Streaming now: an HD recording of the final part of the final session of Orphans Online, May 29, 2020. Anke Mebold (DFF – Deutsches Filminstitut & Filmmuseum) introduces the puzzle/compilation film of uncertain date and origins. Original music composed and performed by Stephen Horne. 24 minutes.
Click to enlarge, or watch at vimeo.com/432997996.
The Mebold metadata on the DFF film:
An Atlantic Voyage: Von Hamburg zu den Niagarafällen mit dem Schnelldampfer Kaiser Wilhelm II
[From Hamburg to the Niagara Falls with the Express Steamer Kaiser Wilhelm II]
(DE[?] 19?? / GB 1903[?] / FR 1906[?]);
with footage from [?] Charles Urban Trading Company and Pathé Frères.
Digital copy from 35mm nitrate positive, 300 meters; b/w, tinted, toned; 16’19’’@ 20fp
This June 9 post discusses some of the resonances of An Atlantic Voyage.
A connection to May 29 session, Not Lost But Found in the Ocean, is worth noting. Bill Morrison’s Sunken Films uses footage of a 1915 newsreel showing RMS Lusitania beginning its final voyage. The ship featured in An Atlantic Voyage is less well known, but not obscure in its day. Kaiser Wilhelm II carried luxury passengers on trans-Atlantic trips and numerous immigrants in steerage, hence its encounters with the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island seen in the film. See wikipedia entry.
Schnelldampfer Kaiser Wilhelm II was noted as the speediest trans-Atlantic vessel, until surpassed by the Cunard Line’s Lusitania.
The program listing for this stand-alone segment reads
Envoi & Bon Voyage!
An explanation of that is a postscript in the next blog post.
