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Griffith
Masterworks
Biograph Shorts
(1908-1914)

Contents: The Adventures of Dollie (1908), Corner in Wheat (1909), The Sealed Room (1909), Those Awful Hats (1909), The Unchanging Sea (1910), The Usurer (1910), Enoch Arden (1911), His Trust (1911), The Last Drop of Water (1911), The Miser’s Heart (1911), The Burglar’s Dilemma (1912), Friends (1912), The Lesser Evil (1912), The Massacre (1912), The Musketeers of Pig Alley (1912), The New York Hat (1912), One is Business, The Other Crime (1912), The Painted Lady (1912), The Sunbeam (1912), An Unseen Enemy (1912), Death’s Marathon (1913), The Mothering Heart (1913) and The Battle at Elderbush Gulch (1914).

Kino on Video
2002 DVD edition

Griffith Masterworks: Biograph Shorts (1908-1914), black & white, 362 minutes total, not rated, including The Adventures of Dollie (1908) black & white, 12 minutes, not rated, Corner in Wheat (1909), black & white, 14 minutes, not rated, The Sealed Room (1909), black & white, 11 minutes, not rated, Those Awful Hats (1909), black & white, 3 minutes, not rated, The Unchanging Sea (1910), black & white, 13 minutes, not rated, The Usurer (1910), black & white, 18 minutes, not rated, Enoch Arden (1911), black & white, 33 minutes, not rated, His Trust (1911), black & white, 14 minutes, not rated, The Last Drop of Water (1911), black & white, 13 minutes, not rated, The Miser’s Heart (1911), black & white, 16 minutes, not rated, The Burglar’s Dilemma (1912), black & white, 15 minutes, not rated, Friends (1912), black & white, 13 minutes, not rated, The Lesser Evil (1912), black & white, 13 minutes, not rated, The Massacre (1912), black & white, 30 minutes, not rated, The Musketeers of Pig Alley (1912), black & white, 18 minutes, not rated, The New York Hat (1912), black & white, 16 minutes, not rated, One is Business, The Other Crime (1912), black & white, 15 minutes, not rated, The Painted Lady (1912), black & white, 12 minutes, not rated, The Sunbeam (1912), black & white, 15 minutes, not rated, An Unseen Enemy (1912), black & white, 15 minutes, not rated, Death’s Marathon (1913), black & white, 15 minutes, not rated, The Mothering Heart (1913), black & white, 23 minutes, not rated, and The Battle at Elderbush Gulch (1914), black & white, 29 minutes, not rated.

Kino International, K268, UPC 7-38329-02682-0.
Two single-sided, dual-layered, Region 0 NTSC DVD discs; 1.33:1 aspect ratio picture in full-frame 4:3 (720 x 480 pixels) interlaced scan image encoded in SDR MPEG-2 format at 4.0 Mbps average video bit rate (capable of progressive scan upscaling to 60 fps); Dolby Digital (AC3) 2.0 stereo sound encoded at 192 Kbps audio bit rate; English language intertitles, no subtitles; 23 chapter stops; two-page insert card; double-wide two-disc DVD keepcase; $29.95.
Release date: 10 December 2002.
Country of origin: USA

Ratings (1-10): video: 8 / audio: 8 / additional content: 8 / overall: 8.

This DVD collection, released three months after David Shepard’s two-disc set D.W. Griffith: Years of Discovery 1908-1914, contains many of the same films (this Kino edition was also predominantly a David Shepard production), with a couple of variations and bonus short films produced by Bret Wood.

The films are accompanied by music scores composed, arranged and conducted by Robert Israel, and piano scores performed by Jon C. Mirsalis.

Which set collectors will want to acquire will purely depend on which films they want to own. We own both sets as the video transfer qualities are similar if not identical.

For our comparative reviews of the individual films, see our The Adventures of Dollie on home video, Those Awful Hats on home video, The New York Hat on home video, Death’s Marathon on home video, The Mothering Heart on home video and The Battle at Elderbush Gulch on home video pages.