Leontine Maddern is a self-centered, unscrupulous actress, while her twin sister Leona is a serious and compassionate artist. Because of a scandal in which Leontine was involved, Leona uses her mother's maiden name of Rosalie Byrnes.
A hush settles over the nitrate, as if the celluloid itself fears to breathe. The first intertitle blooms like a bruise: “The world knew her as Rosalie Byrnes—yet mirrors remembered Leona.” From that instant, director Wilmuth Merk’s 1920 chamber-thriller The Shadow of Rosalie Byrnes refuses to let spectators languish i...
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Comparing the cinematic DNA and archive impact of two defining moments in cult history.
George Archainbaud
George Archainbaud
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"A hush settles over the nitrate, as if the celluloid itself fears to breathe. The first intertitle blooms like a bruise: “The world knew her as Rosalie Byrnes—yet mirrors remembered Leona.” From that instant, director Wilmuth Merk’s 1920 chamber-thriller The Shadow of Rosalie Byrnes refuses to let spectators languish in comfort. Instead, it drags us through a hall of mirrored identities where every reflection lies, and love letters detonate like grenades misplaced in silk glove boxes.Merk, chief..."
Grace Sartwell Mason, R. Cecil Smith
United States
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