85 minutes
The Garden of Eden preceded by Kipho (Film)
In this pre-Code gem from the late silent era, The Garden of Eden, a woman flees her pretzel-baking guardians in Vienna to pursue her dreams of becoming an opera singer in Budapest, where she lands a job as a showgirl in a seedy nightclub. After she and her coworker are fired, they travel to the Hotel Eden in Monte Carlo for a whirlwind vacation in this irresistible sex comedy. Dir. Lewis Milestone • USA • 1928 • Silent • 80 min
Screening with Kipho (Film), a short, modernist, promotional film for the 1925 “Kipho” trade show in Berlin. Through montage and quick splices, the film’s images––shot behind the scenes and including iconic archival clips––abstractly represent the filmmaking process and industry. Dir. Julius Pinschewer, Guido Sieber • Germany • 1925 • Silent • 5 min
Film Notes by Ehsan Khoshbakht: The Garden of Eden
A film of and about deceptive appearances, The Garden of Eden starts as a Viennese drama but soon morphs into a Riviera comedy. Its script was penned by Hans Kraly, Ernst Lubitsch’s collaborator on 30 films, and was briskly directed by Lewis Milestone in a joyful, light-hearted mood. Corinne Griffith plays Toni, a young woman raised by her baker guardians in Vienna. Unsatisfied with baking pretzels for life, she dreams of becoming an opera singer. She departs for Budapest, under the impression she is auditioning for a serious singing role. However, on her first night on stage, Toni is shocked to discover––unbeknownst to her––that she has been dressed in a see-through costume. Further revelations follow: the venue is a disreputable music hall, and its patronness offers her girls to wealthy men. Disillusioned and pursued by a persistent rich man, Toni finds solace with the theatre’s grandmotherly wardrobe mistress (Louise Dresser). The two women pack up and leave… for Monte Carlo. Even more surprises await: the wardrobe mistress is actually a baroness. They soon check into the Hotel Eden, a playground for the sexual escapades of the wealthy, lavishly designed by the film’s art director and Milestone’s frequent collaborator, William Cameron Menzies. The hotel sets the stage for a series of further revelations, culminating in the second half of this charming comedy. The material could have easily been adapted into a screwball comedy in the sound era, and the film is undoubtedly ahead of its time. Milestone elaborates on some of his earlier mise-en-scène ideas, such as characters circling and being circled. Described by Milestone’s biographer Harlow Robinson as the director’s “most successful romantic comedy,” the original film featured a sequence in colour of which only a few frames have survived.
The Garden of Eden was restored by San Francisco Film Preserve in collaboration with George Eastman Museum and the Library of Congress.
Film Notes by Martin Koerber: Kipho (Film)
The advertising-film producer Julius Pinschewer commissioned pioneering cameraman and film historian Guido Seeber to produce this short film to promote the Kino- und Photoausstellung (or “Kipho” for short), a trade show for film and photography that took place in Berlin from 25 September to 4 October 1925. Seeber fashioned a frenzied montage, combining staged behind-the-scenes shots of studio filming and post-production with excerpts from his collection of historical film equipment and documents. Seeber also incorporated footage from then-recent films made by Ufa––Germany’s leading production company––including Fritz Lang’s Die Nibelungen (1924). (The impressive human-operated life-size model dragon created for Lang’s film was featured as an exhibit at Kipho.) F.W. Murnau’s The Last Laugh (1924) and, most prominently, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920) also echo through Seeber’s promotional film. Above all, however, it is its whirlwind of multiple exposures and special effects that make the film, simply titled Film, a masterpiece of cinéma pur.
Kipho copy from Deutsche Kinemathek–Museum für Film und Fernsehen.
Presented by Archives on Screen
Archives on Screen (AoS) brings rare, unseen archival films from around the globe to Minnesota. Co-founded in 2022 by Michelle Baroody and Maggie Hennefeld, AoS has worked with international film archives and local film venues to expose students, diverse audiences, and underserved populations to the richness of cinema history. We screen everything from silent films to contemporary features, focusing primarily on counter-cinemas, such as feminist and queer films, world cinema, and anti-colonial productions. Our events facilitate public education, community engagement, and open conversation about how the archives of film history can help us to imagine different worlds and alternative futures. Archives on Screen’s flagship program, Il Cinema Ritrovato on Tour, is a curated selection of films from Il Cinema Ritrovato, an annual international film festival that exhibits new restorations and rediscovered films in Bologna, Italy every summer. We also host a quarterly screening series at the Trylon Cinema in Minneapolis and regular screenings at the Heights Theater and other local venues. Learn more about Archives on Screen at archivesonscreen.org