WATERVILLE – The Maine Film Center and the Colby College Museum of Art are thrilled to announce a one-night only event featuring a screening of the silent film “The Trail of ‘98” with a live, and original, accompaniment by Mark Tipton and Les Sorciers Perdus. Free and open to all, this special event will be held on Friday, Dec. 1 at 7 p.m. as a part of December’s Downtown Waterville First Friday celebrations.
Trumpeter, composer, and educator Tipton has toured the U.S and Europe extensively with his jazz stylings. Currently pursuing his doctorate in musical arts degree in jazz studies at the New England Conservatory of Music.
“My original score for Clarence Brown’s 1928 silent film, “The Trail of ’98,” offers a blend of vintage and contemporary jazz, classical, and folk music sonorities, as well as sound signifiers, to convey the struggle encountered by the Klondike Gold Rush prospectors,” says Tipton. “The film’s narrative includes romance, adventure, aspiration, defeat, and betrayal, so there is no shortage of variety in the requisite musical themes that I composed.”
“The Trail of ‘98”, one of the last great films of the Silent Era, was released in 1928 and is based on the 1910 novel of the same name written by Robert W. Service. Featuring Harry Carey and Dolores del Río as fortune hunters seeking to strike it big in the Klondike Gold Rush, the film was shot in part on location in Alaska at heights of 11,6000 feet and in -60 temperatures.
“Fans of the Maine International Film Festival will certainly recognize the tremendous and immersive productions that Mark Tipton and Les Sorciers Perdus bring to a silent film
screening,” said Mike Perreault, executive director of the Maine Film Center. “They are truly anything but silent, with Tipton’s compositions totally transforming classic films into fully satisfying new experiences.”
Free to the public, advance ticket reservations are currently available and highly recommended. The film has a runtime of 1 hour and 27 minutes and is unrated. For more information, please visit MaineFilmCenter.org
Maine Film Center educates, entertains, and builds community through film. As Maine’s first independent art house cinema and host of the 10-day, 100 film Maine International Film Festival, MFC shows the best of American independent, international, and repertory film – and offers the best popcorn in the known universe. For more information visit MaineFilmCenter.org.
