Up next! Scoring original dinosaur flick 'The Lost World' on Wednesday, 7/16 at Leavitt Theatre

An original release poster for 'The Lost World' (1925).

Even pre-history had to start somewhere!

And with the movies, 'The Lost World' (1925) generally gets the credit as the first-ever dinosaur movie. 

Based on the Arthur Conan Doyle story, the film pioneered stop-motion animation techniques that allowed long-extinct creatures to be brought to life on the big screen.

It'll be my privilege to create live music for a screening of this classic adventure thriller on Wednesday, July 16 at 7 p.m. at the Leavitt Theatre in downtown Ogunquit, Maine.

Lots more info in the press release below. Hope to see you at the Leavitt for this amazing picture, which really must be seen on the big screen, as dinosaurs are not small creatures.

*    *    *

'The Lost World' combined stop motion animation with live action footage.

MONDAY, JUNE 30, 2025 / FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact Jeff Rapsis • (603) 236-9237 • jeffrapsis@gmail.com

Dinosaurs! Silent film classic 'The Lost World' at Leavitt Theatre on Wednesday, July 16

Ground-breaking thriller, first to bring prehistoric creatures to the big screen, to be shown with live music; based on Arthur Conan Doyle story

OGUNQUIT, Maine—Before there was 'Jurassic Park' or 'Godzilla' or even 'King Kong,' there was 'The Lost World.'

The movie, a blockbuster hit when released in 1925, paved the way for Hollywood's enduring fascination with stories pitting mankind against dinosaurs and other larger-than-life creatures.

See for yourself when a restored version of 'The Lost World' is screened on Wednesday, July 16 at 7 p.m. at the Leavitt Theatre, 259 Main St., Route 1 in Ogunquit, Maine.

The screening will feature live accompaniment by Jeff Rapsis, a New Hampshire-based composer who specializes in creating scores for silent films.

Tickets are $15 general admission and available at the door.

The Leavitt is celebrating its 100th anniversary, having served the community continuously since 1925. To honor this long record, the venue has planned a season of vintage silent movie classics from 1925 with live music.

The series gives area film fans a chance to see movies from the pioneering days of cinema as they were intended to be shown—on the big screen, with an audience, and accompanied by live music.

 

A two-page trade journal ad for 'The Lost World' (1925). Click on the image to enlarge.

 

'The Lost World' is a silent fantasy adventure film based on Arthur Conan Doyle's 1912 novel of the same name. The movie was produced by First National Pictures, a precursor to Warner Brothers, and stars Wallace Beery in the lead role as Professor Challenger.

'The Lost World' tells the tale of a British exploration team that journeys to South America to confirm reports of long-extinct creatures still roaming a remote high plateau deep in the jungle.

The landscape they discover, filled with a wide range of dinosaurs and other fantastic creatures, was enough to astonish movie-goers when 'The Lost World' first hit movie screens in February 1925. Scenes of a brontosaurus on the loose in central London broke new ground in terms of cinema's visual story-telling possibilities.

Early viewers of the film were especially impressed by special effects breakthroughs that allowed live actors to appear simultaneously on-screen with stop motion models of prehistoric creatures. This led to rumors that the filmmakers had actually discovered living prehistoric creatures.

Terrorizing downtown London—and predating Godzilla in Tokyo by three decades.

The film featured pioneering stop motion special effects by Willis O'Brien, who would go on to create the effects used to bring 'King Kong' to the screen in 1933.

Arthur Conan Doyle's novel and the movie version of 'The Lost World' proved so influential in the dinosaur genre that the title was borrowed by author Michael Crichton for his 1995 novel, and then used by director Steven Spielberg for 'The Lost World: Jurassic Park' (1997), the sequel to the original 'Jurassic Park' movie of 1993.

In 1998, the original 'The Lost World' (1925) was deemed "culturally, historically or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry.

Despite the film's popularity, only incomplete copies of 'The Lost World' survived from its initial run in the silent era. In recent years, historians have been piecing together 'The Lost World' from fragments found scattered among the world's film archives.

The version to be shown at the Leavitt includes footage from eight different prints. At 93 minutes in length, it's the most complete version of 'The Lost World' available. The edition includes rare footage of Arthur Conan Doyle that has been missing from most prints since the film's original release.

To accompany the film, Rapsis will use a digital synthesizer to recreate the texture of a full orchestra. For each film, the score is created live in real time as the movie is screened.

Rather than focus on authentic music of the period, Rapsis creates new music for silent films that draws from movie scoring techniques that today's audiences expect from the cinema.

Following 'The Lost World' (1925) on Wednesday, July 16 at 7 p.m., other programs in this year's Leavitt silent film series include:

• Wednesday, Aug. 13, 2025, 7 p.m.: "The Freshman" (1925) starring Harold Lloyd. Welcome football season with Harold Lloyd's blockbuster silent-era hit about a college boy who dreams of success on the gridiron. One of Lloyd's all-time best!

• Wednesday, Sept. 17, 2025, 7 p.m.: "Risky Business" (1925) starring Vera Ralston, Zazu Pitts. No, not the 1986 film starring Tom Cruise. In this silent-era 'Risky Business,' Zasu Pitts stars with Vera Reynolds in a tale of a society girl's love for a country doctor in a film that is by turns harrowing, hilarious, and heart-warming.

• Monday, Oct. 27, 2025, 7 p.m.: "Phantom of the Opera" (1925). Long before Andrew Lloyd Webber created the hit stage musical, this silent film adaptation starring Lon Chaney helped place 'Phantom' firmly in the pantheon of both horror and romance. See it if you dare!

The restored 'The Lost World' will be shown with live music on Wednesday, July 16 at 7 p.m. at the Leavitt Theatre, 259 Main St. Route 1, Ogunquit, Maine; (207) 646-3123; admission is $15 per person, general seating.

For more information, visit www.leavittheatre.com.

Report from Cleveland: 'The Lost World' (1925) highlights sci-fi marathon. Next up: 'Way Down East' on Sunday, Jan. 26 in Wilton, N.H.

Rules are posted prominently at the Case Western Reserve University Film Society's annual science-fiction marathon.

Cleveland may have the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame, but it also has the Case Western Reserve University Film Society. 

And Rock 'n' Roll may be about rebellion, but I'm here say that this past weekend, the real rebels in Cleveland attended the CWRU Film Society's annual Science Fiction Marathon—all 30 hours of it.

It being the event's 50th year, steps were taken to commemorate this remarkable milestone. One of those steps: including a silent film with live music in the line-up.

That's where I came in: on Saturday afternoon, after the 1951 sci-fi classic 'The Day The Earth Stood Still' (with its Bernard Herrmann score), I had the privilege of doing live music for 'The Lost World' (1925).

And let me tell you—nothing compares to the audience response of several hundred hardcore sci-fi buffs for this kind of film. Everyone supplying dinosaur noises was just the start. People reacted to everything and anything. Comments were shouted at the screen throughout the movie.

To a silent film accompanist, it's a special experience—one worth driving 700 miles one-way for, which is what I did this weekend. (What do silent film accompaniment and long-haul trucking have in common?)

I've scored silent films for previous editions of the marathon, so arrival and set-up followed a well-established pattern: driving onto the Case Western campus sidewalks to reach the back entrance of the Strosacker Auditorium; unloading my gear and staging it in a back hallway; waiting for the previous film to wrap, then helping attendees relocate their inflatable mattresses and whatever else might be in the way; setting up and plugging in all my stuff.

It takes about 15 minutes, and before I know it, the lights go down and off we go! First up was "Koko in 1999," an 'Out of the Inkwell' cartoon from 1927 that was a new one to me. In it, Koko the Clown gets chased by Father Time all the way to the far-off future year of 1999, where he experiences robotic barbering, a mechanized wedding, and futuristic marital strife. 

