Silent Classics

The Czech archive version of one of cinema's last and most luminous silent masterpieces, an enduring fable of love, loss and redemption.

Premiere. A breathtaking and poignant account of the valiant 1924 British assault on the awe-inspiring peak, beautifully restored by the BFI.

An incontestable masterpiece of silent cinema, Carl Dreyer's moving biopic features one of the most powerful performances ever captured on film.

Fritz Lang’s expressionist, dystopian vision is one of the first science fiction feature films, and is arguably the most influential.

A fixture in the critical canon almost since its premiere, Eisenstein’s film about a 1905 naval mutiny was revolutionary in both form and content.

Oscar Micheaux’s startling silent classic – the earliest surviving feature from an African-American director.

Paul Robeson's remarkable film debut, the star playing dual roles in this key work of African American cinema from pioneering filmmaker Oscar Micheaux

Louise Brooks dazzles as the iconic showgirl who leaves a trail of destruction in her wake, in one of the great silent films of the Weimar era.

A scabrous study of desire, the subconscious and anti-clericalism - Buñuel and Dalí’s provocative first film is a classic of Surrealist cinema.

Dazzling document of Soviet life, by Dziga Vertov, showing a living city and the people and machines that propel it.