Sneak Preview: Russian Sniper Attack

From January 28, 2015, American Cinematographers in the Great War will be available online and in bookstores both in the United States and Europe. For more information go to the publisher's website:

http://www.johnlibbey.com/books_detail.php?area=cine&ID=168

As a preview, here's a scene from Wilbur H. Durborough war film On the Firing Line with the Germans (1915). Durborough and his camera operator Ries accompanied the German army in the summer of 1915 during the attack on Russian Poland. Their work at times was dangerous, as they noticed while entering the city of Bloni about 16 miles west of Warsaw. The intertitle of the film reads:  "Surprised by Russian snipers at Bloni, in which one man was wounded and we were very nervous for a few minutes while the 'fun' lasted."

Sniper attack - scene from W.H. Durborough's movie

Link to high res image

Back to Pordenone

For those of you who were not at Pordenone, Italy, here's a link to Charles Musser's weblog on his pilgrimage to the 33rd edition of the Film Festival, highlighting his comments on some remarkable silent movies that were shown this year such as the Nibelungen by Fritz Lang and Fred Niblo's Ben Hur.

http://www.charlesmusser.com/?tag=david-francis 

Charles also mentioned in his blog the new books published by John Libbey that were presented at Pordenone, including our publication on the American cinematographers of World War I, and as you can see we enjoyed the book launch very much. Great prosecco, John!