Hey pod and welcome back! Welcome to the second spoiler special in the ¡Presente! Latin Cinematic Heritage Series discussing the film, Ben-Hur: A Tale of The Christ (1925). The most expensive spectacle of its time, this film tells the familiar story of Judah Ben-Hur (played by Ramon Novarro) in the early days of Christianity. His wealthy family is persecuted for their faith by the Romans, including Judah’s childhood friend Messala. Following an accident, Judah is sentenced to life as a galley slave and separated from his family. He seeks to find a way to escape, exact his revenge, and find his sister and mother. The massive sea battle scene and the famous chariot race are the centerpieces of this epic tale that still resonates a hundred years later.

Back on the podcast tonight is Cuban American educator and artist, Jason Barber – welcome back Jason! You can follow him on Instagram.

Joining us briefly is newcomer to Representation in Cinema, Jared Case. Jared Case is Curator of Film Exhibitions at The Dryden Theatre. In 26 years at the George Eastman Museum, he has founded the Nitrate Picture Show, appeared on Turner Classic Movies and Mysteries at the Museum, spoken at film festivals around the country, and interviewed such luminaries as Christopher Nolan, Jodie Foster, and Julia Roberts.

Wherever you’re listening from, hit that subscribe button, give us a 5-star rating, share this episode and leave a comment to let us know what you thought of tonight’s episode. Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Tiktok, & Threads.

Visit ourvoicesproject.com and sign up for our newsletter for more information about what we do. We’ll be back with more spoiler specials from the ¡Presente! Latin Film Fest with Zoot Suit, which will be screening at The George Eastman Museum on Wednesday, October 7 at 7:30pm. As a reminder, the screenings in this series are free and open to the public.

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Hello pod, and welcome back.

If this is your first time listening and or watching, welcome to Representation in Cinema.

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Welcome to the second spoiler special in the present day Latin Cinematic Heritage series discussing the film Ben Hur A Tale of the Christ.

This film tells the familiar story of Judah Ben Hur, played by Ramon Navarro in the early days of Christianity, his wealthy family is persecuted for their faith by the Romans, including Judah's childhood friend Messala.

Following an accident, Judah is sentenced to life as a galley slave and separated from his family, he seeks to find a way to escape, exact his revenge, and find his sister and his mother.

The massive sea battle scene and the famous chariot scene are the centerpieces of this epic tale that still resonates a hundred years later.

Back on the podcast tonight is someone who needs no introduction because he's been here a bunch of times, a podcast regular, Jason Barber.

Welcome back.

Thank you for having me.

Absolutely.

Feels like it was only two days ago.

Yep, that's all I'm gonna say about that.

We also have a newcomer joining us on Representation in Cinema.

That is Jared Case.

He is the curator of film exhibitions at the dryden Theater.

In 26 years at the George Eastman Museum, he has founded the Nitrate Picture show, appeared on Turner Classic Movies and Mysteries at the museum, spoken at film festivals around the country, and interviewed such luminaries as Christopher Nolan, Jodie Foster, and Julia Roberts.

Welcome to the pod, Jared.

Oh, thank you.

It's welcome to the pod.

But we've known each other for so many years.

It feels very comfortable.

I'm glad.

And yes, yes, we have.

He's new here on the pod.

So happy to have you both here.

So let's get into the discussion.

First and foremost, I want to know for you, what are the highlights of this film?

Jason, I'll start with you.

The action.

Okay.

Great and simple.

I mean, actual sea battles, actual chariot races.

I mean, it is.

Yeah, it's the action.

I mean, this is.

They don't make movies because they're not legally allowed to make movies like this anymore.

So I think that's what's epic about it.

It is one of the those epic movies that are physically and logistically impossible to do in this time and age.

Even if Christopher Nolan tries as much as Christopher Nolan tries, it's impossible to do what this movie did.

Absolutely.

How about you, Jared?

If I can be sort of pedantic about this.

The fact that we get to see it on 35 millimeter is.

Is such a treat.

This is a preservation from the George Eastman Museum.

So it's something that we're very proud of.

And just to have, you know that black and white photography, so crisp and clean in the preservation and the added tints to it really evoke that time period.

But in terms of the story itself, I'd have to agree with Jason.

It's incredible action sequences that are from watching a lot of silent films.

You don't get a lot of that.

