Word: silent
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...past 19 years, Rudolph Valentino has wordlessly fought the same rival and lost and won the same woman above the fading velveteen seats of the Majestic Theatre at Pomona (pop. 900), 30 km inland from the Sunshine Coast. And on most of those nights, Ron West has provided the silent movie's voice on his Wurlitzer pipe organ, playing swirly harp sounds when the heroine swoons, shifting to a sinister key when the villain appears, and pulling up short when the hero reins his horse...
...When West and his late wife Mandy took over the Majestic in 1974, the old picture palace had long since adapted to the talkie, Technicolor times. Ron, whose father played the oboe in silent-movie orchestras in New Zealand, had been a church organist since his schooldays, when he took up the organ to get out of football. As a hobby, "a plaything that I thought would keep me busy into my retirement," he started restoring the Majestic's decrepit organ, gathering pipes and electrical switches from old theaters and churches as far away as Fiji...
...Sunshine-Coast resort asked if the Wests could screen "something nostalgic" for a coach load of travel agents. They pulled out Son of the Sheik-and had an instant hit. Three months later the theater went all-silent, and the organ (whose pipes "speak" through a vent from a side room) has hardly had a quiet moment since. As well as the Thursday-night show, West runs an annual silent-film festival and puts on extra screenings by request-earlier today, for a group of New Zealand golfers whose game was rained...
...essence, though the Lebanese Army is envisaged as the foundation of the long-term solution, it has remained remarkably silent during the three-week war on what is, legally at least, its own territory. And the reasons for its passivity may hold important clues to the final shape of a peace agreement...
...docudrama approach was mostly an excuse to show lowlifes in low lighting. And if Higgins supplied the craft of Mann's noir films, cinematographer John Alton surely served up the art. Before hooking up with Mann, Alton had a nomad's r?sum?: born in Hungary, an assistant in Hollywood silent films, shooting pictures in Argentina in the '30s, then B and C movies back in America. The two men clicked as collaborators, sparking with extreme visual tropes, each instantly elevating the other's work. "I found a director in Tony Mann who thought like I did," he told Todd McCarthy...