1927 in film

Years in film
1870s
1880s
1890s
1890 • 1891 • 1892 • 1893 • 1894 1895 • 1896 • 1897 • 1898 • 1899
1900s
1900 • 1901 • 1902 • 1903 • 1904 1905 • 1906 • 1907 • 1908 • 1909
1910s
1910 • 1911 • 1912 • 1913 • 1914 1915 • 1916 • 1917 • 1918 • 1919
1920s
1920 • 1921 • 1922 • 1923 • 1924 1925 • 1926 • 1927 • 1928 • 1929
1930s
1930 • 1931 • 1932 • 1933 • 1934 1935 • 1936 • 1937 • 1938 • 1939
1940s
1940 • 1941 • 1942 • 1943 • 1944 1945 • 1946 • 1947 • 1948 • 1949
1950s
1950 • 1951 • 1952 • 1953 • 1954 1955 • 1956 • 1957 • 1958 • 1959
1960s
1960 • 1961 • 1962 • 1963 • 1964 1965 • 1966 • 1967 • 1968 • 1969
1970s
1970 • 1971 • 1972 • 1973 • 1974 1975 • 1976 • 1977 • 1978 • 1979
1980s
1980 • 1981 • 1982 • 1983 • 1984 1985 • 1986 • 1987 • 1988 • 1989
1990s
1990 • 1991 • 1992 • 1993 • 1994 1995 • 1996 • 1997 • 1998 • 1999
2000s
2000 • 2001 • 2002 • 2003 • 2004 2005 • 2006 • 2007 • 2008 • 2009
2010s
2010 • 2011 • 2012 2013 and beyond

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Events

• January 10 - Fritz Lang's science-fiction fantasy Metropolis premieres in Germany.
• April 7 - Abel Gance's Napoleon often considered his best known and greatest masterpiece, premiers (in a shortened version) at the Paris Opéra and would demonstrate techniques and equipment that would not be used for years to come, such as hand-held cameras, and what is often considered the first widescreen projection format Polyvision. It would be more than three decades before films with a widescreen format would again be attempted.
• April 12 - The Marx Brothers' Zeppo Marx marries Marion Benda.
• May 11 - The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences was founded in Los Angeles, California by Douglas Fairbanks. The 1st Academy Awards (Oscars) went on to films, which are released in 1927 or 1928.
• August 12 - Paramount's dramatic film Wings, which would go on to win the first Academy Award for Best Picture, opens at the Criterion Theater in New York City, with an unheard-of roadshow admission price of $2.00 per ticket.
• September 7 - Oswald the Lucky Rabbit debuts in Trolley Troubles.
• September 23 - FOX Films acquires the rights to the Tri-Ergon sound-on-film technology, which had been developed in 1919 by three German inventors, Josef Engl, Hans Vogt, and Joseph Massole.
• October 6 - The Jazz Singer, (starring Al Jolson), premieres at the Warner Theater in New York City. Although not the first 'talkie', The Jazz Singer becomes the first box-office hit and popularizes sound motion pictures. It was the highest-grossing movie of all-time.
• Italian Alberto Rabagliati wins a Rudolph Valentino look-alike contest and moves to Hollywood to start his acting career.

Top grossing films

Academy Awards

• Best Production: Wings
• Best Artistic Quality: Sunrise
• Best Actor: Emil Jannings for The Way of All Flesh and the 1928 movie The Last Command
• Best Actress: Janet Gaynor for Seventh Heaven and Sunrise, as well as the 1928 movie Street Angel
• Best Director: Frank Borzage for Seventh Heaven