It's some of the action that you get in the silent period is very sort of small scale.

You know, you're watching westerns and it's a couple guys on a street that's completely made up.

But the effort that they went into with epics like this is.

This was not directed by Cecil B. DeMille, but the baby as well has been for the amount of money that they poured into the film in order to make it look at least genuine, if not accurate to the time.

So it's incredible experience on the big.

Screen, even though the story's not accurate to the time because it's a made up Bible story.

Yeah.

Cool fact about this, about Ben Hur.

It was written by General Lee Wallace and General Lee Wallace was the territorial governor of a place called New Mexico.

And he sent a bunch of regulators out to get the.

Get everything under control out there.

And those regulators were Billy the Kid and his friends.

Yeah, you gotta love the intersections.

And it was the number one Christian historical fiction book of the 19th century.

Wow.

Yeah.

That's incredible.

Before we get into the production and history, because we are definitely going to dig into that.

No, you're fine.

You're absolutely fine.

I just want you both, if you could reiterate for our Audience, especially because we did an overview episode where we got into why you selected each film.

But just to reiterate for our audience, for anyone who didn't watch that, please go back and watch and.

Or listen to that.

But, Jared, I'll start with you.

What went into the decision making for this specific film?

One of the things that went into it said every fall, we do have this Silent Tuesday series where we have silent films with live accompaniment on our piano here at the.

At the Dryden.

So to be able to tie into that and expand the audience in that way, we'll have people coming for Ben Hur, we'll have people coming for the Latin Cinematic Heritage series, and we'll have people coming forth island films in general, to have that sort of combination of audience and expose each of those audiences to the other ones, I think was part of it.

But this is the earliest film that we've done so far.

We went back into the 40s, 30s and 40s last year.

So to have a film from the 20s.

And this series is all about showing the audience that Latin film artists have been in the industry since the beginning, even in Hollywood, that each country had its own industry.

But to show people that not only were they acting in these films, but they were sex symbols.

They were out there in front and people were admiring them and for their acting talents.

He was, I think, the first Hispanic person to get the.

The award back in the 50s for his work in the silent period.

And the second was last year.

Yeah,.

Yeah.

Anything you want to add Jason to that?

No, I think that that was something we've talked about before.

I think when Jared and I first met, like two years ago, his name came up and Dorothario, you know, like, they.

They were the first two to come up because they were kind of set the trend, you know, for Latinos in cinema, you know.

Yes, he was following the line of Rudolph Valentino.

And that was a time where, you know, Latinos and non Latinos and Jewish people all became Hispanic or Italian and made Italian last name so they can become the next sex symbol in Hollywood.

But he was Latino, he was Mexican, he was pro, you know, so.

And he carried his name all the way up until his death in the 70s.

Okay, so getting into this production, so before y' all had mentioned so many or so much money, I think it was you, Jared was saying, like this, so much money that went into this Film.

I. I looked up the budget.

It was 4 million.

Yeah.

With inflation, that's $77 million.

Yeah.

That's.

That's insane.

So one of the red is that I saw that it said it was one of the most expensive silent films made.

Is it the most.

Or was there one that kind of.

That topped that intolerance?

Maybe.

Yeah.

I don't.

I don't know for sure.

Okay.

It was.

It was fairly early in the 20s.

So there, there's plenty of big productions that happened afterwards probably challenged it, if not surpassed it.

Gotcha.

I don't know.

Metropolis.

Yeah.

Okay.

And then I read that it grossed so 9 million.

So then in with inflation, that's pretty close to.

Well, I can do it right now.

Yeah.

Let me check that.

Let's see.

Because I think it would be like on.

That would be on par with.

It might be on par with other films.

$174 Million.

Okay.

Okay.

Pretty.

It's not like.

It's not like here.

It's not like now.

But it's not gone off the wind numbers, which is still, I think, with inflation, the highest grossing movie of all time.

Okay.

Which is scary to think.

Yes.

That's what it is actually one of.

The highest person movies of all time, for sure.

Oh, my gosh.

Because I'm.

I'm watching the film and I'm looking at.

Well, first of all, like, I'm looking.

Which we'll get into.

I'm looking at the sea battle.

I'm looking at the chariots, but I'm also just looking at the.

The production design, how many extras you have there.

There's like so much.

And I mean, it's an epic.

Right.

