The Man from Beyond (1922)

User Rating:

6.4/10   

Director:

Burton L. King

Writers:

Harry Houdini (story)
Coolidge Streeter (adaptation)

Release Date:

2 April 1922 (USA)

Genre:

Mystery

Plot:

A man who has been frozen in the Arctic ice for 100 years returns to civilization to find his lost love. |

Plot Keywords:

Reincarnation

Cast

Harry Houdini	...	Howard Hillary / The Man From Beyond
Arthur Maude	...	Dr. Gilbert Trent
Albert Tavernier	...	Dr. Crawford Strange
Erwin Connelly	...	Dr. Gregory Sinclair
Frank Montgomery	...	François Duval
Luis Alberni	...	Captain of the Barkentine
Yale Benner	...	Milt Norcross
Jane Connelly	...	Felice Strange / Felice Norcross
Nita Naldi	...	Marie Le Grande

Directed by
Burton L. King

Writing credits
Harry Houdini		(story)
Coolidge Streeter		(adaptation)

Produced by
Harry Houdini	....	executive producer

Cinematography by
Louis Dunmyre
Harry Fischbeck		(as Harry A. Fischbeck)
L.D. Littlefield
Alexander G. Penrod
Irving B. Ruby
Frank Zucker

Stunts
Bob Rose	....	stunt double: Harry Houdini (uncredited)

Production Companies

• Houdini Picture Corporation

Distributors

• Houdini Picture Corporation (1922) (USA) (theatrical)
• Alpha Video Distributors (2006) (USA) (DVD)
• Grapevine Video (????) (USA) (VHS)
• Videobrary (????) (USA) (VHS)

Runtime:

74 min

Country:

USA

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Sound Mix:

Silent

Filming Locations:

Fort Lee, New Jersey, USA

Company:

Houdini Picture Corporation

Movie Connections:

Edited into Days of Thrills and Laughter (1961)

Houdini's mysticism holds true.

Written by the master escape technician, Harry Houdini, THE MAN FROM BEYOND is a fantasy of one who lived before, and is also produced and stars Houdini, who portrays Howard Hillary, an Arctic explorer who is revived after being encased within ice for 100 years aboard a ghost ship, and who then must deal with a vastly changed world. This is the first effort released by Houdini Picture Corporation, and is filmed in large part at and about Lake Placid in New York, and Niagara Falls to the brink of which the stalwart Hillary is whirled in his efforts to save his lady love, Felice (Jane Connelly), from apparently certain death by drowning and, previously, from designs of immoral blackguards. The plot is quite melodramatic, as Felice, in Hillary's eyes, was his fiancee aboard the Arctic vessel wherein he was trapped by a storm following a losing battle with the ship's captain, and he must, in 1922, convince her that she was his beloved in an earlier manifestation a century of years before, and thereby wrest her from her current beau, who has designs upon her fortune, and the latter's partner in crime, Marie La Grande (Nita Naldi in a brief appearance). Houdini, who utilized the sobriquet Man From Beyond, was enthralled by the possibility of linkage between the material world and a spiritual domain (although he detested spiritualists), and his script conveys his philosophy rather didactically as based upon his extensive study of the arcane.