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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White Tiger
(1923)
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This Tod Browning crime feature stars Priscilla Dean, Raymond Griffith, Wallace Beery and Matt Moore.
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 Kino Classics
2020 Blu-ray Disc edition
Drifting (1923), color-tinted black & white, 84 minutes, not rated, with White Tiger (1923), black & white, 77 minutes, not rated.
Kino Lorber, K25141, UPC 7-38329-25141-3.
One single-sided, dual-layered, Regions ABC Blu-ray Disc; 1.33:1 aspect ratio picture in pillarboxed 16:9 (1920 x 1080 pixels) 24 fps progressive scan image encoded in SDR AVC format at 32.4 Mbps average video bit rate; DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 stereo sound encoded at 2.0 Mbps audio bit rate; English language intertitles, no subtitles; 8 chapter stops; standard BD keepcase; $29.95.
Release date: 20 October 2020.
Country of origin: USA
Ratings (1-10): video: 4 / audio: 8 / additional content: 8 / overall: 5.
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This Blu-ray Disc edition has been mastered from a good 16mm reduction print held by the Library of Congress. The worn source material shows a significant amount of print damage still present in the high-definition scan, with dust, speckling, schmutz, vertical scratches, filmbase damage, and other print flaws compromising the picture. It truly is a pity that this film is not known to survive in better condition.
The film is accompanied by a music score composed and performed on piano by Anton Sanko.
Supplemental material includes audio commentary for The White Tiger by edition producer Bret Wood and for Drifting by film historian Anthony Slide; and a fragment of the presumed lost Browning film The Exquisite Thief (1919) (10 minutes).
This is our recommended home video edition of the film.
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This Region 0 Regions ABC Blu-ray Disc edition is available directly from . . .
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 Kino Classics
2020 DVD edition
Drifting (1923), black & white, 84 minutes, not rated, with White Tiger (1923), black & white, 77 minutes, not rated.
Kino Lorber, K25140, UPC 7-38329-25140-6.
One single-sided, dual-layered, Region 0 NTSC DVD 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; $19.95.
Release date: 20 October 2020.
Country of origin: USA
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This DVD edition has been mastered from a 16mm reduction print held by the Library of Congress.
The film is accompanied by a music score composed and performed on piano by Anton Sanko.
Supplemental material includes audio commentary for The White Tiger by edition producer Bret Wood and for Drifting by film historian Anthony Slide; and a fragment of the presumed lost Browning film The Exquisite Thief (1919) (10 minutes).
This is our recommended DVD home video edition of the film.
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This Region 0 NTSC DVD edition is available directly from . . .
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 Alpha Video
2010 DVD edition
White Tiger (1923), black & white, 83 minutes, not rated.
Alpha Home Entertainment, distributed by Oldies.com,
ALP 6475D, UPC 0-89218-64759-7.
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 6.8 Mbps average video bit rate (capable of progressive scan upscaling to 60 fps); Dolby Digital (AC3) 2.0 mono 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: 28 December 2010.
Country of origin: USA
Ratings (1-10): video: 4 / audio: 5 / additional content: 0 / overall: 4.
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This DVD-R edition has been prepared from a good to very-good 8mm reduction print, provided by National Film Archive, Incorporated (whoever that is), with reasonable image detail and a fairly broad greytone range. In the last quarter of the film the picture gets a little flat and greyed in comparison with the rest of the print. A significant amount of dust and speckling, schmutz, emulsion scuffing, frame jitters, and other print flaws are present in the picture.
The film is accompanied by a music score composed and performed on piano by Douglas M. Protsik. It is a change from the standard Alpha practice of cobbling a soundtrack together from preexisting music recordings. It is too bad that the results are amateurish, sounding every bit like a send-up of silent film accompaniment, and risks being as annoying as a compilation soundtrack.
Note: Our file copy of this release is not a manufactured-on-demand DVD-R disc but is instead a standard manufacture DVD disc. That said, there is no guarantee that discs purchased today will not now be MOD DVD-R discs.
Not recommended but it does, at least, look better than the Grapevine Video edition noted below.
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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 Grapevine Video
2002 DVD edition
White Tiger (1923), black & white, 81 minutes, not rated.
Grapevine Video, no catalog number, unknown 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 6.0 Mbps average video bit rate (capable of progressive scan upscaling to 60 fps); Dolby Digital (AC3) 2.0 mono sound encoded at 384 Kbps audio bit rate; English language intertitles, no subtitles; 18 chapter stops; standard DVD keepcase; $16.95 (reduced to $14.95).
Release date: 2002.
Country of origin: USA •
Ratings (1-10): video: 3 / audio: 4 / additional content: 0 / overall: 3.
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This DVD-R edition has been mastered from a good 8mm reduction print that is heavily worn, substantially contrasty, and with blasted out highlight details. A significant amount of dust, speckling, emulsion scuffing and blemishes, splice jumps, long vertical scratches, and other print flaws are present.
The film is accompanied by a number of preexisting orchestral music recordings, edited to fit the action.
This review was updated in 2025.
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This Region 0 NTSC DVD-R edition is available directly from . . .
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Other silent era TOD BROWNING films available on home video.
Other CRIME FILMS of the silent era available on home video.
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