I used a modest pipe organ sound for Koko, but switched to full orchestra for 'The Lost World.' 

And it really was quite a ride. Right from the start, there was no shortage of marathon attendees ready to pile on with "witty" shouted commentary. And then there was the "dinosaur noises," which started with one person, but soon everyone was doing it. It never let up. 

Another thing was clapping. If I played using any kind of regular rhythmic pattern, people would start clapping. This happened during the opening titles, and for the remainder of the film I tried to avoid triggering a similar reaction.

It was all good-natured, of course—but then, what effect does the clapping and shouting have on the film, which itself is from "a lost world?"

Sometimes I say that I accompany an audience as much as the film on screen—that the audience influences how the music unfolds. But that definitely wasn't the case with 'The Lost World.' Because of the over-the-top audience reaction, I felt it was important to play the film straight, to plow through the  audience reactions, to give the film a fighting chance.

I think it worked. As the film progressed, you could tell that people were following it and buying it. The noise never quite let up, but it seemed to fade over time. To the film's credit, it does a solid job storytelling in a way that causes viewers to let it in, even after all these years.

So I tried hard to accompany the film without reference to the audience, and in the end everyone got a great experience: those at the marathon got to contribute dinosaur noises, while I was created a score that supported the film and kept things together.

Next up is the great D.W. Griffith melodrama, which I'm accompanying on Sunday, Jan. 26 at 2 p.m. at the Town Hall Theatre, Wilton, N.H.

Press release is pasted in below. Hope to see you at the movies!

Jeff R.

*     *     *

Original promotional art for 'Way Down East' (1920).

MONDAY, JAN. 6, 2025 / FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact Jeff Rapsis • (603) 236-9237 • jeffrapsis@gmail.com

Silent film classic 'Way Down East' at Town Hall Theatre on Sunday, Jan. 26

D.W. Griffith blockbuster starring Lillian Gish, filmed partly in New England, to be screened with live music

WILTON, N.H. — The iconic image of actress Lillian Gish trapped on an ice floe and headed straight for a waterfall will once again fill the big screen when 'Way Down East' (1920) is revived on Sunday, Jan. 26, 2025 at 2 p.m. at the Town Hall Theatre, 40 Main St., Wilton, N.H.

Live musical scoring will be provided by silent film accompanist Jeff Rapsis. Admission is free; donations are accepted, with $10 per person suggested to defray expenses.

The movie, a blockbuster melodrama directed by D.W. Griffith, is set in old-time rural New England, and was partly filmed on location in New Hampshire and Vermont. It stars Gish in an acclaimed performance as a wronged woman trying to make her way in an unforgiving world. Can she find love and redemption, or will she ride to her doom on the raging river's ice floes?

In 'Way Down East,' Gish stars as a poor New England country girl who travels to Boston to visit her rich relatives in the hopes of getting financial help. While there, she's dazzled by upper class society and romanced by a rich womanizer (Lowell Sherman) who takes advantage of her innocence by tricking her into bed with a fake marriage ceremony.

Lillian Gish on the ice-bound Connecticut River in 'Way Down East' (1920).

Convinced she's found the husband of her dreams, Gish returns home to the country, only to be abandoned. She informs her faux husband she's pregnant; he orders her to get an abortion. Instead, Gish goes into exile to have the baby, finds herself persecuted for giving birth out of wedlock, and flees into the rural countryside to seek refuge. The film was noteworthy in its time for addressing such topics as abortion and women's rights.

Modern critics hail 'Way Down East' for Gish's performance, which continues to mesmerize audiences nearly a century after the film's release. "Gish provides an abject lesson in screen acting and brings home the importance and effectiveness of seeing a film in a theater with a crowd," wrote Paul Brenner on www.filmcritic.com in 2007. "If you are not moved at the scene of Gish baptizing her dead baby, then you should check the obituaries of your local paper to see if you are listed."

The film also stars silent era heartthrob Richard Barthelmess. In the film's climax, Barthelmess must dash to rescue Gish from being carried away on the ice floes.

Lillian Gish on location near White River Junction, Vt.

Much of the acclaimed ice floe sequence was filmed in March 1920 on location on the Connecticut River in New Hampshire and the White River in Vermont, as the winter pack ice was breaking up. No process shots or post-production special effects were available to filmmakers at the time, so Griffith and his crew had no choice but to stage and shoot it all on a real river, with the players out on the ice. To get the floes to break up and float down the river, Griffith's crew dynamited pack ice upstream.

Gish later said that she suffered frostbite by following director Griffith's command to always keep one hand in the water during the shooting.

Despite such hardships, 'Way Down East' cemented Gish's reputation as one of the silent era's major stars. Gish would continue to work in films and, later, television, until the 1980s. She died in 1993 at age 99.

Accompanist Jeff Rapsis specializes in creating music that bridges the gap between an older film and the expectations of today's audiences. Using a digital synthesizer that recreates the texture of a full orchestra, he improvises scores in real time as a movie unfolds, so that the music for no two screenings is the same.

"It's kind of a high wire act, but it helps create an emotional energy that's part of the silent film experience," Rapsis said. "It's easier to follow the emotional line of the movie and the audience's reaction when I'm able to follow what's on screen, rather than be buried in sheet music," he said.

Because silent films were designed to be shown to large audiences in theaters with live music, the best way to experience them is to recreate the conditions in which they were first shown, Rapsis said.

"Films such as 'Way Down East' were created to be shown on the big screen to large audiences as a communal experience," Rapsis said. "With an audience and live music, silent films come to life in the way their makers intended. Not only are they entertaining, but they give today's audiences a chance to understand what caused people to first fall in love with the movies."

D.W. Griffith (in bowler hat) directs the cast of his blockbuster melodrama 'Way Down East' (1920).

'Way Down East' was based on a popular stage drama, for which director Griffith paid the then-astounding sum of $175,000 to turn into a movie. The picture proved to be a huge moneymaker, taking in $4.5 million, making it the fourth-highest grossing movie of the silent film era. 

'Way Down East' would be the last of Griffith's great blockbusters; tastes changed as the 1920s rolled on and Griffith's Victorian style fell out of favor. Receipts from 'Way Down East' kept Griffith's studio afloat during a subsequent series of box office flops.

"This picture was a monster hit when it was released," Rapsis said, "and it still holds up well today. As a melodrama, it's a great film for an audience to cheer on the good folks and boo and hiss the bad guys. But there's an additional level of interest now because the film captured a way of life that's long since disappeared."

'Way Down East' will be shown with live music on Sunday, Jan. 26 at 2 p.m. at the Town Hall Theatre, 40 Main St., Wilton, N.H.

Admission is free; donations are accepted, with $10 per person suggested to defray expenses. For more information, call the theater at (603) 654-3456.

Off to Cleveland to accompany 'The Lost World' at Case Western Reserve's 50th annual sci-fi marathon; then 'Way Down East' in Wilton, N.H.

Original poster art for 'The Lost World' (1925).

This weekend takes me to the fair city of Cleveland, Ohio, where I'll accompany 'The Lost World' (1925) at this year's annual Sci-Fi Marathon at Case Western Reserve University.

It's the 50th annual edition of the Case Western Film Society's marathon, at which diehard movie buffs spend a mid-winter weekend watching sci-fi films of all types 30 to 36 hours non-stop.

And next month, I get to do music for a silent film at a similar event: the Boston Sci-Fi Marathon, also celebrating its 50th year on Presidents Day Weekend at the Somerville Theatre in Somerville, Mass.

The Boston folks have programmed an unusual title this time around: 'Algol: A Tragedy of Power' (1921), a German silent that I've never accompanied before.

