Unseen Treasures from The George Eastman House 2012: Beggars of Life (1928)

Louise Brooks’ penetrating charisma and transcendent naturalness made her an icon of 1920s silent cinema.  In director William Wellman’s early Depression-era portrait of transient life, she gave one of her absolute strongest performances during her brief stint in the Hollywood, playing a girl who must go on the run after killing her abusive stepfather in self-defense. Fleeing, she meets the handsome drifter Richard Arlen and the two hit the road, one step ahead of the law and soon encounter Oklahoma Red (Wallace Beery), a tough, high-spirited hobo. Together they ride the rails, with Brooks dressed as a boy, through a hobo underworld where danger is always close at hand. This empathetic, darkly realistic drama is loaded with stunning visuals and is one of the great late silent-era features.  The Warhol Museum continues its partnership with the world-renowned photograph and motion picture archives, George Eastman House, to bring rarely shown silent and early sound masterpieces from its extensive collection exclusively to Pittsburgh.