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The 13th British Silent Film Festival opens at Leicester Phoenix on Thursday April 15 and promises another goldmine of undiscovered treasures from the UK's national film archive as well as rare treats from archives around the world. Amongst stunning actualities of the earliest Everest expeditions and historic Polar and Antarctic attempts, dinosaurs roam the Earth in the first version of 'The Lost World' (created by King Kong animator Willis O'Brien), Rudolf Valentino smoulders in 'The Sheik', and Louise Brooks hits the road in 'Beggars of Life', a superb evocation of railroad-riding hoboes in pre-depression America, scored by the renowned blues band The Dodge Brothers including one Mark Kermode. The festival features the finest silent film musicians in the world playing live as well as a stunningly recreated original score for the WW1 epic 'The Battle of the Ancre'. See the world as never before, from secret initiation rites on the Torres Straits, to the amazing early work of scientific film-makers (introduced by Tim Boon of the Science Museum) to the still-unfolding role of women in the pioneering days of the British film industry. Brochures and delegate passes available from Phoenix Square, Leicester (0116) 242 2800 or book for individual events online at www.phoenix.org.uk

Long time supporters of the British Silent Film Festival will remember Professor Andrew Higson’s inspiring presentation on Cecil Hepworth and Percy Stow’s 1903 Alice in Wonderland. Way back then we thought we were doing well to get 100 people in all the world interested in this stuff – now, nicely restored with original tints and a bit of judicious timing to coincide with the Disney release of Tim Burton’s film our little silent Alice has gone viral – 442,569 hits on youtube today and counting – Spectacular!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zeIXfdogJbA