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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South o’ Santa Fe
(1919)
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This western short film, directed by Clifford Smith, stars Texas Guinan, with George Chesebro, Jack Richardson Anna Purdon and Donna Wayne.
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 Fatkat Enterprises
201? DVD edition
Texas Guinan Silent Westerns, Volumes 1 and 2 (1918-1921), black & white, ? minutes total, not rated, including South o’ Santa Fe (1919), black & white, ? minutes, not rated.
Fatkat Enterprises, no catalog number, UPC 6-35189-66952-8.
Two single-sided, single-layered, Region 0 NTSC DVD-R discs; 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; $17.50.
Release date: 201?.
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 to be accompanied by a soundtrack compiled from preexisting music recordings.
For information about other films in this collection, see our Texas Guinan Silent Westerns, Volumes 1 and 2 on home video page.
The video edition producer has since expanded this release into a three-disc home video edition (adding their two-film collection, Texas Guinan Silent Westerns, Volume 3) which is available on eBay, and sale benefits the Niles Essanay Silent Film Museum. This producer from Stayton, Oregon, has released DVD-R editions under the company names Fatkat Enterprises and Rare Silent Films.
Sight unseen, this is our recommended home video edition of the film.
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This Region 0 NTSC DVD-R edition is available from
FATKAT ENTERPRISES through . . .
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 Alpha Video
2018 DVD edition
South o’ Santa Fe and Other Rare Shorts (1919-1920), black & white, 64 minutes total, not rated, including South o’ Santa Fe (1919), black & white, 25 minutes, not rated.
Alpha Home Entertainment, distributed by Oldies.com,
ALP 8159D, UPC 0-89218-81599-6.
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 6.4 Mbps average video bit rate (capable of progressive scan upscaling to 30 fps); Dolby Digital (AC3) 2.0 mono sound encoded at 384 Kbps audio bit rate; English language intertitles, no subtitles; no chapter stops (within the film); standard DVD keepcase; $7.98 (raised again to $9.99).
Release date: 27 November 2018.
Country of origin: USA
Ratings (1-10): video: 3 / audio: 3 / additional content: 0 / overall: 3.
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This DVD-R edition has been mastered from a videotape copy of a 16mm reduction print. Smeary picture details and incompetant edge sharpening (see the white line highlights on the left side of faces in the above still frame) are telltale signs of an older analog video transfer. Dust, speckling, schmutz, frame jitters, and other print flaws are present in the picture.
The film is accompanied by a soundtrack compiled from extremely poor and abruptly-edited preexisting music recordings.
For information about other films in this collection, see our South o’ Santa Fe and Other Rare Shorts on home video page.
After having released so many poor quality discs like this one, we are amazed the Alpha Video offices haven’t yet been besieged by angry villagers with torches and pitchforks. Need we say — not recommended?
This review was updated in 2026.
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This Region 0 NTSC DVD-R edition is available from
ALPHA VIDEO through . . .
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Other WESTERN FILMS of the silent era available on home video.
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