Short Film: Lot in Sodom (1933)

I'd like to share a project I recently completed and performed.  

The idea was to compose an original soundtrack to a short film and perform it live.  I chose James Sibley Watson's Lot in Sodom from 1933.  I fell in love with it as I worked with it.  I cut some 5 minutes of material to suit me and the time constraints.  What you will hear is my live performance.  

Here is the file:

Lot in Sodom (.mov)
(There are a couple of cringeworthy guitar hiccups--my only excuse is that it was dark.)


I'm not well-versed in film or the history of cinema.  A friend/collaborator was responsible for compiling the list of films to be used.  This motivated me creatively, and I want to do more events like this in the future.  First of all it was educational for me.  Secondly I like to think this is a recreation of how silent cinema would've been experienced; with the soundtrack composer/conductor in the pit, watching and playing along.

For me, the themes in the movie (coming as they do from the biblical story) address ideas and sentiments that I associate with some like-minded people on this forum and elsewhere.  Decadence, the decline and fall of civilizations, male and female sexuality and feminization.  There is perhaps also a chord it strikes in me because I was raised as a Protestant Christian. The story is apocalyptic and moves me.

I'd like to know how you interpret the film, what you think the filmmaker's (and my) intentions were, etc.  Also, since I want to make more soundtracks to more silent films, I'd appreciate your recommendations, and any discussion of silent and/or experimental film in general.

I'd gladly make more soundtracks and share them here.  And if any of you are artistically inclined aside from writing, I wonder if you'd share some of your creations in this forum.

There are other forums where this might be more appropriate, but if nothing else, I was thinking of some of you guys when I made this.

Here is the original film, with the original score and minus the cuts I made for my purposes. The list of films archived on this site is large.
Lot in Sodom (1933)
(The forced smugness of the uninspired philistine twat who wrote the blurb gave me a little more fuel.)

I preferred your soundtrack to the original.

The film is well-crafted and distinctly anti-classical.

CW., Congratulations on your live performance and nice of you to want to share it here. I can relate with "recreation of how silent cinema would've been experienced; with the soundtrack composer/conductor in the pit, watching and playing along." I can imagine it being a total streamlining of your instinct and intuition playing off each other. I have no time to watch the film just yet, so will have to get back on that latter, sorry...

You said you'd gladly make more soundtracks and share them here; I wonder how much you need the visuals to let your artistic side flow; I wonder how much you need it at all instead of working from your imagination... a movie or scene or theme just playing off in your mind?
I'm curious how Zarathustra or Nietzsche's Dionysian/tragic vision feels to you in musical lang., what kind of mood would you set to it, like a 1 or 2 min. theme...? Since most appreciate N. here, I wonder if we would affinity in your theme or if your piece would resonate in me at some level... and if not, to explore from what angle of feeling such a tone originated, etc.

Edit: Also, I wonder what tone does the KT/ 3E / Hyperborean Heritage "silent symbol" made by Satyr and Apaosha inspire in you?

Experimental/silent films - what kind are you looking for? Philosophical, Fantasy, Political, Religious, Crime...?

Good luck with your future projects.

Lyssa wrote:

I wonder how much you need the visuals to let your artistic side flow; I wonder how much you need it at all instead of working from your imagination... a movie or scene or theme just playing off in your mind?

In fact it's a collaboration, with the added intention of enhancing the film's finest qualities. The visuals are enhanced by the sound and the sound is enhanced by the visuals. I interpret the filmmaker's vision and then try to do that interpretation justice. I don't know how the original soundtrack composer and the filmmaker worked, how much the visuals owed to the music or vice versa.

Growing up in post-Hollywood American(ized) culture one's imagination is partly captured already by the movies. This project was delightful because I felt I was offering the audience something they were used to, and therefore would be more entertained and moved by, than if the attention were all on me. Both I and the audience were able to be passive and enjoy the film.

Lyssa wrote:

Experimental/silent films - what kind are you looking for? Philosophical, Fantasy, Political, Religious, Crime...?

I'll take a look at anything. Most of the other films I had to choose from were highly abstract. This was the only one with a straightforward narrative--and well-known at that. Maybe canonical status of biblical stories guarantees people will have strong feelings about it no matter what. I'd be interested in checking out mythological and poetic narratives in general. Check out this film and maybe something similar will come to mind?