Old Hollywood: Silent Stars, Deadly Secrets (2007) (TV)

User Rating:

9.6/10   

Director:

Scott Colthorp

Writers:

Zak Weisfeld (writer) &
Geoffrey Proud (writer)

Release Date:

16 January 2007 (USA)

Genre:

Documentary

Plot:

A look at the 1920s murder of Hollywood director William Desmond Taylor, which officially remains unsolved. Many historians, biographers, and a few survivors are interviewed. |

Cast

Sidney Kirkpatrick	...	Himself
Jennifer Niven	...	Herself
Brandon K. Hogan	...	Himself
Gloria Stuart	...	Herself
Duncan St. James	...	Himself
Marc Wanamaker	...	Himself
Charles Higham	...	Himself
Betty Lasky	...	Herself
Johnny Grant	...	Himself
Laurie Jacobson	...	Herself
Bruce Long	...	Himself
Raul Moreno	...	Himself
Ellen Strain	...	Herself
Paul Winfield	...	Narrator

Runtime:

USA:120 min (with commercials)

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (color and black & white archive footage)

Sound Mix:

Stereo

Company:

Jupiter Entertainment

Trivia:

Paul Winfield's last project.

Goofs:

Factual errors: One important fact about murder victim William Desmond Taylor, which was quite a revelation when it was uncovered during the official investigation, was that back East he had walked out on his wife and children, whose existence was heretofore unknown in Hollywood, and assumed the phony name of Taylor en route to California. This is not acknowledged at all in this program.

A Documentary about a Mystery that is Itself a Mystery!

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

The murder of silent movie director William Desmond Taylor is one of those enduring real-life mysteries that continues to pique interest even eighty years later. This documentary, however, does not do it justice. It is by no means worthless, but it is severely flawed. There is absolutely no mention whatsoever of the revelation during the original, official investigation that Taylor was an alias, and that this man had walked out on his wife and children back east and disappeared before resurfacing in California under his new name. Furthermore, late in the program, it is asserted that Taylor was secretly gay, and that this undercut almost every theory about the case. This claim is followed not by the least little shred of supporting evidence, but by a description of how the publicizing of this "fact" would have been devastating to the Hollywood film industry at that time, and so it was consequently suppressed. This contention is in fact flatly contradicted by much evidence in the case, one piece of which is shortly thereafter repeated! One would be much better off finding and reading a copy of the book, "A Cast of Killers," whose author, Sidney Kirkpatrick, is one of the interview subjects here. A strange fact of this production is that it was in fact several years old at the time of its apparent premiere, on the Biography Channel. Its copyright notice bears the year 2000, and it is narrated by Paul Winfield, of "City Confidential" fame, who passed away in early 2004. In fact, several members of this production's staff and crew worked on that A&E series, and the presentation style here bears a marked resemblance to the other's. Given its extended running time, were it not for the fact that no such subject can be found in the "CC" episode guide on A&E's official website, one would think that this was a special edition of that series. Was it intended as such and shelved due to the inaccuracies in the content described above, finally getting "thrown away" on a channel available to a much smaller audience than the parent? We may never know.