Sunday, July 6, 2008

Jason goes to the Niles Film Museum and sees "The Busher" plus a couple of shorts

Back at my favorite Saturday night silent film hangout. Okay, it's usually the only Saturday night silent film hangout in the Bay Area. But not next weekend. Next weekend there's the SF Silent Film Festival at the Castro. I'll be busy Saturday night, but I should be there Friday and Sunday.

Anyway, these were the movies in Niles last Saturday:

"Alkali Ike's Auto"--a short comedy with Alkali Ike (Augustus Carney) and Mustang Pete (Harry Todd) vying for the affection of Betty Brown (Margaret Joslin). Ike offers to take her on a horse ride. Pete one-ups with a carriage ride. So Ike buys a fancy new horseless carriage. If only he knew how to drive. Interesting trivia, Harry Todd and Margaret Joslin were married in real life.

"Saturday's Lesson" was (one of?) the last "Our Gang" silents, before they went all talkie. The gang doesn't want to do chores on Saturday morning. But a guy in a devil costume teaches them a lesson. Maybe a little too well, in fact.

And then the feature, "The Busher". A good ol' baseball story. Small town star makes an impression when the champion St. Paul Pink Sox stop in town (their train breaks down). He's called up to the majors, gets a big head, gets sent away, and returns home shamed. But when the big cross-town rivalry comes around, some unscrupulous types try to rig the game. Luckily he's there to save the day. And he vows only to pitch for local town pride ever again. A nice movie.

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