Reviews of silent film releases on home video.
Copyright © 1999-2025 by Carl Bennett
and the Silent Era Company.
All Rights Reserved. |
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A Little Princess
(1917)
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Based on the novel Sara Crewe by Frances Hodgson Burnett, this Mary Pickford vehicle is another of her early ‘poor little rich girl’ films that silent era audiences loved. Norman Kerry and ZaSu Pitts support.
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 The Milestone Collection
2003 DVD edition
Without Lying Down (2000), color and black & white, 55 minutes, not rated, with A Little Princess (1917), black & white, 62 minutes, not rated.
Milestone Film & Video, distributed by Image Entertainment,
ID1025MLSDVD, UPC 0-14381-10252-9.
One single-sided, dual-layered, Region 1 NTSC DVD disc; 1.33:1 aspect ratio picture in full-frame 4:3 (720 x 480 pixels) interlaced scan image encoded in SDR MPEG-2 format at 6.0 Mbps average video bit rate (capable of progressive scan upscaling to 60 fps); Dolby Digital (AC3) 2.0 stereo sound encoded at 224 Kbps audio bit rate; English language intertitles, no subtitles; 8 chapter stops; standard DVD keepcase; $29.99.
Release date: 11 March 2003.
Country of origin: USA •
Ratings (1-10): video: 7 / audio: 7 / additional content: 7 / overall: 7.
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This DVD edition of A Little Princess (1917) is included as supplementary material to a documentary on writer Frances Marion. The film is presented in a full-frame video transfer which runs at slightly faster than natural speed, and with windowboxed still-frame titles on the majority of main titles and intertitles. The entire presentation could well be a video-only compilation of the best surviving elements. The source print is generally in very-good condition but a little contrasty, with plugged-up shadows and some featureless highlights, and some sections of higher amounts of speckling and emulsion scuffing. Some shots (of the exterior of the palace, for instance) are out-and-out blurry.
The film is accompanied by a piano score.
For now, this is our recommended home video edition of the film.
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This Region 1 NTSC DVD edition has been discontinued
and is . . .
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 Loving the Classics
202? DVD edition
A Little Princess (1917), black & white, 62 minutes, not rated.
Loving the Classics,
no catalog number, no UPC number.
One single-sided, single-layered, Region 0 NTSC DVD-R disc; 1.33:1 aspect ratio picture in full-frame 4:3 (720 x 480 pixels) interlaced scan image encoded in SDR MPEG-2 format at ? Mbps average video bit rate (capable of progressive scan upscaling to ? fps); Dolby Digital (AC3) 2.0 stereo sound encoded at ? Kbps audio bit rate; English language intertitles, no subtitles; chapter stops; standard DVD keepcase; $14.99.
Release date: 202?
Country of origin: USA
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This DVD-R edition has likely been mastered from a 16mm reduction print.
The film is likely accompanied by a soundtrack compiled from preexisting music recordings.
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This
Region 0 NTSC DVD-R edition is available directly from . . .
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Other silent era MARY PICKFORD films available on home video.
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Mary Pickford filmography in The Progressive Silent Film List
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