in 1924.

Today, we are familiar with documentaries from inaccessible places, but here to some extent, is the mystery and majesty of the landscape restored. It's jollied along by Ponting's idiosyncratic commentary on inter-titles. Derek Jarman collaborator Simon Fisher Turner has written a new score, plucking strings and blippy beats that lurch forebodingly as Scott and his four companions prepare their assault on the Pole. We watch them disappear, industrious black beetles against the white snow, never to return. There is surprisingly little of Scott, just a few snatches – they didn't go in for introspection, this lot. That is until the end, as Ponting excerpts hauntingly from his diary: "Great God, this is an awful place!"
~ Cath Clarke

Extras:
- 90° South
- Newsreel Items
- Great White Silence: How Did They Do It?
- The Sound of Silence
- Location field recordings

IMDb

"90° South" screencaps


The Great White Silence (1924) [REPOST]

The Great White Silence (1924) [REPOST]

The Great White Silence (1924) [REPOST]