Customer Reviews

Daughter Of The Night (Silent)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Along with the 2006 release of Lugosi's The Deer Slayer, this is a big upgrade from the collector's copy I own & I would recommended it for Lugosi fans; I paid an Amazon 3rd party seller $3.79 + shipping brand new & consider it a steal at that price!

Alpha seems to be cleaning up their act lately. While nowhere near the quality we expect from Kino, Image, Criterion, etc, this print is of much higher quality then the pd collector's copies on ebay & higher quality then I expected. It didn't used to be that way, I have several pd prints that are much better then the equivalent pre 2006 Alpha releases.

Best known as Bela Lugosi's earliest surviving photoplay (but nowhere near his first screen appearance), DAUGHTER OF THE NIGHT (silent-1920) was originally a two-part German feature called "Der Tanz auf dem Vulkan" (or "dance on the volcano") that ran at least 100 minutes total. Recut to a considerably shorter work for American audiences, this is now the only version known to exist.

Its star, Lee Parry appeared in dozens of German films between 1919 and '35. Her career ended by age 38 with the French-made ADIEU VIENNE (1939). Parry remains unknown to all but the most knowledgeable of silent or Germanic cinemaphiles.

SYNOPSIS--
An abundance of retrogressions plus perhaps editing holes make this picture most hard to follow. The volcano of the story is an allegoric (and visual) reference to the Russian Revolution. Here, a rather wooden Lugosi plays a wealthy Frenchman who falls for a Bolshevik actress/singer. Any propagandistic attempt to portray the revolutionaries as compassionate types is undone by this tale's brutal ending. Or maybe that's just history...


ALPHA VIDEO offers bargain priced, often hard-to-find vintage movies that are ideal for those willing to skip DVD extras. Their transfers show no evidence of restoration, so quality varies from one title to the next, with "fair to good" being the average. Considering its age, "Daughter of the Night" is one of their better efforts.

Related item--
Also set on the Continent, Cecil B. DeMille's THE LITTLE AMERICAN (1917) is progaganda of a different tenor. Here, Mary Pickford stars opposite Jack Holt, as a survivor of a German U Boat attack who returns to her native France to witness what would these days be called crimes against humanity.

Very good film for a real Bela Lugosi's fan. It shows one of the earliest silent films and we can observe his energy and character in acting.

Very poor picture quality, even for Alpha. The sound is okay, but the washed out picture takes away from what is an otherwise rare and interesting Bela Lugosi silent film before he came to America.

If you can find a DVD copy for $1.00, that's about all it is worth. I love Bela Lugosi, and this shoddy DVD release is a real insult to his memory.

I love it. Bela Lugosi looks so young. One of my fav movies! I'll be keeping this forever!