April, 20089

Specialty DVD Supplier Flicker Alley Announces UNDER FULL SAIL – SILENT CINEMA ON THE HIGH SEAS Featuring Five Digitally Mastered Films

UNDER FULL SAIL makes its home video premiere on Tuesday, April 14th

Los Angeles, CA— Flicker Alley, a specialty supplier of fine silent films and classic cinema programming, in association with the Blackhawk Film Collection, announces the release of Under Full Sail – Silent Cinema on the High Seas, a new DVD release featuring five breathtaking films that preserve the romance, grandeur and allure of windjammers sailing open waters, exquisitely photographed in the style of the time. This collection carries a suggested retail price of $29.95.

The Yankee Clipper (1927), produced by Cecil B. DeMille and directed by Rupert Julian, restored to the most complete version available since the film’s release, is a feature-length melodrama recreating the real-life race from Foo Chow to Boston for the China tea trade. The gorgeous production filmed at sea for six weeks aboard the 1856 wooden square-rigger Indiana with stars William Boyd, Elinor Fair and (Frank) “Junior” Coghlan. Renowned organist Dennis James, in his solo DVD premiere, accompanies the film on an original-installation 1928 Wurlitzer pipe organ recorded at Seattle’s Paramount Theatre.

Around the Horn in a Square Rigger (1933) was filmed by noted sailor, author, and photographer Alan Villiers documenting the record-breaking 83-day voyage of the 1902 barque Parma from Australia to England in the 1933 Grain Race. Villiers writes, “We wanted to make a picture that would capture some of the stirring beauty of these ships…some glimmer of understanding of the attraction which they hold over those who sail in them.” Music by Eric Beheim.

The Square Rigger (1932), an early sound short filmed as part of Fox’s Magic Carpet of Movietone, shows life aboard the schoolship Dar Pomorza, “The White Frigate.” Built in 1909 as the Prinzess Eitel Friedrich, it was ceded from Germany to France as a prize of World War I, and was later donated to the Polish State Maritime School in 1930 where it served 50 years and trained more than 13,000 cadets.

Ship Ahoy (1928), is a unique record of the conditions and traditions of the North American lumber trade, featuring an unidentified schooner equipped with a fore and aft rig as it transports lumber from the Carolinas up the coast to a northern port. Music by Eric Beheim.

The collection is rounded off with a ten-minute sequence from Down to the Sea in Ships (1922), documenting an authentic whale hunt from the 1878 wooden ship Wanderer out of New Bedford, Massachusetts. The cameramen risk their lives to capture practices unchanged since Herman Melville immortalized them in Moby Dick. Music by Dennis James.

DVD bonus features include an audio reminiscence by (Frank) “Junior” Coghlan about the filming of The Yankee Clipper. An enclosed booklet includes detailed program notes by film scholar and U.S. Navy marine engineer John E. Stone and an essay about the scoring of The Yankee Clipper by organist Dennis James.

Under Full Sail – Silent Cinema on the High Seas is the seventh DVD title to be released through the partnership of Film Preservation Associates’ Blackhawk Films Collection and Flicker Alley, following Discovering Cinema, Saved From The Flames, Georges Méliès: First Wizard of Cinema (1896-1913), Abel Gance’s La Roue, Perils of the New Land: Films of the Immigrant Experience (1910-1915), and Douglas Fairbanks: A Modern Musketeer.

ABOUT THE BLACKHAWK FILMS COLLECTION
Blackhawk Films was founded in 1927 as a producer of film advertising for merchants and as a distributor of regional newsreels. The company made its mark as a nontheatrical distributor with the advent of 16mm sound film in 1933, establishing several regional offices before WWII. In 1947, Blackhawk expanded into sales of used film and soon thereafter began distributing new 8mm and 16mm prints of Laurel & Hardy comedies from Hal Roach Studios as well as titles from such other suppliers such as Fox Movietone, Killiam Shows, and National Telefilm Associates. David Shepard joined Blackhawk as Vice President (1973-1976) and after founding Film Preservation Associates in 1986, acquired the Blackhawk Films library which now comprises some 5,000 titles.

ABOUT DENNIS JAMES
Since 1971, Dennis James has presented live accompaniments for silent films, with piano, theatre organ, chamber ensemble and full symphony orchestras both in the United States and internationally. He also performs under his production company, Silent Film Concerts. James has one of the largest private libraries of authentic silent film music in existence, including complete original film scores and hundreds of published generic silent film music compositions that are used to create historically accurate new musical scores where the originals do not survive. The soundtrack for The Yankee Clipper is James’ solo DVD premiere. CONTACT: SILENT FILM CONCERTS, PO BOX 2072, TACOMA, WA 98401, PHONE 253-573-1683, E-MAIL MUSCUR@GMAIL.COM.

ABOUT FLICKER ALLEY
Flicker Alley, LLC was founded in 2002 by Jeff Masino. Each Flicker Alley project is the culmination of hundreds of hours of research, digital restoration, and music production. Flicker Alley has partnered with Turner Classic Movies on several historic cable broadcasts including three previously unavailable silent films produced by Howard Hughes, three rarely seen Rudolph Valentino films and new digital editions of J’Accuse and La Roue, by Abel Gance. Flicker Alley is the proud recipient of the National Society of Film Critics’ 2008 Film Heritage Award and the 2008 Willy Haas Award. For more information, please visitwww.flickeralley.com.

Flicker Alley titles are available in North America directly through Flicker Alley (www.flickeralley.com) and through online retailers such as Amazon.com (www.amazon.com). Wholesale orders are handled by Emphasis Entertainment Group, Inc. (astrutz@aol.com). For institutional sales please contact Gartenberg Media Enterprises (gartmedia@nyc.rr.com).