Santa Claus

Santa Claus (1898)

*** (out of 4)

This early British film is one of the first to show Santa Claus. The film is pretty simple as a couple kids want to stay up to see Santa but their mom makes them go to bed. We then see how Santa gets into their room without waking them up. This film runs 75-seconds so naturally one shouldn't expect a full story but it's interesting to note that they were at least trying to tell something and this is a full five years before THE GREAT TRAIN ROBBERY. What's interesting when viewing this film today is the look of Santa as they have him a lot thinner than we are use to see and he's also wearing more of a robe than an actual suit. The special effects used in the film are certainly primitive if you compare them to the stuff of today but for 1898 they're actually pretty good. I thought the effect of the mother turning the light off was something incredibly simple but the visual of it was terrific.

George Albert Smith was one of early cinema's most important pioneers; he was, perhaps, even more innovative than his more acclaimed contemporaries, namely, Edwin Porter and Georges Méliès. He is surely less popular because he didn't create as elaborate of story films, but he did pioneer many narrative techniques and opened up new possibilities for the art form. In 1898, the year of this picture, fiction films were still in their infancy. "Santa Claus" involves a one-minute, single-scene story of Santa Claus visiting two children as they sleep. Yet, this was the normal length and narrative simplicity of early fiction films, and Smith's presentation of this story was innovative.

One point of interest of this film is the appearance of Santa Claus, although he had already appeared in previous films. Additionally, seasonally-timed releases began early in film history, and Smith having made this film in September (see "The Beginning of the Cinema in England" by John Barnes) would have allowed exhibitors time to purchase it for the Christmas season. By the end of the 19th Century, Christmas had essentially become the holiday that we know today, including some of the commercialism. American cartoonist Thomas Nast had already transformed the image of Santa Claus. In England, however, this film has a rather thin Santa with a loose robe. Nevertheless, he's readily recognized, and the story follows Santa entering a home through the chimney and delivering presents to children as they sleep.

Another interesting aspect of this film is it's the earliest one I've seen or heard of which includes its title within the film--lettered at the beginning, as is the case with most movies since. In the beginning, films didn't include their own titles within the picture, but catalogues would list the titles of the films and exhibitors would often either create their own title card slides or have a lecturer inform audiences verbally of the titles of films. Later, in such films as "The House That Jack Built" (1900) and "Dorothy's Dream" (1903), Smith pioneered the use of intertitles.

Most interesting, however, is Smith's use of then novel trick effects to present the film's narrative. Smith stopped the camera to cover the set in black drapes to represent darkness after the nurse turns off the lights for the children to sleep. Although it's obvious today that drapes cover the stage, it was a creative effect then, especially since the black background was needed for the following multiple exposure photography, which is the film's most brilliant aspect.

Somewhere from around July to October of 1898, Smith made at least six films that employed the multiple exposure, or superimpositions, trick. It's somewhat unclear whether Smith or Georges Méliès introduced this technique to motion pictures. Smith tried to patent the application of it to motion pictures, but that was frivolous since it was already in use in still photography. The earliest film that I know of to use superimpositions is Méliès's "The Cabinet of Mephistopheles" (Le Cebinet de Méphistophélès) (1897), which appears to now be lost. The uncertainty is somewhat moot, however, given that Méliès and Smith are known to have had discussions around the time of these inventions, and both filmmakers were leaders in exploring the possibilities of the art form.

As in Méliès's film, Smith used double exposure for ghostly images, but in others, such as "Santa Claus", he masked the camera lens for a circular vignette of the secondary image within the original scene. Smith seems historically uncontested in having introduced masking to cinema. Before entering the business of film production, Smith was a magic lantern lecturer, and the vignette scene-within-a-scene images on magic lantern slides were surely his inspiration for these films. In addition to "Santa Claus", Smith created a scene-within-a-scene as a vision presented by a supernatural being in "The Corsican Brothers", "Cinderella" and 'Faust and Mephistopheles'. "Santa Claus" seems to be the only one of these multiple-exposure experiments from 1898 that still exists today (outside of a few stills). Additionally, the "vision" in "Santa Claus" is somewhat different from those described in his other films.

The film allows for some interpretation of its vision, too. On one hand, the trick allows for the presentation of parallel action without crosscutting between shots, which probably makes this the earliest instance in film history of showing two simultaneous actions of differing locations (the children in bed and Santa Claus on the rooftop). In later films, such as Méliès's "Le Voyage dans la lune" (1902) and Porter's films "Life of an American Fireman" and "The Great Train Robbery" (both 1903), filmmakers used temporal repetition to present parallel action, or to show events from different perspectives. The earliest instances of crosscutting between shots that I've heard of began with Vitagraph and Pathé productions around 1906.

On the other hand, the vision and Santa Claus may be the children's dream. The catalogue description provided by Barnes supports this interpretation, as it describes the effect as a "dream-vision". Additionally, Santa Claus doesn't appear until the children appear asleep. This is, again, probably a first in film history. Porter used the same technique in "Life of an American Fireman", and other filmmakers soon used the multiple-exposure technique, if not a similar circular mask, for dreams and other visions. The earliest matte shots, such as in "The Great Train Robbery", too, I believe, used masking.

I prefer to consider the vision both a dream and an instance of parallel action, and it's certainly an instance of parallel action whether or not it's a dream. Both of these elements would introduce new dimensions to cinema. Shortly after this film, Smith introduced the representation of dreams in separate scenes in "Le Me Dream Again" (1900). He was a remarkable filmmaker.

This interesting look at a vision of Santa Claus from the late nineteenth century is notable for a number of reasons. First is obviously its age. I think it's the first piece of movie-making from the nineteenth century that I've ever seen, and the quality and clarity was quite surprising, given that age. There's some decent enough use of special effects (extremely primitive by today's standards, but surprisingly effective when placed in their historical context.) The image of Santa Claus gives us a bit of a picture of how the jolly old man has evolved over the years. In this vignette, he has the traditional white beard but his clothing appears to be more of a robe than a suit, and he's very thin compared to the image of Santa we have today. In a little over a minute, filmmaker G.A. Smith was able to tell us the story of a Christmas Eve when two young children are put to bed. It seems to me that the first appearance of Santa is meant to be a dream that the children are having, as Santa appears hovering over them in the corner of the screen. As the children dream of Santa, he then comes through the darkness and into their bedroom to leave them with candy. It's really a delightful little film, fascinating from a historical point of view. I find it difficult to rate, because I really have nothing to compare it to from that era, but I'd say somewhere around 8/10 seems right.

When you look at films from before the 20th century or so, you need to keep them in context to properly enjoy them. First, most all films of the time were less than two minutes long (like this one). Second, a traditional style narrative was unusual...often the films just shows snippets of everyday events. But in "Santa Claus", the filmmakers have done something different...they have a fictionalized story AND it's pretty charming...albeit short.

The story begins with a servant putting two kids to bed. Soon, Santa arrives and he's holding a small Christmas tree. He enters the kids' room, deposits small toys in their stockings and simply disappears.

In 1898, Santa was not the ever-present symbol he later became and Santa's look wasn't so codified. This one looks a bit more like Father Christmas but nevertheless, you will recognize him and what is happening. Rather sweet and charming despite its brevity.

Santa brings a pack of goodies to the little kiddos and all are delighted in the holiday of the year. Admirable special effects for the time and the sheer vintage quality of the film offer undeniable appeal in this minute-sized glimpse from the distant past.

Merry Christmas to all. :-)