I've done films at earlier editions of both marathons. What I love about them is that the audience is always so engaged. They may get into a "Mystery Science Theatre 3000" groove sometimes, but overall you won't find a more enthusiastic crowd than the sci-fi marathon audience.

If you're in the Cleveland area this weekend, I understand the Case Western marathon lets you buy tickets for individual screenings. 

Although I encourage you to take in the experience in its entirety, if you'd like to attend just 'The Lost World,' it's scheduled to run on Saturday, Jan. 18 at 3 p.m. (Start time subject to change due to the ebb and flow of the marathon schedule.)

For more information about attending, check out the marathon's webpage. 

Looking ahead: after a quiet start to 2025, things perk up with a cluster of screenings in late January and early February. 

I'm accompanying 'Way Down East' (1920) on Sunday, Jan. 26 in Wilton, N.H.; 'Wild Orchids' (1929) on Wednesday, Jan. 29 in Manchester, N.H.; 'Straight is the Way (1921) in Campton, N.H.; 'The Flying Ace' (1921) on Sunday, Feb. 2 in Somerville, Mass.; and 'Nanook of the North' (1922) on Monday, Feb. 3 in Greenfield, Mass.

Hoping for a good turnout for 'Way Down East,' as I've found a crowded theater always helps the Griffith films "click" with modern audiences.

Seen in isolation, the early pioneering features directed by D.W. Griffith really seem to drag. But shown with an audience, they spring to life. 

I think this has something to do with what Griffith did prior to the movies. For many years, he staged and directed melodramas for theatrical troupes that toured through small towns.

Back then, if you didn't entertain people, they'd throw things at you—or worse. So Griffith got very skilled at telling stories that would grab an audience early and then not let go. 

I believe that more than anything else, this was Griffith's superpower: to be able tell a story in such a way that an audience can't stop watching. 

Find out for yourself by being part of the experience when I accompany 'Way Down East' later this month at the Town Hall Theatre in Wilton, N.H. More details in the press release pasted in below.

*    *    *

Original promotional art for 'Way Down East' (1920).

MONDAY, JAN. 6, 2025 / FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact Jeff Rapsis • (603) 236-9237 • jeffrapsis@gmail.com

Silent film classic 'Way Down East' at Town Hall Theatre on Sunday, Jan. 26

D.W. Griffith blockbuster starring Lillian Gish, filmed partly in New England, to be screened with live music

WILTON, N.H. — The iconic image of actress Lillian Gish trapped on an ice floe and headed straight for a waterfall will once again fill the big screen when 'Way Down East' (1920) is revived on Sunday, Jan. 26, 2025 at 2 p.m. at the Town Hall Theatre, 40 Main St., Wilton, N.H.

Live musical scoring will be provided by silent film accompanist Jeff Rapsis. Admission is free; donations are accepted, with $10 per person suggested to defray expenses.

The movie, a blockbuster melodrama directed by D.W. Griffith, is set in old-time rural New England, and was partly filmed on location in New Hampshire and Vermont. It stars Gish in an acclaimed performance as a wronged woman trying to make her way in an unforgiving world. Can she find love and redemption, or will she ride to her doom on the raging river's ice floes?

In 'Way Down East,' Gish stars as a poor New England country girl who travels to Boston to visit her rich relatives in the hopes of getting financial help. While there, she's dazzled by upper class society and romanced by a rich womanizer (Lowell Sherman) who takes advantage of her innocence by tricking her into bed with a fake marriage ceremony.

Lillian Gish on the ice-bound Connecticut River in 'Way Down East' (1920).

Convinced she's found the husband of her dreams, Gish returns home to the country, only to be abandoned. She informs her faux husband she's pregnant; he orders her to get an abortion. Instead, Gish goes into exile to have the baby, finds herself persecuted for giving birth out of wedlock, and flees into the rural countryside to seek refuge. The film was noteworthy in its time for addressing such topics as abortion and women's rights.

Modern critics hail 'Way Down East' for Gish's performance, which continues to mesmerize audiences nearly a century after the film's release. "Gish provides an abject lesson in screen acting and brings home the importance and effectiveness of seeing a film in a theater with a crowd," wrote Paul Brenner on www.filmcritic.com in 2007. "If you are not moved at the scene of Gish baptizing her dead baby, then you should check the obituaries of your local paper to see if you are listed."

The film also stars silent era heartthrob Richard Barthelmess. In the film's climax, Barthelmess must dash to rescue Gish from being carried away on the ice floes.

Lillian Gish on location near White River Junction, Vt.

Much of the acclaimed ice floe sequence was filmed in March 1920 on location on the Connecticut River in New Hampshire and the White River in Vermont, as the winter pack ice was breaking up. No process shots or post-production special effects were available to filmmakers at the time, so Griffith and his crew had no choice but to stage and shoot it all on a real river, with the players out on the ice. To get the floes to break up and float down the river, Griffith's crew dynamited pack ice upstream.

Gish later said that she suffered frostbite by following director Griffith's command to always keep one hand in the water during the shooting.

Despite such hardships, 'Way Down East' cemented Gish's reputation as one of the silent era's major stars. Gish would continue to work in films and, later, television, until the 1980s. She died in 1993 at age 99.

Accompanist Jeff Rapsis specializes in creating music that bridges the gap between an older film and the expectations of today's audiences. Using a digital synthesizer that recreates the texture of a full orchestra, he improvises scores in real time as a movie unfolds, so that the music for no two screenings is the same.

"It's kind of a high wire act, but it helps create an emotional energy that's part of the silent film experience," Rapsis said. "It's easier to follow the emotional line of the movie and the audience's reaction when I'm able to follow what's on screen, rather than be buried in sheet music," he said.

Because silent films were designed to be shown to large audiences in theaters with live music, the best way to experience them is to recreate the conditions in which they were first shown, Rapsis said.

"Films such as 'Way Down East' were created to be shown on the big screen to large audiences as a communal experience," Rapsis said. "With an audience and live music, silent films come to life in the way their makers intended. Not only are they entertaining, but they give today's audiences a chance to understand what caused people to first fall in love with the movies."

D.W. Griffith (in bowler hat) directs the cast of his blockbuster melodrama 'Way Down East' (1920).

'Way Down East' was based on a popular stage drama, for which director Griffith paid the then-astounding sum of $175,000 to turn into a movie. The picture proved to be a huge moneymaker, taking in $4.5 million, making it the fourth-highest grossing movie of the silent film era. 

'Way Down East' would be the last of Griffith's great blockbusters; tastes changed as the 1920s rolled on and Griffith's Victorian style fell out of favor. Receipts from 'Way Down East' kept Griffith's studio afloat during a subsequent series of box office flops.

"This picture was a monster hit when it was released," Rapsis said, "and it still holds up well today. As a melodrama, it's a great film for an audience to cheer on the good folks and boo and hiss the bad guys. But there's an additional level of interest now because the film captured a way of life that's long since disappeared."

'Way Down East' will be shown with live music on Sunday, Jan. 26 at 2 p.m. at the Town Hall Theatre, 40 Main St., Wilton, N.H.

Admission is free; donations are accepted, with $10 per person suggested to defray expenses. For more information, call the theater at (603) 654-3456.

'Lost World' screening at Flying Monkey in Plymouth, N.H moved to Wednesday, Nov. 6

A scene from 'The Lost World' (1925).

This week's upcoming screening of 'The Lost World' (1925) at the Flying Monkey Moviehouse in Plymouth, N.H. has been moved to Wednesday, Nov. 6 due to UCITA.

That's the acronym for "Unforeseen Circumstances Involving The Accompanist."

Apologies to all who planned on attending this week's screening. I've been unexpectedly called out of town, which is what prompted the last-minute date change.

