The Wonderful Living Fan (French: Le Merveilleux Éventail vivant) is a 1904 French silent trick film by Georges Méliès. It was sold by Méliès's Star Film Company and is numbered 581–584 in its catalogues.[1]
| The Wonderful Living Fan | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Georges Méliès |
| Starring | Georges Méliès |
Production company | |
Release date |
|
| Country | France |
| Language | Silent |
Production
editThe concept for the living fan is derived from a scene in The Sun Prince, a stage spectacle produced in 1899 at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris.[2] Méliès plays the fan maker in the film, which works its tricks using stage machinery, substitution splices, and dissolves.[3] The film's costuming and decor sets the trick in the era of Louis XV.[2]
Survival and reception
editPrints of the film survive in several archives, including a hand-colored print at the Cinémathèque Française.[2] A black-and-white print restored by the film preservationist David Shepard was released on home video in 2008.[4]
In a book on Méliès, film historian John Frazer cited The Wonderful Living Fan as "characteristic of Méliès's best fantasy," comparing the arrangement of women on the fan to "a tableau in a Florenz Ziegfeld musical."[2]
References
edit- ^ Malthête, Jacques; Mannoni, Laurent (2008), L'oeuvre de Georges Méliès, Paris: Éditions de La Martinière, p. 347, ISBN 9782732437323
- ^ a b c d Frazer, John (1979), Artificially Arranged Scenes: The Films of Georges Méliès, Boston: G. K. Hall & Co., p. 142, ISBN 0816183686
- ^ Essai de reconstitution du catalogue français de la Star-Film; suivi d'une analyse catalographique des films de Georges Méliès recensés en France, Bois d'Arcy: Service des archives du film du Centre national de la cinématographie, 1981, p. 195, ISBN 2903053073
- ^ Méliès, Georges (2008), Georges Méliès: First Wizard of Cinema (DVD; short film collection), Los Angeles: Flicker Alley, ISBN 1893967352
External links
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