星期六, 4. May 2013
Pola Negri: Deadly Passion
Royal, Baden
www.royalbaden.ch
Polish dancer Apolonia Chalupova’s turn away from ballet and to acting can be precisely dated. When tuberculosis threatened to put an end to her promising career, she recited some poems by Italian poet Ada Negri while at the sanatorium. Receiving enthusiastic applause, she decided to take up acting under the artist’s name Pola Negri. What followed was a dizzying career in theatre and film, exploring ever-new facets of her role as femme fatale on her way to becoming Europe’s first Hollywood star.
This season, the Institute of Incoherent Cinematography devotes itself entirely to the scintillating topic of femininity in silent film. At the venerable Royal in Baden, which celebrates its centenary this year, the IOIC is showing three of Pola Negri‘s early Polish and German films that predate her move to Paramount Pictures. All films will be shown with live music.
Mara Miccichè aka Iokoi (声音, 电子), Simon Berz (自制乐器, 鼓)
‘Bestia’, also know under its English title ‘The Polish Dancer’, is the earliest preserved film with Pola Negri in the lead role and the only one from her early Polish period. It is clear, from the first scene of playful submission to a St Bernard dog, to her first lover, whom she slyly gets drunk and relieves of his money, that this is a woman playing with death.
The film is accompanied live by delicate and powerful singer and keyboard artist Mara Miccichè aka IOKOI, together with Simon Berz on the electronically extended drums. Since their first meeting on the IOIC‘s China Tour in 2012, they started performing together from time to time.
Linda Vogel (竖琴, 声音)
In order to settle in St Petersburg during tsarist times, Jewish women required a yellow piece of identification. This, however, was only given to prostitutes. This state of affairs was changed after the October revolution. The Yellow Ticket stars a woman who studies and is also a remarkable in being a German propaganda film with a philosemitic message.
The film shows Pola Negri before her later role as active femme fatale and will be accompanied live by the exceptional singer and harpist Linda Vogel. There’s every reason to be excited about her first solo performance to silent film!
Dadaglobal (电子, 钢琴)
The notorious unfaithfulness of his lover Sappho is literally driving engineer Georg de la Croix into madness. When his brother Richard tries to investigate the matter, he too succumbs to her deadly charm. The film holds up a mirror to a decadent world in pursuit of lust and passion and without any consideration for losses incurred or inflicted.
Zurich’s live electronic scene is unthinkable without musician David Daniel aka Dada. Time and again, his at once passionate and humorous silent film performances enthral the audience.