The Dark Romance of a Tobacco Can

Anything and everything silent photoplay!
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Kitty
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Joined: Sat Feb 25, 2017 8:57 pm

The Dark Romance of a Tobacco Can

Post by Kitty »

This is what I presume to be a lost film from 1911 that was transformed into a short story in the October 1911 issue of Motion Picture Story Magazine. This one caught my eye because of the photos---I thought it was going to be a film with black players, and (silly me) perhaps a tale of life on the homestead. Not at all.
It's mainly interesting because in the beginning of the story the character is played by a real black woman, and later the same character is played by a white woman in blackface. For today's standards, it's an unfunny comedy, only of interest to those who want a good idea of how the black community really was treated, especially in the old days in cinema and beyond.

http://archive.org/stream/motionpicture ... 9/mode/2up
You trying to tell me you didn't hear that shriek? That was something trying to get out of its premature grave, and I don't want to be here when it does. - Phantom of the Paradise (1974)

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donnie
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Joined: Sun Feb 26, 2017 8:28 am

Re: The Dark Romance of a Tobacco Can

Post by donnie »

Interesting! Yes, the story is racist, but I love the writing style used in those old stories. This plot reminds me of one of my favorite shorts (can't remember if I've posted somewhere on here awhile back or not—I may have). It is Matrimony's Speed Limit (1913), an Alice Guy-Blaché film, starring Fraunie Fraunholtz. The standard must-get-married-quickly-to-inherit-a-fortune plot, and there is a brief scene with a mistaken African-American prospective bride.
https://youtu.be/Pzi4xGQg5Ag

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