Pavement Butterfly
Grossstadtschmetterling
credits:
Director: Richard EichbergWriters: Hans Kyser, Adolf Lantz
Cast: Anna May Wong, Fred Louis Lerch, Elwood Fleet Bostwick, Alexander Granach
Germany/United Kingdom 1929 | 90 mins | 35mm | Silent
Accompaniment by Robert Israel on the Mighty Wurlitzer
The collaboration between Chinese American legend Anna May Wong and German director Richard Eichberg, consisting of five films between 1928 and 1930, brought many firsts for the actress: her first on-screen kiss; her first English-, German- and French-speaking roles in a talkie. More than these undeniably important things, however, it promised a new world for her, a virtual European union of prestige and sophisticated filmmaking, and less of the stereotyping that limited her Hollywood roles.
In PAVEMENT BUTTERFLY, her second silent film with Eichberg, Wong plays Princess Butterfly, an exotic Parisian fan dancer whose “death leap through a circle of naked swords” act goes tragically wrong. Blamed for the impalement of a fellow performer, she runs away and takes shelter with a handsome but starving painter. She brings him luck: his painting of her catches the eye of an art dealer’s daughter, and suddenly he and his muse are poised to enter the world of art connoisseurs, aristocrats, café society and casinos on the Riviera. But Butterfly (a name that suggests her fate in love) can’t escape her street-performer past, as she realizes when a blackmailer invades her new world.
Wong’s potential as an iconic movie star is poignantly realized here. The camera adores her in close-up, as tears tumble from her enormous eyes or as she narrows them in a lethal rage. Clad in fabulous gowns dripping with spangles and feathers à la Marlene Dietrich, she’s in total possession of the charismatic power that defines movie glamour, a glamour too often denied her by Hollywood.
—Frako Loden
Restored 35mm print provided by British Film Institute
Photo courtesy of Elaine Mae Woo
About Robert Israel
Robert Israel is one of the World’s most important composers of classic film scores. His music and recordings have been heard throughout the world. Garnering respect and outstanding notices from film makers, critics and musicians alike, he has been hailed as "...one of the world's finest practitioners of the art of silent film accompaniment.”
Maestro Israel has composed and recorded musical scores for films released by Warner Bros. Home Video, Turner Entertainment, Sony Pictures/Columbia, Buena Vista Home Entertainment, Flicker Alley and Film Preservation and Associates. Mr. Israel's television work has included composing scores for Peter Jones Productions, American Masters on PBS, "Biography" on A & E Channel, Stephen J. Cannell Productions and for director/producer Gregory Nava.
Between the years 2002 and 2005, Robert Israel was commissioned to composed and produce new orchestra scores for the classic comedies of Hollywood legend, Harold Lloyd. Working with Lloyd’s grand daughter, Suzanne Lloyd, Israel composed and recorded music scores for thirteen short subjects and nine feature length films!
In September 2006, Stockholm University of Sweden awarded Robert Israel an Honorary Doctorate for achievements in composition and his contributions to the field of early cinema.