So there's like, there's so much happening in the film.

And for.

For something of this scale, I'm like sitting there, I'm like wondering, like, good lord, like, how.

How much does this cost?

I mean, also too, like, what they're using.

I'm like, this is not right.

This is.

This is the twenties.

It's all like, practical, you know, things that are, that are.

They're.

They're making this in the practical way.

There isn't.

You know, this is before, you know, CGI and all of that.

Right.

This is the 20s.

They're.

They're making this like, they're making these sets.

They're making all of these things.

And I was.

And I really want to get into this.

So the, the sea battle scene.

So I read that folks died.

Like the people that are jumping out of the people that are jumping out of the, the ships like are actually.

Because it was actually burning and people were trying to like, you know, obviously like jump.

They were jumping ship like because things were dangerous and they didn't want to get caught.

The fire, like.

Do any of you guys want to like talk about the sea battle?

You know, anything as far as like production, you know, in terms of that, in terms of the, the real life, the, the, the.

What am I trying to say?

The life threatening things that were happening on set.

Well, yeah, I think that production at that time that was, it was taking place in Hollywood.

It really was kind of still the wild west in terms of film production.

They didn't have the safety measures.

There was no aspca, so animals were treated poorly or as well as needed to be within that scene.

But the mill is sort of famous for killing horses and training them to do things that would either cripple them or, you know, put them in severe danger.

So it's not unheard of for this kind of thing to happen on these big epics.

And it's, it's a good thing that we have changed that.

Going out on a limb there, but it's at the time, that's one of the things that made it.

I mean, we talk about millions of dollars and $4 million and 160, whatever it was.

And those actually sound low to us now because, you know, these cost $200 million and gross a billion.

But it's the, the reason that those costs were relatively low at the time was because they didn't have these safety measures to have to follow.

So they were going fast and loose and, you know, things happened.

And that's kind of the risk that you accepted by being part of one of these productions.

But it doesn't make it right.

But it is an explanation of how they did it and what was going on at the time.

Yeah.

I don't know if you ever seen the movie Babylon that came out a few years ago.

I love Hollywood.

I tried to watch it.

It's hard to watch.

But I will say the battle scenes are pretty accurate of what it was like at that time.

You know, there was, it was a free fall.

Yeah.

You know, they said just go at each other.

You know, here's your sword, here's your sword.

You know, like, yeah, like that's, that is kind of like the era that we're like, we're watching films in, which is, it's so foreign to us.

But it's also like, you know, these are people who, they have, many of them survived, you have guys who.

It's not that far past the West.

Yeah, Wild West.

And, you know, you have these settlements, you have these guys that were part of the wild wild west shows.

You have people that like riding horses.

You have people who know what it's like to be in an old wooden boat, you know, and run that stuff.

Like, it's not something that wasn't foreign.

So, you know, 20 years ago, you know, there were.

The U.S. navy was just put in some of their steel ship steamers, right?

There was like boats still had wood clad and metal on them, you know, so like it's.

So it's.

It.

To me, it seems like, well, we already know this here.

We got a bunch of guys that ride horses south of us.

You know, we can grab some people from Baja, we can grab some people up from, you know, Arizona and say, okay, we're gonna work.

We're gonna do this, we're gonna do this.

You know, it.

It was that kind of thinking that they had to do back at that time.

Yeah, yeah.

And I also read like, so because of, because of everything that was happening right, like on set, this is how rules were.

This is why rules were put in.

Like, you know how you treat.

How you treat actors.

And I think those came a lot later after this movie.

Well, there's still a lot of movies after this that was very cruel to animals.

So I think, I think that didn't really happen until, I don't know, I think even to the 70s, they didn't start putting more animal cruelty stuff, because I'm just thinking of all the Clint Eastwood eight movies in the 70s.

But when you think about that, Jason, and you're talking about all the riders that they got from all over the place, from the Southwest, you're talking about Mexico and you're talking about South America and these stunt people coming up into the United States to work on the movies.

You have Native Americans, huge Native American groups who would come up, not just to play Native Americans, to do this.

You know, like, there's, there's a long history of that.

Like, we think, oh, they're just playing like native characters.

No, these are people, you know, they're African Americans, they're Latinos, there's Native Americans who were the riders who had that experience of being on horseback.

The ability to run a chariot race.

Yes.

