Kevin Brownlow

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Kevin Brownlow (born on 2 June 1938, Crowborough, Sussex, England, U.K.) is a British filmmaker, film historian, television documentary-maker, author, and Academy Award recipient.[1][2] Brownlow is best known for his work documenting the history of the silent era. Brownlow became interested in silent film at the age of eleven. This interest grew into a career spent documenting and restoring film. He has rescued many silent films and their history. His initiative in interviewing many largely forgotten, elderly film pioneers in the 1960s and 1970s preserved a legacy of cinema. Brownlow received an Academy Honorary Award at the 2nd Annual Governors Awards given by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences on 13 November 2010.[3] This marked the first time that an Academy Honorary Award was given to a film preservationist.[4]

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It Happened Here and Winstanley [edit]

His interest in World War II prompted the creation of an alternative-history film, It Happened Here in which the Nazis have conquered Britain. Brownlow began work on the film at the age of 18 and began to collaborate with a friend Andrew Mollo, who was 16. After 8 years of struggle, during which the film's content changed dramatically, it was completed in 1964 with the last-minute aid of Tony Richardson but not released until 1966.

In 1968 Brownlow published a book, How It Happened Here, which described the making of the film, and the reception it received. Not only does it explain how two teenage boys made a feature film, it also explores the provocative social issues raised by the movie. Brownlow had allowed genuine British Fascists to play themselves in the film, which angered some Jewish organizations. The book contained almost 100 pictures, mostly stills from the film and an introduction by film critic and author David Robinson. It was re-issued in 2007 by UKA Press.

After this cinematic feat Mollo and Brownlow began another project, Winstanley,[5] about Gerrard Winstanley and the Diggers commune following the English Civil War. The duo spent several years trying to gain support and following a long and difficult shoot, the film was released in 1975. In 2009 UKA Press published Winstanley: Warts and All, a making-of book. Brownlow had written it shortly after completing work on the film, but the manuscript had sat on the shelf for 34 years before being published.

Cinema history and preservation [edit]

In 1968 Brownlow's first book on silent film, The Parade's Gone By..., was published. The book had many interviews with the leading actors and directors of the silent era and began his career as a film historian. Brownlow spent many years getting support for the restoration of Abel Gance's 1927 French classic, Napoléon, a 'lost' epic film that used many novel cinematic techniques. Brownlow's championing of the film succeeded, and the restored version, with a new score by Carl Davis, was shown in London and New York in 1980 and 1981.[6] Gance lived to see the acclaim for his restored film. The San Francisco Silent Film Festival presented the complete 2000 restoration of the film, with Davis conducting his score, at the Paramount Theatre Oakland in March 2012.

Brownlow also began a collaboration with David Gill with whom he produced several documentaries on the silent era. The first was Hollywood, a 13-part history of the silent era in Hollywood, produced for Thames Television and screened in Britain in 1980. This was followed by Unknown Chaplin (1983) (Charlie Chaplin), Buster Keaton: A Hard Act to Follow (1987) (Buster Keaton), Harold Lloyd: The Third Genius (1989) (Harold Lloyd) and Cinema Europe: the Other Hollywood (1995), among others. They also restored and released a large number of classic silent films through the Thames Silents series (later via Photoplay Productions) in the 1980s and 1990s, generally with new musical scores by Carl Davis. The Search for Charlie Chaplin (2005; new version: 2010,UKA Press), a making-of book for Unknown Chaplin, was published in 2009.

Since David Gill's death in 1997, Brownlow has continued to produce documentaries and conduct film restoration with Patrick Stanbury. These include Lon Chaney, A Thousand Faces (2000), Garbo, a documentary produced for Turner Classic Movies to mark the centenary of actress Greta Garbo's birth, and I Am King Kong (2005) about filmmaker Merian C. Cooper.

In August 2010, Brownlow received an Honorary Academy Award[7] for his role in film and cinema history preservation.

Filmography [edit]

References [edit]

  1. ^ "Kevin Brownlow: a life in the movies". Guardian. 22 July 2011. Retrieved 7 December 2012. 
  2. ^ "Rescuing a monument". LA Times. 20 November 1983. Retrieved 7 December 2012. 
  3. ^ [1]
  4. ^ King, Susan. "Kevin Brownlow helped spread the word on silent film era". LA Times. Retrieved 7 December 2012. 
  5. ^ http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2008/oct/17/david-caute-winstanley-comrade-jacob
  6. ^ Scorsese, Martin (March 2012). "The Quest for Napoléon". Vanity Fair. Retrieved 7 December 2012. 
  7. ^ http://www.oscars.org/awards/governors/2010/brownlow.html
  8. ^ "Kevin Brownlow brings cinema's past to life". Variety. Retrieved 7 December 2012. 

External links [edit]

Authority control
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