Le manoir du diable

I'm not interested in retroactively assigning early films to the horror genre, as others seem to desire by claiming this film, "Le manoir du diable", as some sort of first horror film or to misunderstand the bat transformation to devil character here to be a vampire. Rather, this is another trick film, which Méliès made many of. Mephistopheles is in quite a few of these, of which this is probably the first. Mephistopheles is the director-magician's surrogate, allowing a slight narrative construction around the attraction of substitution-splices (a.k.a. stop substitutions), as the devil terrorizes a lord/cavalier with various appearances, disappearances and substitutions. By the way, I'm quite sure that Méliès plays the Faust-type lord/cavalier character and not Mephistopheles, despite several sources stating otherwise. Thus, Méliès plays the victim to the magic perpetrated by himself as the film's director and editor.

For a film of 1896, this is a rather elaborate fiction subject and production. Most films at this time were actualities of ordinary events, popularized by the Lumiére Company. The only studio had been the "Black Maria" shack, which provided a black background for every production, in addition to the few props the Edison Company occasionally employed. Soon, Méliès would create the first decent movie studio, but for this film, he at least created a makeshift, painted cardboard set in the open air (see the shadows). Nobody else, as of then, had went to such trouble for a movie. Méliès used the same or very similar backdrop and costumes, as well as a related narrative, for "Le Château hanté" (1897). These films were also offered to be hand-colored, which would add to their appeal.

(Note: At this time, most viewers have probably seen this film via the extract available on the Internet, which is taken from the documentary "The Magic of Méliès" (Le magie Méliès) (1997). A more complete version is available on French DVD, which includes the bat transformation at the beginning. According to catalogues, the film originally ended with the devil being bashed into smoke, but this part seems to be lost. It now ends with Méliès holding a cross to corner Mephistopheles.) EDIT: Flicker Alley has now also put this film on DVD in Region 1.

This Georges Melies film is one of the very first films to dip into the horror genre. As was usual for a Melies production it's full of visual trickery and invention, while obviously being stagey and crude due to it's incredibly old age. It certainly must be one of the first films to make reference to vampires with its bat that turns into Satan. The simple narrative involves this character manifesting himself in an old castle and then conjuring up a cauldron, a young woman and old man. A heroic knight appears shortly afterwards and thwarts the villain. Like all of Melies films, this one isn't about story-lines. Cinema back in the earliest years of the medium never was. It actually took a while before it became obvious that the medium would even be any good for telling stories. And it took many years for both audience and film-makers to work out how to do it. So these early films like the Melies ones were mainly a means of showcasing visual trickery, a way of letting people see the impossible. Hence their extremely short running times too. But I always sort of marvel at the ingenuity of those guys from over 100 years ago. Right from the offset they had loads of crazy ideas of how to present images in creative and interesting ways. It's well worth any fan of cinema taking a few short minutes of their time out to watch these ancient films, not only because they are the very first primitive twitches of cinema but also because they are fascinating historical documents in themselves.

I'm sure the appearing and disappearing in this brief film must have been quite entertaining to the viewers in 1896. In a castle are representatives of the devil. Their purpose seems to be to frighten people, like in a Halloween haunted house. They poke people in the back and then disappear when the person spins around. A beautiful woman is transformed into a hag just as a young man approaches her. There are legions of witches and other creatures. Two young men are accosted by these beings. Anyway, at three minutes or so, there is a lot of action and one of the great early masters of film begins to feel his oats. Worth seeing, even if for the visuals.

The very first horror movie was not 1896's Le Manoir Du Diable (The Devil's Castle), in fact, Georges Melies' Un Nuit Terrible that features a giant insect, is his first production in the horror genre, anticipating the creature-on-the-loose plots of the fifties. However, Le Manoir Du Diable is the first film to feature hints of the vampire. Its running time barely three minutes, and made by and starring Melies. Looking at it many years later it seems primitive and crude, but it also displays an imaginative exuberance and joy that makes it one of film history's little treasures.

The Devil played by Melies himself, has a kind of carnival charm. In a castle, a flying bat turns into the Devil. The Devil makes a cauldron magically appear. He also conjures up a beautiful woman, and an old man carrying a book. Satan then makes cauldron, woman, man, and book disappear. A knight shows up carrying a cross. Our villain clearly panicked, there is a puff of smoke and the Devil is gone.

Because of the brazen, Gothic quality of Le Manoir Du Diable, its brief running time is not a limitation. Serious movie lovers should make the extra effort to get real satisfaction. Go to the "Horror Films" and "Classic Horror Films" Web sites. Read books like " The Satanic Screen: An Illustrated Guide to The Devil in Cinema" by Nikolas Schreck and Allan Hunter's "Chambers Concise Encyclopedia of Film and Television." Find odd-man-out wonders like Le Manoir Du Diable and enjoy horror's timeless feast.

There really isn't much you can say about a silent, three minute short from 1896, is there? Must cinema buffs already know that Georges Melies was a cinema pioneer who single-handled devised many of the tropes that are now familiar to us as modern cinema-goers, and THE HOUSE OF THE DEVIL is another example of his skill as a film-maker.

The story sees the Devil at work in his spooky old castle, summoning up various creatures in a bid to commit evil. Unfortunately he falls foul of an upright Christian, who uses the power of the cross to dispel his opponent.

The three minute running time is chock-full of the special effects work that Melies loved to put on screen, particularly the use of jump cuts to make figures appear and disappear at will. With a plethora of imps, spirits, bats, and ghouls, Melies single-handedly invented the horror genre, one which is still going strong all these years later.