The idea of understanding all this stuff, like they knew how to control a horse.

They knew how to control animals.

So it was.

That was a very unique time when we think about that, like, because it just doesn't exist anymore.

But these were, These were men who knew how to do that.

Yeah.

Speaking of the chariot race or iconic scene that we're talking about there, so the, the, the.

The chariot accident or at least the, like the pile on.

That's another one of those things that was.

That actually happened.

I also read that supposedly chariot riders were paid extra to give them incentive to, like, try to win the race, which is.

Sounds pretty accurate.

I just thought that was.

I just thought that was very interesting.

And like, of course, like, obviously, you know, like, Judah has to be the one, of course, you know, to win the race.

But I just think that's like, just to, to.

To get that, like, you know, people actually going at each other, like, to try to win a race, I think.

And also, like paying them extra.

Yeah.

I hope they got paid ahead of time.

H. I hope they got paid ahead of time.

Yeah, that's what I'm saying.

It's like, it's.

It's like for the hope of money and then something.

If you survive, we'll give you extra.

Exactly.

If you make it out.

Yeah.

We'll give you more money.

We'll cut your pay if you get mained, you know.

I'm sorry.

Right, exactly.

You can only come out here unscathed.

Let's see.

So I also wanted to just briefly, like, talk to about, like, other things that are happening.

Like.

Yes, of course, like, there's a lot of action that's happening, but this is also, like, following.

This is happening, of course, during the time of Christ.

And so you're seeing, like, this kind of parallel story, you know.

Right.

Of.

Of Jesus, you know, alongside, like, Judah and like, what he's going through and then.

And then, you know, seeing, like, Jesus, you know, like the famous story, you know, him and like, him growing up and then doing what he had.

Had done.

And I just thought it was interesting that they didn't.

They never showed you Jesus's face, which is good.

Yeah.

Cool.

I mean, I think that was like.

That's like, that was always a smart.

Yeah.

Rule in cinema.

Oh, yeah.

But, you know, I look at, like, Ben Hur and I look at it like any historical Christian fiction now, you know, but it was such a big book at a time when it came out, you know, you're looking at it as kind of like, well, we want to tell a Christian story, but we won't want to do the Jesus story or anything for the Bible.

So let's make it in the time of Jesus.

But, you know, it's pretty much almost like.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

You know Jesus is there, right?

You don't see Jesus.

You hear him?

Yeah.

You know.

Yeah.

So it's just like, I think that, to me, that.

In that absurd sense, but in a more melodramatic sense.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah, for sure, for sure.

No, I just thought that was interesting.

Like, I. I was like, are they ever gonna show his face?

And then when they didn't, I was like, I think that was smart to do.

It's like, whatever your interpretation, like, you know, kind of leaving it up to the audience, but to that show him.

Whatever.

Whatever their motivation was.

I liked that they made that choice.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So that was.

Yeah.

I think if.

If you have too much of him in the film, it sort of pulls focus from what you're.

That the story you're trying to tell is.

Yeah.

Which is that terrible story.

You do walk a very thin line of sacrilege.

Yeah.

So by showing.

By reinterpreting the actual.

Like, they're not changing the book of story.

Yeah, right.

All this happens in tandem with the Bible story, like, with the story of Jesus.

So it all happens off, like, away from Jerusalem, but in Jerusalem.

But it's like in another neighborhood.

Yeah.

They come, like, they come back to it every whenever.

Like, it serves the main story.

They're always like, coming back to that point.

So I thought that was.

But like.

Yeah.

Like, this film, like, it has everything that you could hope for.

It's.

It's, you know, it's.

You.

You're.

You're here for the battle scenes.

You're here for, like, the.

The story of revenge.

Like, it's.

There's a love story.

There's all these different things, you know, that just make it like the.

Like the blockbuster that you would.

Yeah.

You would hope for.

Is there any other history surrounding the film production?

Anything that we haven't already shared that you would like to share?

I mean, we're going to talk a little more about Ramon Navarro later, but, like, I think not at the moment.

No.

Like, I think it was.

It was the first of.

It was the.

The.

The.

The early kind of blockbuster age of movies.

You know, this was the, you know, D.W. griffith.

You know, all these directors were started in to do the epic blockbusters that we, you know, we don't call.

And they're not the blockbusters of the 70s or the 80s or.

Or now.

