Allow us this tangent for the centennial of the silent comedy The Virtuous Vamp (1919). It starred the then popular actress Constance Talmadge who claims to have been receiving over 60 scripts a week during this period in her career. This particular comedy is among the many honored titles in the Library of Congress National Film Registry as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". The Virtuous Vamp is now in the public domain though we haven't found a way to screen it yet. From our understanding, it's not a "lost" film which is always a relief with silent pictures since the bulk of them vanished from existence through Hollywood's own negligence about their movies. Movies were always and remain cultural artifacts rather than disposable "product" to be tossed once they've stopped collecting immediate coin.
The not-at-all sexist plot (joke) is about a virtuous girl who takes a job at an office of men which causes all sorts of trouble -- none of them can concentrate and do their work due to her beauty...
Constance Talmadge
One of the things that always confounds and fascinates about old movies (and their advertisements) is how much language changes from era to era. For example we think of "vamp" today as something like a seductive and dangeous femme fatale but maybe in the context of this film it was less severe than that and just meant someone who was a flirt?
Constance Talmadge favoured comedies and her sister Norma dramas but they haven't had the staying power in Hollywood mythology like their contemporaries, the Gish sisters. Nevertheless both were major stars of the silents. You can read more about them here.
Wish we could make out the text of this ad in full because what we can read is a doozy. That line... "44% pure but oh boy! that other 56%"
a literal embodiment of "the male gaze" in cinema.
And speaking of language -- what is the following ad even saying?
What was the 'latest love angle' in November of 1919 and what was its 'vital pertinence'? We don't know but we're going to try to work "full of snap and ginger" into a sentence this week or at least into another blog post.