Many thanks to the folks at the Flying Monkey for their ability to quickly change course and arrange for an alternate date that's just two weeks later.

Everything else will be the same, as you'll see in the revised press release below. 

Again, sorry for the short-notice switcheroo, and I hope everyone who was planning to see 'The Lost World' will be able to make it on Wednesday, Nov. 6.

*    *    *

A trade publication ad promoting 'The Lost World' (1925).
 

MONDAY, OCT. 21, 2024 / FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact Jeff Rapsis • (603) 236-9237 • jeffrapsis@gmail.com

Silent film classic 'The Lost World' at Flying Monkey on Wednesday, Nov. 6

Ground-breaking first-ever dinosaur thriller to be shown with live music; rescheduled from original October screening date

PLYMOUTH, N.H.—Before there was 'Jurassic Park' or 'Godzilla' or even 'King Kong,' there was 'The Lost World.'

The movie, a blockbuster hit when released in 1925, paved the way for Hollywood's enduring fascination with stories pitting mankind against larger-than-life creatures.

See for yourself when a restored version of 'The Lost World' is screened on Wednesday, Nov. 6 at 6:30 p.m. at the Flying Monkey Moviehouse and Performance Center, 39 Main St., Plymouth, N.H.

General admission is $10 per person.

The screening will feature live accompaniment by Jeff Rapsis, a New Hampshire-based composer who specializes in creating music for silent films.

The screening was originally scheduled for Wednesday, Oct. 23, but was moved to the new date of Wednesday, Nov. 6

'The Lost World' is a silent fantasy adventure film based on Arthur Conan Doyle's 1912 novel of the same name. The movie was produced by First National Pictures, a precursor to Warner Brothers, and stars Wallace Beery in the lead role as Professor Challenger.

An original release poster for 'The Lost World' (1925).

'The Lost World' tells the tale of a British exploration team that journeys to South America to confirm reports of long-extinct creatures still roaming a remote high plateau deep in the jungle.

The landscape they discover, filled with a wide range of dinosaurs and other fantastic creatures, was enough to astonish movie-goers when 'The Lost World' first hit movie screens in February 1925. Scenes of a brontosaurus on the loose in central London broke new ground in terms of cinema's visual story-telling possibilities.

Early viewers of the film were especially impressed by special effects breakthroughs that allowed live actors to appear simultaneously on-screen with stop motion models of prehistoric creatures. This led to rumors that the filmmakers had actually discovered living prehistoric creatures.

The film featured pioneering stop motion special effects by Willis O'Brien, who would go on to create the effects used to bring 'King Kong' to the screen in 1933.

Arthur Conan Doyle's novel and the movie version of 'The Lost World' proved so influential in the dinosaur genre that the title was borrowed by author Michael Crichton for his 1995 novel, and then used by director Steven Spielberg for 'The Lost World: Jurassic Park' (1997), the sequel to the original 'Jurassic Park' movie of 1993.

In 1998, the original 'The Lost World' (1925) was deemed "culturally, historically or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry.

Touring London: a scene from 'The Lost World' (1925).

Despite the film's popularity, only incomplete copies of 'The Lost World' survived from its initial run in the silent era. In recent years, historians have been piecing together 'The Lost World' from fragments found scattered among the world's film archives.

The version to be shown at the Flying Monkey includes footage from eight different prints. At 93 minutes in length, it's the most complete version of 'The Lost World' available. The edition includes rare footage of Arthur Conan Doyle that has been missing from most prints since the film's original release.

To accompany the film, Rapsis will use a digital synthesizer to recreate the texture of a full orchestra. For each film, the score is created live in real time as the movie is screened.

Rather than focus on authentic music of the period, Rapsis creates new music for silent films that draws from movie scoring techniques that today's audiences expect from the cinema.

The restored 'The Lost World' will be shown on Wednesday, Nov. 6 at 6:30 p.m. at the Flying Monkey Moviehouse and Performance Center, 39 Main St., Plymouth, N.H.

General admission is $10 per person. For more info, visit www.flyingmonkeynh.com or call (603) 536-2551.

Dinosaurs and Dixieland! 'Lost World' tonight, then 'Safety Last' with live band on Sunday, 7/9

An original poster for 'The Lost World' (1925).

It's 'The Lost World' tonight, and then a new world of Dixieland this coming Sunday!

New to me, anyway, as it's the first time I've collaborated with a Dixieland band in scoring a silent film—or in anything, really!

Be that as it may, it's back to making music after a 4th of July weekend break.

First up is 'The Lost World' (1925), which is running tonight (Thursday, July 6) at the Capitol Theatre in Arlington, Mass.

It's the original 'dinosaur' movie—the one that showed the way for filmmakers all the way through Steven Spielberg's 'Jurassic Park' and beyond.

Showtime is 8 p.m. We've been getting good crowds at the Capitol silent film series, and it's turning out to be a great place to experience silent film the way it was intended: in a theatre, with live music, and with an audience.

And then on Sunday, July 9, the music will take a turn for New Orleans, with a screening of Harold Lloyd's great comedy 'Safety Last' (1923) in 35mm at the Somerville Theatre, 55 Davis Square, Somerville.

Harold checking the time.

The show starts at 2 p.m. And with me in the pit will be Sammy D and the Late Risers, a local Dixieland ensemble.

I first heard Sammy and the band a few months ago at the Aeronaut Brewery, also in Somerville, when they were jamming prior to one of my Sunday night silent film programs.

I've always had a sweet tooth for the classic Dixieland sound—and for a bunch of guys from New England, they seemed to come pretty close!

If you'd like to get a sense of their sound, here's a clip of them in action. It's wild, uninhibited stuff and really effective in live performance.

(For our show, we're using trumpet, clarinet, banjo, bass tuba and drums. (Plus me on keyboard, as appropriate.)

And as I listened, it occurred to me that 'Safety Last' was coming up at the Somerville Theatre, and I was looking for a different approach, as we'd run the title a few years ago.

I also remembered seeing 'Safety Last' more than 10 years ago at a Boston area venue that will remain nameless.

The print had arrived unexpectedly without a recorded soundtrack, and so the theater's solution was to play a CD of Scott Joplin piano rags.

There's nothing wrong with Scott Joplin. And 'Safety Last' is one of the great thrill rides of cinema—even today the climax can be a nail-biting and nerve-wracking emotional roller coaster.

But two great things don't always go together. And in this case, I was struck how the steady, measured ragtime beat of Joplin's rags totally flattened the film!

Rather than amp up the excitement, the music removed all the peaks and valleys, leaving it a cinematic flat tire.

Wow! That was one of the reasons I began doing music for film—because, I reasoned, even I could do a better job, and something like that should never be allowed to happen to one of the cinema's great treasures.

So how to integrate a Dixieland group into the score? Carefully!

To that end, Sammy (full name Sammy Dechenne) and I have worked out a cue sheet that identifies when and where his group will play, and what kind of music will work. And in some places, I'll take over with just keyboard.

I think we've come up with an effective balance, and also a plan that will help Lloyd's great film come to life on Sunday afternoon.

Please join us and see what you think! See you on Sunday at the Somerville!

Being mistaken for a priest, plus Harold Lloyd's 'The Freshman' on 9/22 in Plymouth, N.H.

Harold Lloyd in 'The Freshman' (1925) on Thursday, Sept. 22 at 6:30 p.m. at the Flying Monkey Moviehouse in Plymouth, N.H. But first, a brain dump from the accompanist.

Random scenes from doing live music for five silent film screenings in five days in four different states.

• Last Wednesday, I was mistaken for a Catholic priest. Because I often wear a black shirt for accompanying a film, I'm surprised this doesn't happen more often.

What was really surprising was that this happened in the men's room of the Rogers Center for the Performing Arts at Merrimack College, where I accompanied 'The Lost World' (1925).

