As the Earth Turns (1938 film)

As the Earth Turns is a 1938 American science-fiction silent film directed by Richard Lyford. Lyford was 20 years old when he directed As the Earth Turns and the film is one of many avant-garde films that he made in Seattle, Washington, before finding success with Walt Disney in the 1940s.[1] He portrays a central character in the film, Pax, "who attempts to persuade the world to put down its weapons by inducing extreme climate change".[2]

Like most of Lyford's early films, it was presumed lost until it was discovered in his former Seattle home over 80 years later.[3] KING-TV reported that the film may have never left Lyford's basement, which he would use as an auditorium to show his films.[4] After the rediscovery, Lyford's family asked Seattle composer Ed Hartman to create a score for the film.[4] LA Weekly wrote that by October 2019, the rediscovered film "played at over 100 film festivals worldwide and garnered many awards along the way".[1]