La chaise à porteur enchantée (1905)

User Rating:

5.6/10   

Director:

Georges Méliès

Genre:

Short | Fantasy

Plot:

A man stands in front of a backdrop painted with a nature scene. From a fan, he conjures a costume, then a woman appears inside it...

Plot Keywords:

Sedan Chair | Magician | Magic Act

Cast

Georges Méliès

Also Known As:

The Enchanted Sedan Chair (USA)

Runtime:

3 min

Country:

France

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Sound Mix:

Silent

After seeing about three dozen of his films, this is the worst Méliès film I have seen

This short silent film is part of the DVD collection entitled "The Magic of Méliès" and is the fourth volume of THE MOVIES BEGIN series from Kino Video. Unlike copies of Méliès' films that are posted on the internet, the prints for these short films are exceptionally crisp and clean and feature wonderful musical scores. Oddly, though, is that aside from a few films such as THE BLACK IMP and THE IMPOSSIBLE VOYAGE, most of the shorts chosen for this DVD are actually not among the best of Méliès' films--having a strong tendency to show is "stagy" material as opposed to the films that have elaborate sets and plots. In particular, my favorites such as BARBE-BLEUE and LE VOYAGE DANS LE LUNE (his most famous film) are not on this DVD.

This silent short, like too many on the DVD, is just a stage magician's act that has been given a few less than inspiring camera tricks. In fact, of all these types of films I have seen from Méliès, this is the dullest and least inspired. It's too bad, as people watching this DVD might think Méliès was a "hack", but he made many fantastic films that never even got included (why, I have no idea).