"Father, I want to talk to you," said an elderly gentleman as we both went to wash hands.

Before I could explain I wasn't a man of the cloth (if anything, a man of the paper towel at the moment), he had confessed that he hadn't received his college diploma, but instead went on a trek to the North Pole.

"Sounds like you made a great decision," I said, thus making it his turn to be surprised.

• Reading Jan Swafford's biography of Johannes Brahms, I was surprised that the composer's fatal liver illness had a curious side effect: towards the very end of his life, Brahms actually turned a shade of green.

Interesting and somewhat sad, too. But also the cause of this smart remark: "I'd have thought that if any composer was going to turn green, it would be Giuseppe Verdi."

• Another line that just came out of me at the Western New York Film Expo, held earlier this month: "It's fitting that we're running silent film in Buffalo, famous for its wings, because I'll be completely winging the score for this next movie."

• A turnout of 145 people made last Saturday night's screening of Chaplin's 'The Kid' the most-attended show in six seasons of silent film at the Brandon (Vt.) Town Hall and Community Center.

And it almost didn't happen because the old DVD-R disc on which I have Chaplin's original cut of the film would not cooperate with the town hall's fancy new Blu-Ray player.

After we fiddled with it for what seemed like ages, I resigned myself to going out to the car to get a substitute film. (I always carry spares in case this happens.)

So imagine my surprise (and relief) when I came back in the building and the opening title to 'The Kid' was up there filling the big screen.

"How did you do it?" I asked Dennis Marsden, who manages the town hall's events and its ongoing restoration.

"I just kept pressing buttons until finally I saw 'The Kid' up there on the screen."

• The Chaplin screening was one of those magical evenings where audience response is strong right out of the gate.

First up was the First National sort 'A Dog's Life' (1918), and people were laughing just at the sight of Chaplin, asleep next to a drafty fence.

The very first gag—Chaplin plugging a knothole to keep out the chill—produced a belly laugh. And it went on from there.

So with comedies, when everything's clicking, there are times when you hardly have to play at all.

That happened in the lunch counter scene, where Chaplin matches wits with half-brother Syd over stack of griddle cakes.

For this, I played only the slightest wisp of a melody in 3/4 time, and then went totally silent each time Syd turned to catch Charlie stealing food.

I've done this scene before, and it never seems to get the laughs it deserves.

So in Brandon, I went completely silent. And a funny thing happened to the reaction: after a moment of silence, with both Charlie and Syd holding their poses, the laughter came.

It just took that pause to give the audience a chance to react, and to help bring out the comedy.

Sometimes less really is more.

Led into temptation: a scene from Father Sergius.

• I had the pleasure of returning to the Harvard Film Archive on Sunday, Sept. 18 to do music for two rarely screened Russian silent features: 'The Queen of Spades' (1917) and 'Father Sergis' (1918).

What a pleasure to do music in such a first-class venue. And by that, I mean just music: no projection worries, no publicity chores, no light cuing issues, and so on. For what I do, it's a needed glimpse of a better world. Heck, they even had a native Russian speaker on hand to project translated intertitles on screen!

I was unfamiliar with both films, and had only a chance to quickly preview 'Spades' just before the screening. But both dramas lent themselves to the material I chose to work with and my general style of accompaniment.

For 'Spades,' I used a strings-only texture, and was able to stitch together a compelling score (I thought) out of a pair of motives that transformed themselves and evolved as the story progressed.

Most effective, I thought, was a fantasy sequence in which an elderly woman dreams of herself as a young woman being courted by a dashingly handsome man, only to waken (and returned to old age) when a young man actually does arrive.

For that, I was able to use the simple motifs, but add in strange harmonies and use other techniques such as keeping the rhythm but changing the intervals of the melody. It built up to a nice climax.

With 'Father Sergius,' all I knew was that the Czar was in it, and also that the title character would be tempted by lust and at one point would cut off his finger. For contrast and to up the musical ante, I switch to a full orchestra texture, complete with timpani and cymbal crashes when needed.

For the Czar, I figured I could use the old Russian Imperial Anthem, well-known outside Russia mostly because of Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture. Using a familiar tune is always a question in music for silent film, because you don't want to take an audience out of a film's spell and start having them play 'Name That Tune.'

But in this case, it worked as a way to project the power and authority of the Czar.

Because 'Father Sergius' is set among the Russian aristocracy, a silent film accompanist should expect some kind of gala ball. And sure enough, there it was, right at the start—and with on-screen references to certain specific dances, no less. Before I knew it, I was running through one fake mazurka after another!

And what about that finger slicing? (This has special significance to anyone at the keyboard.) Well, I had no idea how I would handle it, but it helped to know it was coming.

What I felt the music would need to do, ideally, is express three things at once: the on-screen female temptation, the rising feelings of uncontrollable lust in Father Sergius, and also the inevitability of the ongoing collision.

So it was a kind of musical "ménage à trois"—okay, not the best imagery for the on-screen temptation of a Russian Orthodox clergyman.

To my surprise, it all came together in a way that really worked, I felt.

For the on-screen temptation, I used Dominant 7th chords in the mid-range of the keyboard, holding them for a bit and then sliding one half-step either up or down, and then cut.

This would be followed by a simple but ominous "thud" from deep in the bass, representing the clergyman's lust.

For the left hand, the thumb played a steadily repeating single note, while the pinkie held down the same note an octave above to help hold it all together. Hey, presto: inevitability!

So I kept this going, gradually cycling through all 12 notes in the chromatic scale, and being very careful to resist my own temptation to increase the volume (or the tempo) too fast too soon.

And for variety and to make it fit in with the rest of the score, I actually worked in snatches of the other melodies with the right hand.

And it worked!

Something like this doesn't always come together. And you can't plan it in advance because that robs it of the magic and flexibility of spontaneity.

But when it does, there's nothing like it.

So thanks for to the Harvard Film Archive and Prof. Daria Khitrova of the Slavic Language Department for programming these unusual titles. A good time was had by all, except perhaps Father Sergius.

Looking ahead: it can't be football season without a screening of Harold Lloyd's classic gridiron comedy 'The Freshman' (1925).

Get your fix this Thursday, Sept. 22 when we screen the picture (courtesy the Harold Lloyd Trust) at the Flying Monkey Moviehouse and Performance Center in Plymouth, N.H.

Kickoff time is 6:30 p.m. and tickets are $10 per person.

Worth putting this one on your list because there's nothing like a Harold Lloyd film screened as originally intended: in a theater, with live music, and (most importantly) with a large audience.

This means you! More info in the press release below. Hope to see you there as Harold tackles college life, romance, and...well, you know.

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MONDAY, AUG. 22, 2016 / FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Jeff Rapsis • (603) 236-9237 • jeffrapsis@gmail.com

Silent film classic 'The Freshman' on Thursday, Sept. 22 at Flying Monkey in Plymouth, N.H.

Celebrate football season with Harold Lloyd's comic masterpiece about college life, with live music

PLYMOUTH, N.H.—What happens when a first-year student's dreams of college collide with the realities of campus life?

The result is Harold Lloyd in 'The Freshman' (1925), one of the most popular comedies of the silent film era. Filled with classic scenes and a great story, 'The Freshman' endures as one of Lloyd's most crowd-pleasing movies.

See for yourself with a screening of 'The Freshman' (1925) on Thursday, Sept. 22 at 6:30 p.m.at the Flying Monkey Moviehouse and Performance Center, 39 South Main St., Plymouth, N.H.

The program will be shown with live music by Jeff Rapsis, a New Hampshire-based silent film accompanist. General admission is $10 per person.

The program is the latest in the Flying Monkey's popular silent film series, which offers audiences a chance to experience silent film as it was intended: on the big screen, with live music, and in a theater with an audience.

