The untold
story of the rise and fall of one of America's pioneering silent motion
picture studios.
  
  
This award winning 53 minute documentary premiered on opening night at the
Pordenone Silent
Film Festival in Pordenone, Italy on October 4, 2014 and was featured on
Turner Classic Movies "Silent Sunday Nights" in July 2015. It was awarded a
Special Jury Award for Documentary
at the 2015 WorldFest-Houston,
Award of Excellence by the
Depth of Field
International Film Festival, nominated for Best Documentary Feature by the
Los Angles Film Review, selected for competition by the
New York
Independent Film Festival, and was awarded Best Documentary Feature by
Star Doc Fest. Read reviews by
Marc Mohan (The Oregonian),
Sean Axmaker (Fandor's Keynote), and
Lea Stans (Silent-ology). It is now available
for purchase on DVD and BluRay or to
watch online.
The DVD disc also includes two Thanhouser
films highlighted in the documentary: Petticoat
Camp (1912) and The Evidence of the Film
(1913). Buy the DVD and BluRay or watch the trailer below and stream the documentary
online:
Watch
The Thanhouser Studio and the Birth of American Cinema
by
Ned Thanhouser
(No Charge)
My grandparents, Edwin and
Gertrude Thanhouser, founded a groundbreaking independent silent movie
studio in 1909. This studio eventually made over 1000 films that were
distributed around the world until suddenly disappearing in 1917…almost
all the films were either lost or destroyed. As a result, the Thanhouser
Film Studio is largely forgotten today.
I've spent more than two decades recovering what I can find of the
studio’s output, including original nitrate films, posters and
historical artifacts. To date, I've discovered over 225 Thanhouser films, and
I continue to find more every year
buried in archives and
private collections around the
world. The Thanhouser story deserves a place in any discussion
of early American Cinema, and to that end, I've worked for
three years
on a documentary that tells my family’s story, as
well as my journey of
discovery.
The documentary recounts the
untold story of the rise and fall of this remarkable pioneering motion
picture studio during the first decade of the twentieth century. It
traces the evolution of one family’s career as it transitioned from
producing live theater to establishing one of the most successful
independent silent motion picture studios in early cinema.
Set
against a backdrop of Thomas A. Edison and his Motion Picture Patents
Trust companies dominating the industry, the story plays out in New
York, Florida and California. It is a compelling story of fame and
fortune, twisted by the vagaries of fate and ending on a bittersweet
note.
I believe telling this story is
important because it is provides a new perspective on the development of
early cinema in America. Scholars, researchers, and fans of film history
will learn how the Thanhouser studio helped to establish independent
productions that led to what we know today as Hollywood.
Please
Contact Us if you wish to to
schedule a screening at your venue. And,
THANK YOU to everyone who supported the
fundraising campaign to help finish this film...your
contributions are very much appreciated!
- Ned Thanhouser, October 2014
Thanhouser Company Film Preservation, Inc.
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