Louise Brooks

Seven years before she dazzled international audiences as the amoral Lulu in G.W. Pabst's 1929 German masterpiece "Pandora's Box," Louise Brooks was a willful, intelligent and beautiful 15-year-old girl living in Wichita, Kan. Summer 1922 changed Brooks' life. She left home accompanied by a provincial 36-year-old housewife named Alice Mills and traveled by train to New York City so she could attend the Denishawn school of modern dance run by Ruth St. Denis and Ted Shawn. Mills returned that summer to Wichita and vanished from the life of Brooks, who would shortly become one of the icons of the silent screen.

Seven years before she dazzled international audiences as the amoral Lulu in G.W. Pabst's 1929 German masterpiece "Pandora's Box," Louise Brooks was a willful, intelligent and beautiful 15-year-old girl living in Wichita, Kan. Summer 1922 changed Brooks' life. She left home accompanied by a provincial 36-year-old housewife named Alice Mills and traveled by train to New York City so she could attend the Denishawn school of modern dance run by Ruth St. Denis and Ted Shawn. Mills returned that summer to Wichita and vanished from the life of Brooks, who would shortly become one of the icons of the silent screen.

She is gone. There was never an actress like her in films before her. There will never be, can not be, anyone like her again. Her final, towering hours in film came at the end of the silent era. Her image is fixed forever in the mythology of the modern world in such films as "Diary of a Lost Girl" and, above all, "Pandora's Box." I had read and reread her superb essays in "Lulu in Hollywood." So I knew that she could write. My god, could she write! And though I have seen hundreds of films nothing in any of them can compare with the final moments of "Pandora's Box."

Director Monte Hellman returns to features after a 21-year-absence with "Road to Nowhere. " The film is a stylish, shimmering neo-noir with a multi-layered narrative for which the director's longtime collaborator Steven Gaydos has written an exceedingly elliptical and challenging script. Genre conventions become a point of departure for Hellman as he contemplates and explores an all-consuming romantic passion, a love of making films, the blurry lines between truth and illusion and the magic of cinema and its enduring power.

No actress made fewer starring movies yet attained so major a place in film history as Louise Brooks. And as narrator Shirley MacLaine remarks in the excellent "Louise Brooks: Looking for Lulu" (on Turner Classic Movies tonight), "Nobody burned more bridges than Louise Brooks."

LOUISE BROOKS was not just a Jazz Age actress, she was a drug that went right to your head, a performer of phenomenal presence who jumped to icon without a lengthy stay at earthbound stardom. The written word cannot convey her qualities, but to see her is to immediately understand. Because 2006 is the centenary year of Brooks' birth on Nov. 14 in Cherryvale, Kan., celebrations are in order.

Louise Brooks, a sloe-eyed beauty whose portrayals of wanton women placed her atop the ranks of reigning silent film queens, but whose independent spirit forced her to soon give up what she determined was the "slavery" of acting, has died. Wire service reports Friday said that the actress had been found dead in her sparse Rochester, N.Y., apartment where she had lived reclusively since the late 1950s.

Writer-director Richard Ayoade has the knack. A fresh and inventive cinematic voice, he's taken a subject that's been beaten half to death and brought it miraculously to life in his smart and funny debut feature, "Submarine. " Based on a novel by Joe Dunthorne, "Submarine" is not exactly the first film willing to explore the coming of age of a teenage boy. But by grafting delightful cinematic wit and style and a fondness for the energy of the French New Wave onto the tale of a 15-year-old taking on life in a town in Wales, Ayoade makes us feel like it's never been told before.

Director Monte Hellman returns to features after a 21-year-absence with "Road to Nowhere. " The film is a stylish, shimmering neo-noir with a multi-layered narrative for which the director's longtime collaborator Steven Gaydos has written an exceedingly elliptical and challenging script. Genre conventions become a point of departure for Hellman as he contemplates and explores an all-consuming romantic passion, a love of making films, the blurry lines between truth and illusion and the magic of cinema and its enduring power.

