Directed by William Nigh
Terry O'Neill is the youngest of a family of Irish firefighters. He falls in love with Helen Corwin, but complications ensue when Terry learns that her father, a wealthy contractor, has cut costs by putting his buildings in danger of fire.
USA USA 
For now I have to do with the rusty old VHS version of this classic, but I hear there is a stunning restoration making the rounds, so hopefully that'll reach me at one point. In The Fire Brigade (1926) you see the MGM machinery in full effect. Every shot does something, bringing energy, laughs and thrills. Charms turned up to 100%. That was their way. And with that the character and action came off in a big way. But you could also see the padding to the story as things does slow down quite a bit in the middle there. But this is such a crowd pleaser that it leaves a positive mark regardless. And I'm sure even more so with the restored color scenes and all that glitz and glamor.
So clearly one of those movies where the powers behind it came up with two spectacular fire sequences (excerpted with some spoilers here), and slapped together a plot to hang them on. May McAvoy is charming throughout, and moving in a simply-blocked but very effective scene where someone opens a door, then shifts slightly to reveal her reaction to an overheard betrayal.
The spiritual prequel to last year's Capitolfest closer The Shield of Honor (1927).
A city's fire department is almost the O'Neil family business, employing the grandfather, father, and three grandsons. But the city is plagued by buildings constructed by a contractor who underbids everyone by cutting every corner--fires in these buildings claim two of the three grandsons. And when this contractor, secretly in league with the city's leading philanthropist, wins the contract to build a new orphanage, I felt like I was watching a Batman plot.
Of course the philanthropist has a beautiful daughter, who falls madly in love with the youngest O'Neil grandson. Of course the newly opened orphanage catches fire when the paint plant across the street explodes.…
This movie might have worked for me inevitably - my first screening at the San Francisco Silent Film Fest in years, plus my first live music since the pandemic started (courtesy the always-amazing accompanists Stephen Horne and Frank Bockius), was gonna be an emotionally charged event. But credit where it's due: the stridency of this movie's tribute to Our Brave And Stalwart Firefighting Men is sincere from start to finish without ever becoming corny, and it backs it up with full tilt artistry, from Technicolor sequences to tinted fires to hell yeah rear projection. Charles Ray is nearly Harold Lloyd-level smarmy in his early innings as a third-gen firefighter, but it's lovely watching his inner hero emerge; the movie shows him fucking up a bunch of things early on, and even though we just know he's going to nail them all in the final reels it is deeply satisfying and moving to see him pull them off.
I'd seen clips of this in the first episode of Hollywood, but the entire film is astounding. The visual effects are stunning by today's standards, never mind 1926. The few scenes that were in colour were gorgeous and the tinting of the flames really added a vibrancy to those scenes. As for the melodrama of the story, it's a hundred years later, yet you feel like this kind of graft would scarcely make a mention in the news.
Capitolfest 2022 movie #18.
GOD DAMN YOUR SOUL
Look this movie earns its four star rating almost entirely in the third act. But holy hell what a third act. I don't know that I've seen anything on that scale in a movie theater before, certainly nothing in a silent film this side of Metropolis.
This was just a banger all around, has a little bit of everything, romance, drama, family, action, but honestly the most intense and exciting action in the climax I’ve seen in a silent film so far. Just something that you can tell absolutely rocked at the movies 95+ years ago. Those red flames? The romance scenes in full Technicolor? The cars flying down streets and the POV shots? Genuinely exhilarating even today. And the charm these actors have!! It all completely translates here.
HUGE shoutout to Dennis Scott, the in-house organist, if only everyone could see this movie with a fucking killer organist wailing away fire bells and intense chords over buildings crumbling and firefighters saving lives by seconds. Added so so much god I love the Music Box.
Gosh darn it I cried in the theater
Like many my first exposure to Fire Brigade 1926 was the fragments used in Kevin Brownlow's colossal Documentary Hollywood 1980. Even despite its unflattering VHS quality presentation you knew the film is special.
The restoration shown recently at the San Francisco Silent Film Festival was something of a revelation it employed three colour techniques 1) Two-Tone Technicolour 2) Dye Tinting 3) Handschiegl Color Process used for those sharp Red Flames.
The first half of the film is a tad predictable and sentimental but the final conclusion makes up for everything, some of the most thrilling scenes I have seen in Silent Cinema. The Live Musical Accompaniment at San Francisco Silent Film Festival took this to a sublime event.
“ If the fire spreads, we roll out! “
got the opportunity to see this film on a film reel on loan from the library of congress. it is toted as being one of the first color movies, and we got to see that on preserved film cells where they had hand painted color scenes of a party. then, they hand painted the fires red.
the plot itself? one of the best thrillers i’ve ever seen, silent or not. phenomenal cast and direction. 🔥
Capitolfest #18
What a way to end Capitolfest. How is this not a classic of the Silent Era?
Knew when we were working on it that it would be an audience pleaser and was super excited to see it accompanied by Stephen Horne and Frank Bockius and they did not disappoint. So much fun!