"Put the whole experience back together, and you can see why people first fell in love with the movies," Rapsis said.

'The Freshman,' the most successful film of Lloyd's career, was an enormous box office smash. Its release sparked a craze for college films that lasted well beyond the 1920s, and even a popular hit song, the collegiate fox trot "Freshie."

The story follows Lloyd, small town newbie, to Tate College, where he hopes to achieve fame as Big Man on Campus. Instead, his quest to win popularity becomes a humiliating college-wide joke, with Harold getting tricked by upperclassmen into hosting the school's annual "Fall Frolic" at his own expense.

Harold and co-star Jobyna Ralston.

Realizing he's an outcast, Lloyd decides he can make his mark on the college football team, where he holds the lowly position of waterboy and serves as tackling dummy. On the day of the Big Game, can the bespectacled "freshie" somehow save the day and bring gridiron glory to dear old Tate?

For football fans, the film's climactic game sequence was shot on the field at the actual Rose Bowl in 1924. The crowd scenes were shot at halftime at California Memorial Stadium during the November 1924 "Big Game" between UC Berkeley and Stanford University. Other exterior scenes were filmed near the USC campus in Los Angeles.

Beyond its comic appeal, 'The Freshman' today has acquired an additional layer of interest in its depiction of college life in the 1920s—a time of raccoon coats, ukeleles, and many other long-gone fads and fashions.

"It was long before television, the Internet, cellphones, or Facebook," said Rapsis. "To us today, it looks like college on another planet, which I think adds to the appeal of a film like 'The Freshman.' But at its core, 'The Freshman' is still a great story about people, and that's why it remains such an entertaining experience today, especially when shown as Lloyd intended it."

In 1990, 'The Freshman' was selected for preservation in the U.S. National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant," named in only the second year of voting and one of the first 50 films to receive such an honor.

Lloyd, along with Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton, is recognized as one of the silent screen's three great clowns. Lloyd's character, a young go-getter ready to struggle to win the day, proved hugely popular in the 1920s. While Chaplin and Keaton were always critical favorites, Lloyd's films reigned as the top-grossing comedies throughout the period.

However, Lloyd's public image faded after his retirement in the 1930s, when he turned his energies to charitable causes such as the Shriners. He retained control over his films, refusing to release them for television and only rarely allowing them to be screened at revivals, fearing modern audiences wouldn't know how to respond to his work or to silent films in general. He died in 1971.

In recent years, Lloyd's family has taken steps to restore Harold's reputation and public image. They've released his work on DVD, and arranged for more frequent screenings of his films in the environment for which they were made: in theaters with live music and a large audience.

Despite the passage of time, audiences continue to respond just as strongly as when the films were new, with features such as 'The Freshman' embraced as timeless achievements from the golden era of silent film comedy.

Critics review 'The Freshman':

"Regarded as the quintessential Harold Lloyd vehicle.”
—TV Guide

"Gag for gag, Lloyd was the funniest screen comic of his time. Passionately recommended. "
—Dave Kehr, Chicago Reader

Upcoming programs in the Flying Monkey's silent film series include:

• Thursday, Oct. 13, 6:30 p.m.: 'Woman in the Moon' (1929). The final silent film of director Fritz Lang ('Metropolis') is an amazing sci-fi epic about mankind's first-ever lunar voyage, complete with espionage, romance, stowaways, and spectacular visual design.

• Thursday, Nov. 10, 6:30 p.m.: 'Her Sister From Paris' (1925). The scene: Europe. The cast: Rich people. Get swept off your feet by not one but two privileged ladies, both played by amazing actress Constance Talmadge, who was Buster Keaton's sister-in-law.

• Thursday, Dec. 8, 6:30 p.m.: 'The Kiss' (1929) starring Greta Garbo. Take a break from holiday shopping with this steamy romance and courtroom thriller. Will Garbo resort to murder, risking everything for love? Garbo's last silent role and the final silent film released by MGM.

Head back to school with Harold Lloyd's 'The Freshman' (1925), to be shown on Thursday, Sept. 22 at 6:30 p.m. at the Flying Monkey Moviehouse and Performance Center, 39 South Main St., Plymouth, N.H. General admission $10 per person. For more info, visit www.flyingmonkeynh.com or call (603) 536-2551.

Rediscover magic in 'The Lost World' (1925) on Friday, April 3 at Red River Theatres

It's the original dinosaur movie!

And when released in 1925, 'The Lost World' was one of those pictures that really must have blown people's minds. One reason is, of course, that it's a really entertaining movie, as well as a really visual one. There's a lot to see. Just look at that poster!

But it also blew people's minds, I think, by coming out at just the right time for people to go crazy over seeing dinosaurs up on the big screen.

And in doing so, I think it has something to teach us about balance between reality and fantasy, even all these years later.

What can we learn? Well, to borrow a turn of phrase from the late great Rod Serling, consider the notion of dinosaurs in the 1920s...

Yes, there had been stories about prehistoric creatures, including the very tale by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle on which 'The Lost World' was based.

And yes, there had been drawings and paintings and images of pre-historic beasts that once roamed the Earth's surface. Amazing, right?

But never had anyone seen dinosaurs in action, being dinosaurs, right before their eyes. (Not counting Windsor McKay's early 'Gertie the Dinosaur' animated cartoons.)

Not until 'The Lost World' (1925)—a motion picture filled with not only dinosaurs, but a veritable field guide of prehistoric creatures brought to life through the then-new magic of the movies.

Yes, 'The Lost World' was a big commercial hit. But more than most pictures, it must have given audiences a sense of the limitless ability of the motion picture to transport us to places we could never visit on our own.

And not just places, but different epochs in history, and also to induce intense states of mind and emotion: fear, joy, panic, awe, and so many other big emotions.

Part of what fueled this magic, I think, was that early audiences were drawn to the cinema in part due to a basic and innate belief in the fidelity of the camera. What they saw on the screen had to be photographed by a camera, so the underlying assumption was that it had to have really happened.

Yes, films were edited and put together to tell a story, and everyone understood that. But the camera itself did not lie.

It could be fooled, as when Buster Keaton would mask one side of the lens, then rewind the film and mask the other side, allowing two Buster Keatons to dance alongside each other in 'The Playhouse,' a 1921 comedy short. But what it photographed was understood to be real.

Hence the reports from screenings of 'The Lost World' of people really believing explorers had actually discovered dinosaurs still alive somewhere. How else could they have been photographed? How else could they be in a movie, seen marauding through the streets of London, right before our eyes?

Well, of course there were no dinosaurs, so they could not be photographed or filmed. This made their appearance in 'The Lost World' all the more magical, especially at a time when the fidelity of film was a firmly entrenched idea.

At the dawn of special effects, the effects were truly "special" because they were so unusual and so startling, especially to audiences whose basic understood belief was that the camera was an impartial witness to reality.

Bessie Love shares the screen with a pre-historic scene-stealer in 'The Lost World.'

Movies, of course, have come a long way since 1925. Nowadays, filmmakers can create entire worlds on a hard drive, without exposing one frame of film to a living thing or inanimate object. What can be done is simply amazing. But is it magical in the same way a movie such as 'The Lost World' must have been?

Maybe it's possible to have too much of a good thing. Maybe today's abundance of creative possibilities—the ability to digitally conjure worlds where superheros effortlessly ignore the law of gravity as the "camera" swirls all around them from impossible angles—has diluted the basic bond of believability that helped mesmerize people back at the beginning.

This bond, I think, is what made the movies seem so compelling to early audiences. And I think that somewhere deep down, it's what draws us to them still: we want to see ourselves.