But like, that was the first era of that.

Like the massive studio, massive, you know, making massive insurance, getting millions of dollars to make something epic and to send it across the country, across the world, you know, and show this, like, world that doesn't exist.

To recreate something from a book, you know, something for fiction, and let people see something, you know, like they're seeing the Bible times they're in it, you know.

Like, there was times that I was reading that they shot some of the early footage in Rome, you know, so that they can get some of those epic shots of like, you know, like of Rome, you know.

So it's.

To me, it seems like anytime any movie wants to go epic, they all go to Rome.

Cleopatra, if you want to be the most expensive film of all time, go to Rome.

I want to ask you guys, how did the romance play for me?

We brought it up.

That's one of the many things that's in this film.

But I feel like I watch a lot of silent films, so it's sort of standard for me.

But for you guys that don't see a lot of silent film, it could perhaps come off as a little funny or unusual.

How did it play for you in this?

You know, I have a heart.

Yeah, like what you said, I. I'm not.

I think like most drama, silent films, the romance seems pretty melodramatic.

It's not like a Chaplin film where it just seems like very heartfelt or, you know, or like German expressionism, which is like paranoia and fear and still very melodramatic.

But like.

Or like, I still.

I still love Pandora's Box and Diary, you know, like.

Like Diary of a Lost Girl, like the Louise Brooks stuff.

Because it seems so natural.

It seemed like, you know, like, it seemed very natural.

The kind of romance and the infatuation.

But that was later, you know, that was.

That was several years later.

And there was Germany with directors who understood that, you know.

Like, I think in American silent films that I've experienced, you know, from D.W. griffith movies or Chaplin or Buster Keaton or later Fritz Laying, but it just seems pretty stilted, you know.

Like, I've always.

I've always felt that way when I.

When I see some silent films.

But like, there's.

There's the exceptions of the rules, you know, like.

Like the GW Paps.

Like some of the German expressionism of like those early silence to.

To me, like, if.

I don't know if you've ever seen Pandora's Box, oh, my God.

I know.

That's.

That's Rochester own Louise Brooks, you know, like, but she.

Yeah, she's just like.

You just feel.

It feels so natural watching her.

And also, like Greta Garbo films and early Marlene Dietrich films, the romance seemed like every man was infatuated with these women and they were just so drawn to them.

But, yeah, it's.

It's.

It's interesting.

It is interesting.

Kind of seeing that kind of like, I haven't.

So I haven't watched.

I haven't watched a ton of silent films, but, like, to me, I, like, I was like.

I think it's like, to be expected because there.

It's a.

It's a silent film and the nature of that is like, they're not speaking lines.

So you're having to, like, at least with this, like, I was like, it's a.

It's an epic.

I'm not really expecting a full, like, drawn out, like, romantic story.

Like, there is romance in it, but I'm not like, it's.

It's kind of there in the background.

It's like.

It's like there.

But, like, the main point is, you know, what.

What Judah is having to do, right, to get to seek revenge and then also seek out his mother and sister.

Like, so it's.

There's not as much.

I think it's like we're looking at the era of cinema where everybody's really just come from the stage, so you have to be bigger and presented.

It wasn't until later in the silent era, in the early, like, like.

And then he went, you know, took some time in the talk era that you realize you could do less is more, you know, in cinema, which is one of the greatest benefits of cinema, is that, like, you do far less.

Everyone reads into it more, you know, so a romance scene, if a guy just looking at the girl, anybody can read in like, oh, he's in love.

I've had that look, you know, and he's just like, I'm staring at the tree behind her, you know, that's how much love he's doing it.

But they're reading into it, you know, and that's.

That's something that, like, we don't.

We don't see that often.

You know, like, at that time, you had to be theater, you know, you had to show off.

You know, you had to do that.

You're not getting the Lillian Gishes or the Mary Pickfords or, you know, the it girls like Clara Bow that can do a smile and a cry.

In a moment.

Yeah.

Notice like, this is when they're starting to come up.

But that's.

They realize that's the year when you do less is more.

I think also too, for me especially Jared, and thinking more about.

Your question is with blockbusters nowadays, like, I'm thinking, you know, you're like your.

Your typical popcorn movie.

Like, you.

You expect, like, the romance is expected.

It's not why you go see the film.

You know, you're seeing it for all the action.

