Reviews of silent film releases on home video.
Copyright © 1999-2026 by Carl Bennett
and the Silent Era Company.
All Rights Reserved. |
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Civilization
(1916)
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The feature war drama, produced by Thomas H. Ince and directed by Raymond B. West, stars Herschel Mayall and Lola May, with Howard Hickman, Enid Markey, George Fisher, J. Frank Burke, Charles K. French, J. Barney Sherry, Jerome Storm, Ethel Ullman, Fannie Midgley, Kate Bruce and Lillian Read.
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 Grapevine Video
2010 DVD edition
Civilization (1916), black & white, 77 minutes, not rated, with The Cost of High Living (1916), black & white, 12 minutes, not rated.
Grapevine Video, no catalog number, UPC 8-42614-10415-2.
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 6.0 Mbps average video bit rate (capable of progressive scan upscaling to 60 fps); Dolby Digital (AC3) 2.0 mono sound encoded at 224 Kbps audio bit rate; English language intertitles, no subtitles; 12 chapter stops; standard DVD keepcase; $16.95.
Release date: November 2010.
Country of origin: USA
Ratings (1-10): video: 3 / audio: 2 / additional content: 3 / overall: 3.
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This DVD-R edition has been mastered from a fair to good 16mm reduction print of the synchronized sound rerelease version. The print is soft in image details, with dust, speckling, scuffing, frame jitters, print tears, and other flaws present.
The film is accompanied by a noisy low-fidelity soundtrack of music and sound effects from the source print, which can make viewing tough going.
Supplemental material includes a Vitagraph comedy short from a good 8mm reduction print and accompanied by a music score performed on electric organ and piano (possibly by Bob Vaughn).
Far from ideal, this is our recommended home video edition of the film for now. This is an important film and should be released by someone in a high-quality edition sooner rather than later. For now, this is our recommended home video edition of the film.
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This Region 0 NTSC DVD-R edition is available directly from . . .
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 Alpha Video
2018 DVD edition
Civilization (1916), black & white, 85 minutes, not rated.
Alpha Home Entertainment, distributed by Oldies.com,
ALP 8069D, UPC 0-89218-80699-4.
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 mono sound encoded at ? Kbps audio bit rate; English language intertitles, no subtitles; chapter stops; standard DVD keepcase; $7.98 (raised again to $9.99).
Release date: 15 May 2018.
Country of origin: USA
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This DVD-R edition has likely been mastered from a 16mm or 8mm 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 from
ALPHA VIDEO through . . .
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