(1910)
Dir - J. Searle Dawley
Overall: GOOD
Around the turn on the century, Edison Studios made roughly twelve-hundred films. While these represented some of the absolute earliest examples of this then new medium, most were less technically innovative and are more noteworthy for being pioneering works that just so happened to show "the first such and such" ever committed to celluloid. The fourteen-minute, 1910 version of Frankenstein as you could guess was the very first movie adaptation of Mary Shelley's novel that was ever made. Presumed lost as so many works from an early era either were or still are, it has since been restored over the years and is still a significant, historical watch. The monster creation scene is the most memorable as human tissue begins to form around a skeleton that comes to life in a huge cauldron, (the electricity and neck bolts would come later via Universal Studios), and liberties are taken with the source material turning it more into a morality play than a straight horror outing.
(1912)
Dir - Lucius Henderson
Overall: MEH
While it is not the first film adaptation of Robert Lewis Stevenson's Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde ever produced, the 1912 version by the Thanhouse Film Corporation is the earliest existing one. Staring film director and actor James Cruze in the dual title lead and only twelve minutes in length, it is understandably a highly condensed telling of the often filmed Stevenson novel and even the 1887 stage play by Thomas Russell Sullivan. As is the case with nearly all silent movies from this time frame, it is simply a series of shots filmed with a single, non moving camera set up on properly lit stages and locations, none of which emphasis any importance on proper atmosphere befitting the material. Still, the Hyde make up is excellently fiendish and the transformation scenes are elementary, but effective enough. Many more versions would emerge in somewhat quick succession in the coming decades, each one for the most part improving upon what was done here.
(1921)
Dir - Buster Keaton/Edward F. Cline
Overall: MEH
One of the few Buster Keaton movies to tip its prat-falling toes into horror, The Haunted House is essentially another tweak of a bunch of people chasing each other and hiding out in a house where other people wear skeleton costumes and bed sheets over themselves to try to scare people because flimsy reasons. It is not to be taken seriously of course as in fact none of Buster Keaton's films are, but ole Stoneface gets to do his usual falling down, jumping over and through things, getting in the middle of a misunderstanding shtick. As far as being one of the iconic actor's funniest outings, it does not come all that close and as a haunted house movie as the title implies, it barely qualifies. The most memorable gag is a staircase that consistently turns into a slide, most humorously as when Keaton dreams about ascending it to heaven only to be denied entry, then having to plummet all the way down to hell instead.
No comments:
Post a Comment