Of course, I always feel like a lot of the films of today, big blockbusters, they kind of.

It's not that over.

Well, I don't know.

Well, it's not really over dramatic in, like, the sense, you know, that we're comparing, you know, obviously to the.

The silent film we're talking about.

But for me, because it's expected.

Like, I don't really.

And it's.

It's.

I. I feel like lots of times it's something that's kind of thrown in because it's expected.

Like, you've got to have.

You've got to have a love story.

You got to have some sort of love scene, or you got to have something having to do with romance, you know, in this big epic or this big blockbuster.

But it's not necessarily something that I feel a lot of times is something that's done well or interestingly.

I mean, one film that comes to mind is like, it's.

It's.

Again, it's not something that's drawn out.

It's.

It's subtle, but nice.

I'm going back.

My.

Immediately pops up is Black Panther, like, obviously between.

No, and it's interesting, like between, you know, between t' Challa and Nakia.

Like, it's.

It's obvious, right, that they're, you know, their love interests, but they don't.

It's.

It's not this.

It's not.

It doesn't feel forced.

It doesn't feel like, overdramatic.

It doesn't feel.

It's.

It's there.

It's subtle.

Yeah.

Of course, it's not the main.

Not the main story, but I, like.

Yesterday, during a long, long trailer or other movie, kind of go into like just the scene sometimes when, you know, Lucy looks at Desi when she was playing with the ear, you know, like, she didn't have to say anything, but she's playing with his ear.

And Desi knows naturally how to just go, like.

Just like he would do in real life.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You know, it's not even him overacting it's.

Just him, literally even really method acting.

He's just like, wait, Lucy does this in real life to me, so I'm, you know, I'm going to react that way.

Yeah.

You know, and I think, like that right there, you said one little scene and you're like, oh, yeah, this is how she gets her way.

Right.

You know, but they didn't have to do that much acting.

She just had to read her lines and he just had to go.

I do, though.

Like, I was thinking about this, too.

I do.

Like how.

Oh, gosh, What's.

What's her name in the film?

What's.

Who's the love interest in this film?

What's her name?

Yeah.

Okay.

So the love interest in this film.

What she ends up doing, though, I think is amazing, like, giving her something to do, because I also see that as well, not just in silent films, because, again, I haven't seen a lot of silent films, but I often feel like the love interest doesn't have anything.

Esther.

Thank you.

Like, they don't often have anything to do, but what she ends up doing is, like, she sees the mother and sister now that they've been, like, freed from prison is like, she recognizes or, you know, she talks to them.

She's the one who goes after.

After them to try to get them, Right.

Help and everything so that she.

Well, first she makes a promise, right, to the mother and sister to not talk about.

To tell that they're still alive.

Right.

Because they have leprosy.

And, you know, given everything at the time, like, you know, they're outcasts.

They can't be around him.

And so her remembering that and then being like, hey, wait, there's a way that we can solve this.

Let me go grab the mother and sister so that this family can be reunited again.

I loved that.

That, you know, that's not the.

You know, that's not necessarily part of the romance, even though, you know that she's doing it out of number one, the kindness of her heart, but also because she.

She loves Judah.

Like, I also love that that's part of her character, is that she set out to go and do this incredible heroic thing, reuniting this family, so.

Oh, I forgot to.

Sorry, I changed the subject.

You were talking about the production of this movie.

Yes.

William Wyler, I just found out, was the assistant director for this movie.

Yeah.

Interesting.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

It's partly the filmmaking as well, I think, in terms of how the.

The romance comes across because can you recall, I don't think that you can had any close ups within the film.

It was all shot sort of back away.

So Jason, as you were talking, you know, you get those shots of somebody looking lovingly as somebody else.

Normally that's in the close up so you can get that emotion from their eyes.

But at the time, and with this being a spectacle, so much of it is shot in medium shot or long shot.

So you get all these multiple people in the frame as opposed to sort of being inside those conversations and getting that close up view of these people that are presumably in love.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Which I think was a detriment at that time.

But like we, you know, you're, you're not, you're getting to that era where that become, you know, you get the, you know, the long, the medium shot, then the close up, then the over the shoulder, you know, then you get to like the perfect cinema of Casablanca where they do the, you know, the close up, the two person shot, then the close up and another close up, then the over the shoulder shot and then it just says everything and then they leave.

