I don't usually interrupt my October horror/science fiction posts in October for any reason but I must make an announcement that is close to my heart. Earlier this year Marilyn Ferdinand of Ferdy on Films and Farran Smith Nehme of The Self-Styled Siren held a blogathon fundraiser for the National Film Preservation Foundation in an effort to preservation films in varying states of decay, resurrect previously lost films and raise awareness of the dire need to preserve our film history. I took part by creating the banners and commercials for the event, seen here and here. 75 American films from the silent period were discovered in a New Zealand film archive in 2009 and the blogathon/fundraiser helped raise money to preserve them. Specifically, the money raised went to the films The Sergeant (1910) and The Better Man (1912), complete with a credit for the blogathon itself. But also among the 75 films was an early John Ford backstage comedy, Upstream, and that's the subject of this post.Two months ago I started working at the National Archives in Washington, D.C. and this Thursday, at 7:00 p.m. in the William G. McGowan Theater on the lower level, the Archives will be showing Upstream, free of charge and open to all. I encourage anyone in the area to attend, especially cinephiles who want to experience a piece of film history (and how can seeing a backstage comedy directed by John Ford, of all people, not be film history). The details can be found at the Archives site, here. After October wraps up I'll post the full details of the experience along with a review. Hope to see you there.