Films released in 1927

U.S.A. unless stated

• Annie Laurie, starring Lillian Gish
• Bed and Sofa (Tretya meshchanskaya) - (U.S.S.R.)
• The Beloved Rogue starring John Barrymore, Marceline Day
• Berlin: Symphony of a Great City (documentary) - (Germany)
• Blighty, directed by Adrian Brunel and starring Ellaline Terriss and Lillian Hall-Davis - (Britain)
• The Cat and the Canary
• Chicago
• Children of Divorce, starring Clara Bow, Gary Cooper and Esther Ralston
• The Chinese Parrot
• College, starring Buster Keaton
• Confetti, directed by Graham Cutts and starring Jack Buchanan and Annette Benson - (Britain)
• The Dove, starring Norma Talmadge, Gilbert Roland and Noah Beery
• Downhill, directed by Alfred Hitchcock, starring Ivor Novello and Isabel Jeans - (Britain)
• The Drop Kick
• Education of a Prince - (France)
• The End of St. Petersburg (Konets Sankt-Peterburga) - (U.S.S.R.)
• The First Auto, starring Barney Oldfield, Patsy Ruth Miller, Charles Emmett Mack, Russell Simpson, and Gibson Gowland
• The Gaucho
• Her Wild Oat, starring Colleen Moore
• His First Flame, starring Harry Langdon
• The Honorable Mr. Buggs
• Hula, starring Clara Bow
• Husband Hunters, starring Mae Busch, Jean Arthur and Mildred Harris
• Huntingtower, by George Pearson, starring Harry Lauder - (Britain)
• It, starring Clara Bow
• The Jazz Singer, starring Al Jolson and May McAvoy
• The Kid Brother, a comedy starring Harold Lloyd
• The King of Kings, directed by Cecil B. DeMille, starring H. B. Warner, Dorothy Cumming and Joseph Schildkraut
• The Lady in Ermine starring Corinne Griffith
• The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog, directed by Alfred Hitchcock, starring June and Ivor Novello - (Britain)
• London After Midnight, directed by Tod Browning, starring Lon Chaney, Sr., Conrad Nagel and Marceline Day
• Long Pants, directed by Frank Capra, starring Harry Langdon
• The Love of Jeanne Ney (Die Liebe der Jeanne Ney), directed by G.W. Pabst - (Germany)
• The Love of Sunya, starring Gloria Swanson
• The Loves of Carmen, directed by Raoul Walsh
• Metropolis, directed by Fritz Lang, starring Alfred Abel - (Germany)
• Mockery, starring Lon Chaney
• The Mountain Eagle, directed by Alfred Hitchcock, starring Nita Naldi - (Britain)
• My Best Girl, starring Mary Pickford and Buddy Rogers
• Napoléon directed by Abel Gance, starring Albert Dieudonne - (France)
• October: Ten Days That Shook the World - (U.S.S.R.)
• The Only Way directed by Herbert Wilcox, starring John Martin Harvey and Madge Stuart - (Britain)
• The Patent Leather Kid, starring Richard Barthelmess
• The Private Life of Helen of Troy, directed by Alexander Korda
• Quality Street, directed by Sidney Franklin, starring Marion Davies and Conrad Nagel
• Quinneys, directed by Maurice Elvey and starring John Longden and Alma Taylor - (Britain)
• The Red Mill, directed by William Goodrich (Fatty Arbuckle), starring Marion Davies
• Romance of the Western Chamber - (China)
• The Scar of Shame, a race movie starring Harry Henderson and Lucia Lynn Moses
• Seventh Heaven, directed by Frank Borzage, starring Janet Gaynor and Charles Farrell
• Shooting Stars, directed by Anthony Asquith and A.V. Bramble - (Britain)
• Singed, starring Blanche Sweet and Warner Baxter
• Slide, Kelly, Slide
• Spring Fever, starring Joan Crawford
• The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg, directed by Ernst Lubitsch, starring Ramón Novarro and Norma Shearer
• Sunrise, directed by F.W. Murnau, starring George O'Brien and Janet Gaynor
• Svengali directed by Gennaro Righelli and starring Paul Wegener (Germany)
• Twelve Miles Out, directed by Jack Conway, starring John Gilbert and Joan Crawford
• Underworld
• The Unknown, directed by Tod Browning, starring Lon Chaney Sr., Norman Kerry, and Joan Crawford
• The Way of All Flesh, starring Emil Jannings
• When a Man Loves, an early Vitaphone sound movie starring John Barrymore and Dolores Costello who would become John Barrymore's future wife
• White Gold, directed by William K. Howard and starring Jetta Goudal
• Why Girls Love Sailors
• Wings, directed by William A. Wellman, starring Clara Bow, Charles 'Buddy' Rogers and Richard Arlen

