Silent films given new life through bluegrass music

Black and white footage of silent films rolled across the projection screen at the International Storytelling Center as part of the “Select Southern Shorts by D.W. Griffith” event.

On Feb. 20, four of Griffith’s short films were accompanied on stage by bluegrass music performed by The Roper Sisters. Before the screening, the director of the International Storytelling Center Kiran Sirah introduced the idea of storytelling in Appalachia and how that connected to Griffith’s films.

“As we watch these representations of Appalachian life, we need to remember its source and that we are seeing the world through a very particular set of eyes,” Sirah said. “Griffith was a privileged man, and one of his privileges was that he got to tell other people’s stories.”

Griffith was often called “the father of narrative cinema,” said Matthew Holtmeier, an ETSU Film Studies professor.

“He’s hugely famous in that sense, but he’s a complicated figure,” Holtmeier said. “He’s sort of a monumental figure in film history for both good and bad reasons. Before Griffith was making big epics, he was making a bunch of short films for the Biograph film company. These short films had small narratives, and I think that’s part of how they represent Appalachia.”

The films featured included “Mountaineer’s Honor,” “The Fugitive,” “The Revenue Man and the Girl” and “Love in the Hills.” Following the screening, audience members participated in a Q&A, posing questions to Sirah, The Roper Sisters and Holtmeier. The Roper Sisters explained their preparation process to play music along with the films.

“We thought about the content of the film, and we picked tunes that had history and a sense of the geography and the time period,” Hannah Roper said. “The tunes that we picked to play are tunes that people then and there would have been playing, listened to and would have known, and also the lyrics of the songs.”

The next silent film screening will be April 16 at The Willow Tree Coffeehouse & Music Room. Ron Roach, director of the ETSU Appalachian Studies program, will lead the discussion about the film, “Our Hospitality.”

If you would like to be placed on a mailing list for ETSU Film Studies events, please e-mail Holtmeier at holtmeier@etsu.edu.