Dolly shot showing two men walking into this.

Yeah, briefly.

I just want to talk about the score because of course that's, it's also a character, especially when it comes to silent film.

I loved this.

Normally I have like, I thing that y' all should know about me is that I listen to film scores regularly.

And this was another one of those.

I was like, man, like I, I would love to just like listen to this fully, you know, without, without the film.

Like it's, it's, it's very much like what, what you would expect from an epic.

But I just, it's, it's done so, it's done so well.

Like I, I, whenever I remember a score, like I, I could tell you like I'm talking right now and I could, I'm like there's, there's clips of the score like playing in my head and like when I can remember a score, I like, I take note because there's a lot of films that I'll watch and I'm like, was there even a score in there?

Like, but this one, because it's, I mean you're essentially what you're paying attention to is you've got, you've got the, the, the title cards, right?

And then you also, you know, telling you the dialogue and everything and then you have the, the music, right?

Because of course it's a silent film, so they're speaking lines.

So that's what you have is you have the picture that's in front of you, you have the music and you have the title cards.

And so, of course, that's why I say, you know, the music, it's is its own character.

It's like.

It's telling you.

It's the buildup, it's.

It's adding to the drama, which is what a score is supposed to do.

I don't know.

Like, did either of you have any thoughts just about.

About the score?

Phil, Carly is kind of a treasure here in the Rochester community in that he is accompanying films around the world, and he's sort of our resident musician for the silent films.

So to have him come in once a week and play along with them, and it's often.

Sometimes he'll know the films and sometimes you'll give him sort of an assignment, and it's like, what country, what year, what studio, what genre?

And he knows exactly what to play.

So to have that aspect to some and recreating silent experience, to have that there is just.

It's something that I think I tend to take for granted.

We did have.

Earlier in the month, we had orchestra come in and play along with Metropolis, but that's.

That's sort of an oversized version of live accompaniment that happens on a regular basis.

I can't wait for.

My girlfriend has never seen a League of Silent film in the theater, and I'm excited for Tuesday so that she can kind of see that experience of having a live accompaniment with.

With a movie.

So it's going to be interesting to kind of see that because I love seeing other people's reactions.

Yeah.

To the movie, you know, to see how, like, how involved they are and so.

And having a silent film, it's just.

It's a unique experience just to see, you know, hear the piano playing, to hear that kind of go along with the scenes.

And you're just like.

You're hearing it fresh.

You're not hearing it from, like, speakers.

Right, right.

Yeah.

You're breaking the time, Jason.

You're revealing the fact that we're recording this before.

This is supposed to be special afterwards.

It's already happened.

I wrote the continuity.

No, Darn it.

Oh, gosh, Jason, you had one job.

No, I'm kidding.

I forgot.

So confused.

In some days, it is all good.

Okay, so moving on, something that will.

Might redeem you is.

Let's talk about the legacy of Ramon Navarro.

Okay, so what.

Tell.

Tell me first of all, like, of course, again, the.

The.

The impact of.

Of seeing again someone who is Mexican, like playing, Playing this role and also Chu.

Like the.

What to you.

What to you is the legacy of Ramon?

Well, I mean, it's, it's funny because he becomes the kind of the first of the Latin lovers, which becomes kind of a.

It becomes eventually for later generations, a stranglehold.

You know, like, I was just.

I've been listening to Desire and as his autobiography, and he, you know, by the time the 40s roll around, he's struggling with that idea of like, oh, I'm not like Ramon Navarro or Cesar Romero or, you know, Anthony Quinn, you know, like, they almost have to break free from this, this stranglehold, but because he's one of the first, you know, you know, to like, to create that image of, you know, you're Latino, you're.

You're suave, you have a slight tan skin, you know, your jet black hair.

That image of like the Latin lover, which we still see in cinema.

You know, we still see it all.

You know, how many times has Benjamin Brat.

How many times has been, you know, Jimmy Smits.

Other people, like, have played the kind of Roman Oscar Isaac.

Pedro Pascal.

Pedro Pascal.

Like, you know, I don't know.

Yeah, but like.

Yeah, I don't.

Pedro.

But.

No, but, like, I mean, everyone crushes on him, but I don't think he's a Latin lover type.

But he's asked women.

Yeah, that's different.

But he's not going out playing those roles, so he's not going out playing like a lover or like a suave.

