And the Oscar goes to…

With a total of ten nominations including best picture, French silent film The Artist could well sweep the board at this weekend's Academy Awards. Chris O' Rourke from the Faculty of English looks at the resurgence of interest in silent cinema, and discusses his research on the acting styles of early film to which The Artist pays homage. For those of us who research early film history, the success of The Artist is reason to celebrate." - —Chris O' Rourke The success of Michel Hazanavicius's film The Artist has taken many people by surprise. As a black-and-white French melodrama about silent filmmaking, made in the style of a silent film, it goes against the grain of much contemporary box office fare. If it does as well at this year's Academy Awards as some commentators predict, it will be the first silent film to take home the top honours since the very first Oscars ceremony in 1929. For those of us who research early film history, the success of The Artist is reason to celebrate. The film has undoubtedly touched a nerve with contemporary audiences - whether out of a nostalgic longing for 'simpler' kinds of cinema, or because we (like the characters in Hazanavicius's film) are going through our own period of media change and uncertainty, as the rise of digital technologies and the current trend for 3D films seems to suggest.