Yes, we love having our mind blown by the infinite possibilities of cinema. But that happens at the most intense levels only when the two desires are in balance—the desire to see ourselves as well as the limitless and mind-boggling nature of cinema to take us anywhere in time and space.

Maybe it's like Beethoven. One reason for the lasting and intense power of his music, as I see (or hear) it, is that Beethoven balanced the classical restraint and form of Mozart and Haydn (in the near past) with the unrestrained freedom of 19th century romanticism to come, as typified by Lizst and Wagner.

Beethoven, by virtue of his time and gifts, got the balance just right—and in many works, triggered infinity in the process.

I think 'The Lost World,' for all its seemingly primitive special effects, gets the balance just right. Consider: the film runs for a good half-hour with just humans (photographed in their natural habitat by the ever-honest camera) before we embark on a journey to exotic South America.

And even then, it takes its sweet time before we finally get our first glimpse of a dinosaur. And then, for the remainder of the film, nearly every time we see a dinosaur or similar primitive creature, it's nearly always in the context of interacting with the people that we've gotten to know already.

Part of this is the solid nature of Conan Doyle's original story. The guy knew how to structure a tale.

But a big part of it is that the special effects, as primitive as they are, are all done in service to the story. The whole strange plateau that they inhabit is only there so that humans we have come to know a bit can discover it and be awed by it and get scared by it and run away from it.

That, when underpinned by the essential belief that the camera did not lie, must have made for a really powerful combination for movie audiences of the time.

And you know what? In doing music for repeated screenings of this film, I've found it still can produce that effect. The balance is so well calculated that even now, almost a century later, it can conjure a sense of why people first fell hard for the movies.

See for yourself by joining us on Friday, April 3 for a screening with live music (by me) at Red River Theatres in Concord, N.H.

More info about the show is in the press release below, which also includes info about the whole year's schedule of silent film screenings at Red River. Hope to see you there!

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One of my favorite pieces of movie promotional material of all time.

TUESDAY, MARCH 17, 2015 / FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact Jeff Rapsis • (603) 236-9237 • jeffrapsis@gmail.com

Adventure, comedy, romance, suspense
— but no dialogue!

Red River Theatres in Concord, N.H. announces 2015 silent film series; all shows to feature live musical accompaniment

CONCORD, N.H.—Clara Bow, Buster Keaton, and Lillian Gish are among the stars returning to the silver screen this year as part of Red River's 2015 silent film line-up.

The series opens in April with the restored classic silent film version of 'The Lost World' (1925), hailed as Hollywood's first-ever dinosaur movie.

The schedule includes Clara Bow in the era-defining romantic comedy 'It' (1927) in May; D.W. Griffith's French Revolution epic 'Orphans of the Storm' (1921) in July; and Buster Keaton's uproarious comedy 'The Cameraman' (1928) in September.

Halloween will bring a visit from 'The Lodger' (1927), a creepy early British thriller directed by a very young Alfred Hitchcock.

All films in Red River's silent movie series will feature live music by Jeff Rapsis, a New Hampshire-based silent film accompanist and composer.

"We're thrilled to once again include silent film with live music in this year's programming," said Shelly Hudson, executive director of Red River Theatres.

"These films are audience favorites, and people continue to be surprised at how engrossing and exhilarating they can be when shown as they were intended: in a theater, and with live music."

Red River Theatres, an independent cinema, is a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to screening a diverse program of first-run independent films, cult favorites, classics, local and regional film projects, and foreign films.

The member-supported theater’s mission is to present film and the discussion of film as a way to entertain, broaden horizons and deepen appreciation of life for New Hampshire audiences of all ages.

Our pre-historic hero shakes up modern London in 'The Lost World.'

First up in this year's line-up is a screening of 'The Lost World' (1925) on Friday, April 3 at 7 p.m. Admission is $10 per person.

'The Lost World' is a silent fantasy adventure film and an adaptation of Arthur Conan Doyle's 1912 novel of the same name. The movie was produced by First National Pictures, a precursor to Warner Brothers, and stars Wallace Beery as Professor Challenger.

The movie, a blockbuster hit when released in 1925, paved the way for Hollywood's enduring fascination with stories pitting mankind against larger-than-life creatures in films such as 'King Kong' and 'Jurassic Park.'

'The Lost World' is a silent fantasy adventure film and an adaptation of Arthur Conan Doyle's 1912 novel of the same name. The movie was produced by First National Pictures, a precursor to Warner Brothers, and stars Wallace Beery as Professor Challenger.

The film was directed by Harry O. Hoyt and featured pioneering stop motion special effects by Willis O'Brien, who would go on to create the effects used to bring 'King Kong' to the screen in 1933.

'The Lost World' tells the tale of a British exploration team that journeys to South America to confirm reports of long-extinct creatures still roaming a remote high plateau deep in the jungle.

The landscape they discover, filled with a wide range of dinosaurs and other fantastic creatures, was enough to astonish movie-goers when 'The Lost World' first hit movie screens in February 1925. Scenes of a brontosaurus on the loose in central London broke new ground in terms of cinema's visual story-telling possibilities.

Early viewers of the film were especially impressed by special effects breakthroughs that allowed live actors to appear simultaneously on-screen with stop motion models of prehistoric creatures. This led to rumors that the filmmakers had actually discovered living prehistoric creatures.

Despite the film's popularity, only incomplete copies of 'The Lost World' survived from its initial run in the silent era. In recent years, historians have been piecing together 'The Lost World' from fragments found scattered among the world's film archives.

The version to be shown at Red River includes footage from eight different prints. At 93 minutes in length, it's the most complete version of 'The Lost World' available. The edition includes rare footage of Arthur Conan Doyle that has been missing from most prints since the film's original release.

To accompany 'The Lost World,' Rapsis will use a digital synthesizer to recreate the texture of the full orchestra. The score is created live in real time as the movie is screened. Rather than focus on authentic music of the period, Rapsis creates new music for silent films that draws from movie scoring techniques that today's audiences expect from the cinema.

Other dates and titles in the Red River silent film series include:

• Friday, May 15, 2015, 7 p.m.: 'It' (1927) starring Clara Bow. The hugely popular romantic comedy about a shopgirl who falls in love with the owner of a huge department store. The film that made Clara Bow a major star and came to epitomize the Jazz age.

• Friday, July 10, 2015, 7 p.m.: 'Orphans of the Storm' (1921). Just in time for Bastille Day, D.W. Griffith's sweeping story of two sisters (Lillian and Dorothy Gish) caught up in the throes of the French revolution. Griffith's last major box office success fills the screen with a succession of iconic images.

• Friday, Sept. 11, 2015, 7 p.m.: 'The Cameraman' (1928) starring Buster Keaton. To impress the girl of his dreams, mild-mannered portrait photographer Buster takes up the glamorous profession of newsreel cameraman. One of the best comedies of the silent era.

• Friday, Oct. 30, 2015, 7 p.m.: 'The Lodger' (1927). A serial killer is on the loose in fog-bound London. Will the murderer be caught before yet another victim is claimed? Just in time for Halloween, suspenseful British thriller directed by a very young Alfred Hitchcock.

Red River Theatres' 2015 Silent Film Series will start with a screening of 'The Lost World’ on Friday, April 3 at 7 p.m. in the Jaclyn Simchik Screening Room at Red River Theatres, 11 South Main St., Concord, N.H. Admission is $10 per person; for more info, call (603) 224-4600 or visit www.redrivertheatres.org. For more information about the music, visit www.jeffrapsis.com.

Thoughts on dinosaurs and silent film: Extinct creatures, an exctinct art form

Two screenings of 'The Lost World' (1925) in the past few days gave rise to a few thoughts worth preserving. Fossils, if you will.

I usually end up introducing the shows I do, with the comments often as improvised as the music that follows.