To quote Gloria Swanson's Norma Desmond in "Sunset Boulevard," film stars of the silent era "had faces." Kino on Video's latest vintage collection ($25 each), aptly titled "They Had Faces Then," features four of film's most fabulous visages: Rudolph Valentino, Louise Brooks, William S. Hart and Richard Barthelmess. Born Rodolfo Alfonzo Raffaele Pierre Philibert Guglielmi in Italy in 1895, Rudolph Valentino was Hollywood's hottest sex symbol of the 1920s.

Writer-director Richard Ayoade has the knack. A fresh and inventive cinematic voice, he's taken a subject that's been beaten half to death and brought it miraculously to life in his smart and funny debut feature, "Submarine. " Based on a novel by Joe Dunthorne, "Submarine" is not exactly the first film willing to explore the coming of age of a teenage boy. But by grafting delightful cinematic wit and style and a fondness for the energy of the French New Wave onto the tale of a 15-year-old taking on life in a town in Wales, Ayoade makes us feel like it's never been told before.

As he nears his 80th birthday, Jean-Luc Godard is no less the gadfly that he was 50 years ago, still dividing audiences with politically charged films that leap outside the confines of beginning-middle-end storytelling. However you define "Godardian," there's no denying his profound impact on the language of movies. With the French filmmaker set to receive an honorary Oscar this weekend, here are five indelible examples of the director's alchemical blend of cinéma vérité and theatricality.

LOUISE BROOKS was not just a Jazz Age actress, she was a drug that went right to your head, a performer of phenomenal presence who jumped to icon without a lengthy stay at earthbound stardom. The written word cannot convey her qualities, but to see her is to immediately understand. Because 2006 is the centenary year of Brooks' birth on Nov. 14 in Cherryvale, Kan., celebrations are in order.

To quote Gloria Swanson's Norma Desmond in "Sunset Boulevard," film stars of the silent era "had faces." Kino on Video's latest vintage collection ($25 each), aptly titled "They Had Faces Then," features four of film's most fabulous visages: Rudolph Valentino, Louise Brooks, William S. Hart and Richard Barthelmess. Born Rodolfo Alfonzo Raffaele Pierre Philibert Guglielmi in Italy in 1895, Rudolph Valentino was Hollywood's hottest sex symbol of the 1920s.

No actress made fewer starring movies yet attained so major a place in film history as Louise Brooks. And as narrator Shirley MacLaine remarks in the excellent "Louise Brooks: Looking for Lulu" (on Turner Classic Movies tonight), "Nobody burned more bridges than Louise Brooks."

The Special Screenings listing of Sept. 1 is in error regarding the film "Lulu in Berlin." It is not "the only preserved film interview" with Louise Brooks. I made a film released in 1976 called "Memories of Berlin: The Twilight of Weimar Culture" in which Louise Brooks has a prominent role and in which she is eulogized by Christopher Isherwood, Lotte Eisner and Francis Lederer. This film has been well preserved. GARY CONKLIN Pasadena

As he nears his 80th birthday, Jean-Luc Godard is no less the gadfly that he was 50 years ago, still dividing audiences with politically charged films that leap outside the confines of beginning-middle-end storytelling. However you define "Godardian," there's no denying his profound impact on the language of movies. With the French filmmaker set to receive an honorary Oscar this weekend, here are five indelible examples of the director's alchemical blend of cinéma vérité and theatricality.

Those who contend that wrestling is nothing but low-grade theatrics aimed at the blue-collar set keep predicting the craze will fade very soon. But it just keeps getting more popular. Consider the figures for an April 7 match, shown on pay-per-view TV and closed-circuit TV. Four million watched worldwide on pay-per-view, 2 million watched on closed circuit. "This one event made millions," said video wrestling expert Steelman Rocco, a columnist for Video Insider magazine.

She is gone. There was never an actress like her in films before her. There will never be, can not be, anyone like her again. Her final, towering hours in film came at the end of the silent era. Her image is fixed forever in the mythology of the modern world in such films as "Diary of a Lost Girl" and, above all, "Pandora's Box." I had read and reread her superb essays in "Lulu in Hollywood." So I knew that she could write. My god, could she write! And though I have seen hundreds of films nothing in any of them can compare with the final moments of "Pandora's Box."