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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The Open Switch
(1926)
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This B-studio feature, directed by the prolific J.P. McGowan, features Helen Holmes and Jack Perrin.
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 Alpha Video
2017 DVD edition
The Open Switch (1926), black & white, 50 minutes, not rated, with Mistaken Orders (1926), black & white, 54 minutes, not rated.
Alpha Home Entertainment, distributed by Oldies.com,
ALP 7955D, UPC 0-89218-79559-5.
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 3.7 Mbps average video bit rate (capable of progressive scan upscaling to ? fps); Dolby Digital (AC3) 2.0 stereo sound encoded at 384 Kbps audio bit rate; English language intertitles, no subtitles; chapter stops; standard DVD keepcase; $7.98 (raised again to $9.99).
Release date: 16 May 2017.
Country of origin: USA
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This DVD-R edition has been mastered from an 8mm reduction print.
The film is accompanied by a music score performed on MIDI digital piano in an annoyingly repetious loop of about two minutes.
Our copy of this disc will not play cleanly in any of the four Blu-ray Disc, DVD and laptop players we tried; we had trouble with four discs manufactured by Alpha Video in 2016-2017, which may indicate a formatting or duplication incompatibility on Alpha’s part.
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This
Region 0 NTSC DVD-R edition is available from
ALPHA VIDEO through . . .
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 Loving the Classics
202? DVD edition
The Open Switch (1926), black & white, 50 minutes, not rated.
Loving the Classics, no catalog number, no UPC number.
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 stereo sound encoded at ? Kbps audio bit rate; English language intertitles, no subtitles; chapter stops; standard DVD keepcase; $14.99 (raised to $15.49).
Release date: 202?.
Country of origin: USA
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This DVD-R edition has likely been mastered from a 16mm reduction print.
The film is likely accompanied by a soundtrack compiled from preexisting music recordings.
Note that this company apparently has a history of pirating other home video editions or pirating television network recordings to produce their products. Be aware that purchasing pirated home video editions does not benefit the original edition producers nor the composers whose music is often pirated as well.
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This
Region 0 NTSC DVD-R edition is available directly from . . .
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Other silent era J.P. McGOWAN films available on home video.
Other RAILROAD FILMS of the silent era available on home video.
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