The White Sister (1923) on

Produced by Inspiration Pictures, the company headed by actor Richard Barthelmess, director Henry King and executive Charles Duell, The White Sister was shot in Italy to capture the beauty of the story’s homeland. The film stars Lillian Gish and Ronald Colman.

This edition, touted as being the complete 10-reel version, has likely been transferred from a 16mm reduction print.

This Region 0 NTSC DVD-R is available directly from Grapevine Video.

This edition of The White Sister from Sunrise Silents reveals a faster-than-natural-speed windowboxed video transfer from a very-good 16mm reduction print. However, the source print is cropped more so on the left side than elsewhere. Image details are soft, the print is contrasty, with plugged-up shadows and featureless highlights, and there are small exposure fluctuations throughout. While the intertitles are readable, some facial features are hard to discern.

The disc features musical accompaniment performed on a MIDI-based synthesizer.

Also on this disc is Charles Chaplin’s second film, transferred from a good 16mm reduction print, a Krazy Kat cartoon, transferred from a very-good 16mm reduction print, a glass-slide gallery (25 images), the fifth episode of the serial Mystery of the Double Cross (1917), transferred from a good 16mm reduction print, a Lillian Gish photo gallery (32 images), and a trailer for What Price Glory (1926), transferred from a good 16mm reduction print.

We were happy to trash our old hard-to-watch VHS edition of The White Sister for this new DVD-R edition, but we look forward to the day the best surviving materials of this film are transferred in HD at a natural speed to allow this spectacular production its due.

This Region 0 NTSC or PAL DVD-R is available directly from Sunrise Silents.

Other silent era LILLIAN GISH films available on DVD home video.

Other silent era RONALD COLMAN films available on DVD home video.