BFI logo

Home

Film

Television

People

History

Education

Tours

Help

  search

Search

   

Screenonline banner
image from The Lure of Crooning Water (1920) MAIN FEATURE

The look of love

As summer begins to bloom, Screenonline turns to romance, as we explore screen lovers of the silent age. Hollywood gave us Valentino, Theda Bara and Clara Bow; Britain had... well, Ivor Novello, coolly beautiful as Parisian rogue The Rat, tragic as Adrian Brunel's Man Without Desire, mysterious as Hitchcock's Lodger. Miles Mander, gloriously caddish in The Pleasure Garden (Hitchcock's first villain) and The First Born, (tormenting lovely Madeleine Carroll). Alma Taylor captured hearts in tragic Hardy-esque roles, while Lilian Hall Davis and Elissa Landi were modern but vulnerable romantic leads. For on-screen chemistry, few matched real-life couple Guy Newall and Ivy Duke, while Henry Edwards and Chrissie White were the Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford of these shores.

Silent Lovers

SIZE ISN'T EVERYTHING

PERSONAL FAVOURITE

MORE HIGHLIGHTS FROM BFI SCREENONLINE

  1. The Little Match Seller (1902)
  2. The Small Back Room (1949)
  3. You In Your Small Corner (1962)
  4. Small Faces (1995)
  5. Syd Little (1942-)

RECENT ADDITIONS

subscribe to our rss feed subscribe to our What's New feed

COMING SOON

  • Gangsters
  • Jack Rosenthal
image from Winstanley (1975)  

Winstanley (1975)

Kevin Brownlow and Andrew Mollo's audacious, politically astute Civil War drama.

AUDIOVISUAL MATERIALS

UK schools, colleges, university libraries and public libraries have FREE access to video and audio material through the National Education Networks (NEN) or JANET.

USEFUL LINKS

Image from The Open Road (1925)

Broadening the mind

All the advantages without any of the packing, currency conversion or linguistic hassles: we look at a century of travel on film.

Travelogues

Image from Spring at the Zoo (1927)

Capital Cut

The Cutting Room - our innovative online edit suite - offers a new selection of London films.

Education Zone

Image of Joseph Losey

A stranger's scalpel

A political exile who found the class-based snobbery of British society all too fertile ground for a dazzling body of work.

Joseph Losey (1909-84)

Image from Mastermind (1972-)

Starter for ten

Not only one of television's most enduringly popular genres, but often far more innovative than they're given credit for.

Game and Quiz Shows