But once in awhile, apart from the usual blah-blah-blah, I find myself saying something that actually sounds worth pointing out.

In the case of 'The Lost World,' the random slot machine of my addled brain came up with an interesting notion, which was this: how fitting for a story about an extinct creatures to be told in an extinct art form.

Dinosaurs and silent film. What a poetic combination!

But then I had another thought. Just as the early filmmakers brought the dinosaurs back to life (at least on screen), so would we (me and the audience) help bring silent film to life.

It was an interesting way of making a point I try to make: that these films were designed from the ground up to be seen a certain way. You need live music, you need a big theater, you need a big audience.

Take any of those away and you're not going to understand why people first fell hard for the movies.

Yesterday's screening of 'The Lost World' was part of a double feature at the Wilton (N.H.) Town Hall Theatre that included 'Tarzan and the Golden Lion' (1927). We had a surprisingly big turnout for a holiday weekend and fine weather (something like 100 people) and the reaction was strong throughout.

And I don't know. Sometimes I just let loose, and that's what happened with the Tarzan film, which came first. I really hadn't prepared anything so I started big and never looked back. And rather than become tiresome, the approach seemed to be just right.

Maybe it's because 'Tarzan and the Golden Lion' is that kind of film: pretty much non-stop action.

I was concerned that I had unloaded too much prior to 'The Lost World,' but that turned out to not be the case. Something about the structure and the pacing of 'The Lost World' provided the break we all needed.

I believe the way the story unfolds, with an extended all-human prologue in London and then the Amazon jungle before the stop-motion dinosaurs make their first appearance, really helped.

So when I amped things up once the exploration party makes it to the plateau, everyone's ears (including mine) were ready for some big stuff again.

And I have to say that one of the best moments in all silent film is the first sight of the escaped brontosaurus stomping around central London to create the film's climax.

Audiences see this and just go crazy, which is what happened Sunday afternoon in Wilton. There's something about this moment, knowing that it's setting the stage for a century or more of movie mayhem to come, that people feel compelled to cheer.

I think because it's such a genuine moment. Here it is, folks! You're present at the creation! (Or the destruction, really.)

Looking ahead, it's a busy week with four screenings in six days: on Tuesday, July 8 at 6 p.m., we're doing 'The Scarlet Letter' (1926) starring Lillian Gish (that's her at left) at the Manchester Public Library; on Wednesday, July 9 at 6:30 p.m., it's Buster Keaton in 'The General' (1927) at the Flying Monkey Moviehouse in Plymouth, N.H.; on Saturday, July 12 it's up to the Brandon (Vt.) Town Hall for a program of Buster Keaton comedies at 7 p.m.; and then we're doing Griffith's 'Orphans of the Storm' (1921) in 35mm at the Somerville (Mass.) Theatre on Sunday, July 13 at 2 p.m. (That's the day before Bastille Day.)

Complete info for each show can be found by clicking 'Upcoming Silent Film Screenings' page at upper right. Hope to see you at a screening real soon!

Coming up next in Boston: 'Faust' on Wednesday, Jan. 23 at the Brattle

The great Emil Jannings in extreme make-up as Mephisto in 'Faust' (1926).

Although I generally favor good over evil, it's my honor to play a part in the Brattle Theatre's ongoing "Dead of Winter: Satan on Screen" series.

To that end, I'll be providing live music for a screening of the great F.W. Murnau film 'Faust' (1926) on Wednesday, Jan. 23 at 7 p.m. Alas, this was just arranged last week, so there hasn't been time for a lot of advance publicity.

Still, Satan always draws a crowd, so I'm looking forward to helping bring the devil to life this week at the Cambridge revival house, which continues to offer great film of all eras all year round on the big screen in a theater.

I'm coming off a recent spurt of silent film activity -- a 10-day period that saw five separate shows in widely varying venues. Here's a summary of what I learned.

- W.C. Fields remains enough of an iconic figure for today's audiences to respond readily to his silent films. A screening of 'Sally of the Sawdust' (1925) on Thursday, Jan. 10 in Plymouth, N.H. draw a warm response from a crowd of about 50 people. I think D.W. Griffith's ability to structure a story for maximum audience response was a big help, but Fields himself really carried the picture. People really seemed to like Carol Dempster as well. I found the music for this really fell together nicely.

- A screening of 'Battling Butler' (1926) on Tuesday, Jan. 15 showed that even "lesser" Keaton has the power to hold an audience. I hadn't done this one before (it's the last of Keaton's features that I'd yet to tackle) and I was curious what the reaction would be, as it lacks the usual Keaton all-outdoors climax on a grand scale. Our audience of about 40 people at the Manchester (N.H.) City Library enjoyed it thoroughly, although the opening scenes of Buster ineptly hunting did not create nearly the reaction I thought they would. However, the training sequences in the boxing camp (which I've always thought were pretty routine) produced gales of laughter. Go figure. And, surprise again, Keaton's fight-in-close-quarters climax actually works very well in a theater. I liked the music for this, as I was able to invent a "rah rah" sports march that was useful throughout the score.

- Our encore showing of Fritz Lang's forgotten epic 'Woman in the Moon' (1929) on Wednesday, Jan. 16 attracted about 30 people to the screening room of Red River Theatres in Concord, N.H., where a screening on New Year's Eve had been sold out. Musically, I think I had better material on hand this time around, and so it was more satisfying on that score. This film continues to amaze me, and our audience seemed astonished, too. Even after a three-hour movie, we had a lively question-and-answer session.

- On Friday, Jan. 18, I made the trek to one of my favorite events: the annual "Arisia" science fiction and fantasy convention, held at the Westin Hotel in downtown Boston. This four-day event attracts more than 3,000 attendees, many dressed in elaborate costumes, and is diverse enough to include a silent film screening with live music. This year's entry was 'The Lost World' (1925), in the form of a truncated 16mm show-at-home print that still managed to hold the audience of about 50 people in a large conference room that doubled as the convention's film theater. (Four full days of film, much of it in 35mm!) With all the distractions of trying to unload my gear, get it up to the theater, find parking, etc., it was not easy to pull my head together for the score, but I felt it held together well enough. What really made it worthwhile, however, was the crowd reaction: lively from the start, it peaked with applause at the scenes of the dinosaur wreaking havoc on the streets of London. The images are truly iconic, and they've fired my desire to program the fully restored version of this film in future programs.

- Finally, a screening of Paul Leni's 'The Man Who Laughs' (1928) at the Wilton (N.H.) Town Hall Theatre on Sunday, Jan. 20 drew only a lower-than-expected turnout due to football playoffs happening at the same time. I think we had about 40 people (usually we get at least double that) for this picture, which I think has a lot to offer. Alas, I hadn't had much time to prepare for it, and after a week of pushing myself, the score that I came up with was a little random and not very focused, I'm afraid. It was all recycled material, which sometimes happens when I don't have time to ponder a film and let new ideas germinate. I guess given the improvisatory nature of my accompaniment, I need to be careful not to overdo it. Still, people seemed appreciative

One thing I've noticed recently is that if I make time to eat a full and good meal prior to a performance, I seem to do better. I did that for 'Sally' in Plymouth and 'Woman in the Moon' in Concord, and both scores fell together quite well. On the other hand, I was frazzled with a dozen errands and distractions prior to today's screening of 'The Man Who Laughs,' and the music seemed to suffer. So there's definitely a pattern here. Something to keep in mind as I figure out the right balance of too much and not enough to stay in the zone of good silent film scoring.

Alas, on Wednesday, I teach a course in Manchester, N.H. just prior to racing down to Cambridge, Mass for 'Faust,' with just barely enough time to set up before showtime, so I won't have a chance to nourish myself in the big city. Perhaps I'll pack a dinner and eat it in the car on the way down. Ah, the glamour of show biz!