In MOVIE NIGHT I wrote about my proclivity for the lost films of Theda Bara.   I just watched HER GREATEST LOVE, a film made in 1917 which is now considered lost.  In this film, Theda played Hazel.

This is my favorite Bara movie so far.  I may transcribe more of the scenes.   In my opinion, years of non-existence have increased this film’s power–it seemed so relevant to me today!    Changes in viewing technologies between 1917 and my obelisk also deeply affected my experience of the film…in this case, my experience of the plot.   The inter-stellar resonance introduced by the image transmission process became the epic content of the film.

my viewing technology

Here’s scene one!

HER GREATEST LOVE

SCENE:  Exterior of  library on small-town Main Street.

(HAZEL, eyes upon earth, arms around books, approaches.)

(Her worsted wool coat, blue, true blue, because she is.)

(CLOSE-UP: HAZEL looks up, revelatory lustre of dream-dark eyes which see which see–)

(–gang of her peers in which a white-eyed BOY laughs, his arm around a pony-tail GIRL.  His coat?  Blue, like forsaken, because HAZEL is.)

(White-eyes spy HAZEL, quickly evade.)

(Jocular jostling.  Elbows jab ribs.  Pony-tails spray fiber-optic fountains of static.)

(CLOSE-UP:  HAZEL’s face, unable to appear OK.)

(Meanwhile, the library portico where vestal virgins bear lamps to light the way.)

(Meanwhile, arithmetic problems of distance, angle, pace, demand immediate solution.)

(HAZEL, eyes upon earth, continues toward library.)

(Obstacles.  Boy legs stuck in soft shoes, pocket-books full of mirrors, the glare of lip-glossed smiles.  Pony-tails hum with electrical potential, wisps stray from rubber bands, filaments for electrocution.)

(HAZEL, at last upon library steps, stumbles.  Her books spill.)

(Behind her, chirping girls barred and flickering like a television frequency intermittently received.)

(Above HAZEL, the library pediment, engraved:)

HAPPY IS THE MAN THAT FINDETH WISDOM
AND THE MAN THAT GETTETH UNDERSTANDING

(.)

(HAZEL gathers books, feels absence of white-eyed boy’s arm upon her.)

(Where arm is absent, bruises swell to welts which pop, pierced by sticky, keratinous extrusions that tunnel out of her back.  Bow-shaped shafts.  Unfurling to horrific span & splendor.)

(CLOSE-UP:  HAZEL’s eyes shudder shut as wings test themselves: open, closed.)

(Passionate shame.  Ludicrous endowment.  Appallingly displayed.)

(Meanwhile, the eternal heaps of uncataloged books, frenetically searched by the light of stars.)

(Meanwhile, consonants excised from penciled passages, admitting nebulous vapors amongst wide a’s, arched e’s, long o’s.)

(Meanwhile, forgotten charts of starry populations fall from flipped pages: monsters, beasts with wings from where, from whence they soon shall come…)

(HAZEL beneath pediment, monstrous winged beast, bereft of white-eyed boy.)

(BOY disconnects himself from pony-tail GIRL, hands trembling as if he would weep.)

(Compacts rapidly issue from pocket-books.  Crystal blue eyes retro-flash signals through the recesses of mirrors into the far regions of space.)

(Pony-tail GIRL tilts her head coyly, smiles all mother-sweet, enforcing blithe, oblivious complacency.)

(A car, chrome-cased like a spaceship, approaches at a super-sonic speed.  All pony-tails flare in a unified direction, aligning the inescapable magnetic field.)

(Ionic dusts assemble, obfuscating judgment and vision.)

(CLOSE-UP:  One half of BOY’s face twitches, involuntarily.)

(CLOSE-UP:  HAZEL opens her eyes.)

INTERTITLE
EVIL FORCES CONSPIRE.
THE EMPIRE IS DIVIDED.

ONLY LOVE CAN TOPPLE THE IMPENETRABLE WALL.

EARTH’S ONE REMAINING HOPE.

(Musical interlude.)

(Silence machines begin.)

END OF SCENE

HAZEL in HER GREATEST LOVE