Faust aux enfers Plot
The German legend of a scholar's unholy pact with the Devil would have been very familiar to most moviegoers (at least European ones), so Georges Méliès' early cinematic treatment likely got away with simply offering a fancifully illustrated late episode without the earlier narrative context (however, spoken narration provides some of the latter in this restored print). Tempted by Mephistopheles with all kinds of dancing and ethereal babes, Faust is at first excited and then terrified by the sight of various demons and monsters. The painted-set designers really went hog wild on this one, depicting the (sometimes sexy) torments of subterranean Hell with in bold terms (even when ballerinas prance in the foreground). (Dennis Harvey, Fandor)
Faust aux enfers Cast
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as Mephistopholes
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Méliès had previously filmed two other adaptations of the Faust legend: Faust and Marguerite (1897) and Damnation of Faust (1898). The 1903 Damnation of Faust was his third version. In 1904, he would make a fourth and last straightforward adaptation, Faust and Marguerite, but his later films The Merry Frolics of Satan (1905) and The Knight of the Snows (1912) are also inspired by the legend.[2] According to Méliès's American catalogue, the direct inspiration for the 1903 version was Hector Berlioz's musical work La damnation de Faust.[3]
Méliès plays Mephistopheles in the film.[2] The dancing masked demons have the same costumes as those in The Infernal Cake Walk, a Méliès film... |
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