Comedy film series

• Harold Lloyd (1913–1938)
• Buster Keaton (1917–1944)
• Our Gang (1922–1944)
• Harry Langdon (1924–1936)
• Laurel and Hardy (1921–1945)

Animated short film series

• Felix the Cat (1919–1962)
• Aesop's Film Fables (1921–1933)
• Ko-Ko Song Car-Tunes (1924-1927)
• Alice Comedies
  • Alice the Golf Bug
  • Alice Foils the Pirates
  • Alice at the Carnival
  • Alice at the Rodeo
  • Alice the Collegiate
  • Alice in the Alps
  • Alice's Auto Race
  • Alice's Circus Daze
  • Alice's Knaughty Knight
  • Alice's Three Bad Eggs
  • Alice's Picnic
  • Alice's Channel Swim
  • Alice in the Klondike
  • Alice's Medicine Show
  • Alice the Whaler
  • Alice the Beach Nut
  • Alice in the Big League
• Krazy Kat (1925–1940)
• Un-Natural History (1925-1927)
• Pete the Pup (1926-1927)
• Inkwell Imps (1927-1929)
• Oswald the Lucky Rabbit
  • Trolley Troubles
  • Oh Teacher
  • The Mechanical Cow
  • Great Guns!
  • All Wet
  • The Ocean Hop
  • The Banker's Daughter
  • Empty Socks
  • Rickety Gin
• Newslaffs (1927-1928)

Births

• January 17 - Eartha Kitt, actress, singer (died 2008)
• February 7 - Juliette Greco singer, actress
• February 20 - Sidney Poitier, actor
• March 1 - Harry Belafonte actor, singer
• March 20 - Cairbre (also known as Leo), Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's lion mascot, born in Dublin Zoo
• April 13- Maurice Ronet actor, director, writer
• May 13 - Herbert Ross, director (died 2001)
• June 23 - Bob Fosse, director (died 1987)
• July 4 - Gina Lollobrigida, actress
• July 6 - Janet Leigh, actress (died 2004)
• September 16 - Peter Falk, actor (died 2011)
• September 19 - Rosemary Harris, actress
• October 14 - Roger Moore, actor
• October 18 - George C. Scott, film and stage actor (died 1999)
• October 31 - Lee Grant, actress
• November 14 - McLean Stevenson, American actor (died February 15, 1996)
• November 20 - Estelle Parsons, American actress

Deaths

• January 13 - Arnold Daly, stage & film actor (born 1875)
• March 17 - Charles Emmett Mack, actor (born 1900)
• April 25 - Earle Williams, American silent screen actor (born 1880)
• May 7 - Bruce McRae, stage & screen actor (born 1867)
• May 16 - Sam Bernard, stage & screen actor, died aboard SS Columbus Atlantic Ocean (born 1863
• June 3 - Einar Hanson, Swedish actor (born 1897)
• June 4
  • Robert McKim, actor (the villain in Fairbanks' "Mark of Zorro") (born 1886)
  • Julia Hurley, veteran actress, played Mr. Hyde's landlady in Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (born 1848)
• July 26 - June Mathis, screen writer highest paid woman in Hollywood (born 1889)
• September 5 - Marcus Loew, theater chain executive & founder of Loews Theaters (born 1870)
• October 5 - Sam Warner, co-founder of Warner Brothers studios (born 1887)
• October 13 - Hughie Mack, rotund American silent film actor (born 1884)
• November 4 - Valli Valli, stage & film actress (born 1882)
• December 6 - Kate Toncray, character actress (born 1867)
• December 15 - Romaine Fielding, silent film actor and director (born 1868)

Film Debuts

• Robert Armstrong
• Claudette Colbert
• Mickey Rooney
• Barbara Stanwyck
• Lupe Vélez
• Fred Zinneman, director and producer