The Kennington Bioscope is a regular cinema event featuring live accompaniment to silent films that takes place at the Cinema Museum.

Au bonheur des dames (France 1930), directed by Julien Duvivier with Dita Parlo, Armand Bour, Pierre de Guingand, Germain Rouer.

Soaring camerawork, luminous decor, and stylish montage sequences make Au bonheur des dames (Ladies’ Paradise) appear strikingly modern, yet it can be seen as an elegy to silent filmmaking. Directed by Julien Duvivier, the film was shot in the autumn of 1929, just as the first French sound films were being released. Adapted from an Émile Zola novel, the film describes the fate of a family tailor shop that is driven out of business when a gigantic department store opens across the street. Dita Parlo, a German actress who later appeared in Jean Vigo’s L’Atalante (1934) and Jean Renoir’s The Grand Illusion (1937), plays a wide-eyed innocent from the country who is lured away from her uncle’s small shop by the richness of the department store. Laura Horak – San Francisco Silent Film Festival

Live piano accompaniment.

Silent film with intertitles which may be suitable for the deaf and hard of hearing.

Tickets & Pricing

£8. Seats are limited, so please arrive early or request an invitation using the email kenbioscope@gmail.com.