You know, I mean, he has.

But.

Yeah, but I think that's something.

But it's also, to me, it's also interested because he's also one of the first silent movie stars to be closeted to be a homosexual, you know, and his death will be related to his homosexuality later in life.

So that's an era that we think of, you know, here's these people, but also here's this closeted time.

Here's this, you know, interesting time of what they call the Hollywood Babylon period.

You know, like, this is, you know, like they're literally building Babylon, like, hence intolerance and even Ben Hur.

They're literally building these kind of like biblical, kind of crazy, epic, hedonistic, like even hedonistic movies.

This is before the hayscope.

So there's nudity, you know, earlier Cleopatras and I, you know, like, there is this existing before.

With scandal and, you know, titillation.

So I think that's interesting that, you know, Romo Navarro is like, one of those people that have fell into that, but also, he's also kind of, you know, like, he's the archetype.

He's the archetype of the Latin character which would exist and, you know, and it was a role for so many actors to get their career started.

Yeah.

You know, we don't have a Cesar Romero.

We don't have, you know, like, we don't.

It goes all the way down to, you know, now, like, we're just saying Pedro.

So.

Yeah, yeah, Jared, I know you have to leave to go introduce a film.

Did you have any other thoughts, you know, about this film, about talking about the.

The legacy of Ramon Navarro?

Yeah.

It's Charlie Chaplin, Harold Lloyd Keaton, Lillian Gish, all of these names that are more easily associated with the silent period, and Navarro is among them, along with cinematographers and directors.

So it's important to note that even if it's not somebody that on the street would be able to recall that the people who appreciated silent cinema at the time were saying, yes, this is an actor who is important.

And we want to take this step to make sure that his legacy is remembered in some way from this point on.

And then this is.

That's something that we'll keep going here because it's part of our history as well.

But to note that he was recognized among these greats that are.

They're still coming off the lips more easily.

It's important.

Yeah, I agree with you completely.

That's so true.

Yeah, absolutely.

All right, well, listen, I wish you all the best, Jared, for all the incredible things that you do over there at Dryden Theater.

We'll hope to have you back, of course, on the pod to talk about more things.

So thank you so much.

Of course.

Thank you for having me.

It's great.

Absolutely.

See you Tuesday.

Break in a time.

Horrible.

No, I'm kidding.

Okay, so do you want to.

Jason, do you want to Remind folks of the remaining films, you know that just, just a real quick reminder we.

Have after Ben Hur will be Zoot Suit, the great movie by Luis Valdez.

And then I've heard a lot of people talking to me about American, sorry, Adams family values.

American family values.

Adams family values with the great but amazing Raul Julie, which I actually just found a vinyl of one of his plays, the Threepenny Opera today at a estate sale.

So I love that.

Like it's an awesome picture of him.

And then La Strada.

Yes.

We are showing a Fellini film for Hispanic Heritage Month and it's not about being Italian, you know, like come and watch it, you'll see why it's for Latinos.

Awesome.

Well, anything else before we wrap up, Jason?

Just about again, anything about the film, Anything about Ramon Navarro?

I think like Jared summed it up perfectly.

You know, like if you know James Carr, the founder, you know, one of the founders of the Dryden at the museum, thought of him as one of the first Latinos to be honored.

Says so much about his impact on cinema and I like that.

Yes, this was a big budget spectacle.

Yes, this is a biblical epic, you know, like one of the really earliest sword and sandal epics.

But you know, he deserves to be on that, that, that, that, that era of the, of the first, you know, he was one of the first and that deserves that, you know.

Absolutely.

All right, so Jason, any, any shout outs you want to give, you know, any, any way that people can, where can people find you and support you?

Just you follow me on Instagram and also you follow the present day film series.

You can follow the Dryden.

All this information is online on Instagram and Facebook.

Awesome.

Well, I want to thank you for joining the podcast tonight.

Of course listeners will have information of course about our guests in the show notes or in the description below.

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Will be back with more spoiler specials from the present day Latin Film Fest with Zoot Suit which will be screening at the George's museum on Wednesday, October 7th at 7:30pm of course, all the screenings in this series are free and open to the public.

This has been Jackie McGriff, your host for this episode of Representation in Cinema.

And as always, thank you for listening.

This has been a presentation of the Lunchadore Podcast Network.