Film/Broken Blossoms (1919)

Film/Broken Blossoms (1919)
directed by D.W. Griffith
introduced by Joyce Jesionowskiwith live accompaniment by Peter Dodge
directed by D.W. Griffith

1919, b&w, 1 hour 25 minutes, USA

Monday, September 3, 7:00pm

Based on the short story by Thomas Burke, "The Chink and the Child" in Limehouse Nights, Lillian Gish plays a Caucasian waif who is abused by a brutal father and befriended by a Chinese shopkeeper in a Dickensian London. "Broken Blossoms was one of Griffith's most claustrophobic exercises at the height of his career, but his fable of trapped lives liberates itself through a sweeping romance of the spirit. Griffith's reliance on master shots and close-ups within a vivid set of London's rundown, dimly lit Limehouse neighborhood—a shack, a wharf, and a few streets—is transcended by the nuance and delicacy of the acting...." (Village Voice) 35mm