L'astronome indiscret

Plot

An elderly gentleman in a silk hat sits on a stool in front of a store on the main street of town. He has a telescope that he focuses on the ankle of a young woman who is a short distance away. Her husband catches the gent looking. What will the two men now do?

Cast

I can confidently say I'm not familiar with those involved.

Verdict

As Seen Through a Telescope is a cheeky little tale but as a form of entertainment in this day and age it's fleeting momentary view time and content serves only as a novelty or perhaps for educational purposes.

At its time, ground breaking. Now it's like a Tik Tok video, just more grainy and considerably less obnoxious. There's minimal entertainment value, just a glimpse to a simpler time and a moment of whimsy.

Rants

Tik-Tok, as a middle aged man let me be clear I've never had a Tik-Tok account and never intend to. I've never however understood the controversy, is there a lot of foolishness present? Yes, but there is literally anywhere that people are able to upload content. I just find it sad that people have such little attention span these days that this has become a mainstream standard form of entertainment.

The Good

Revolutionary Charming

The Bad

Fleeting Serves little entertainment value.

The guy in the top hat, sits on a little chair and looks at things through a telescope, circa 1900. He spots the ankle of a woman as she is assisted by a man. He does not move from the shot. This is an early, simple example of a camera technique. We see most of the film through the lens of the telescope.

This early Smith film is a later experiment of the POV shots and masking that he was experimenting with in his movies. Though made the same year as "Grandma's Reading Glass" this is actually technically better than that film, having an actual story to tell; in the other film, Smith was more just having fun filming POVs without really trying to incorporate any sort of plot. Thus, this can be seen as a more important short in that respect.

A man with a telescope is outside of a shop, looking around at different things with his instrument. He spots a scene happening on the other side of the road and uses his telescope to spy on a man tying a woman's shoe, and glimpses the woman's leg!!!!!!!!!! Whoa, don't look! Woman's showing her leg!!!! AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH! is the reaction it probably got at the time, though it seems pretty harmless now. Not especially great but important and still somewhat entertaining today.

As Seen Through a Telescope (1900)

*** (out of 4)

An old man is looking around with his telescope and notices a woman's ankle. He keeps looking at it and thinks he's gotten away until her husband walks up to him. AS SEEN THROUGH A TELESCOPE isn't a masterpiece but it's a fairly fun film that clocks in just under a minute. While there's nothing ground-breaking here there is one big laugh that makes the film worth sitting through. This comes from the same director of GRANDMA'S READING GLASSES but the effect here is put to much better use.

This light-hearted short feature is fairly good both in concept and in execution. The story is simple but not trivial, and it has a rather detached perspective on events that provide some interesting insights into the perspectives of the film-makers. It is also reasonably resourceful in the way that it films the story.

Movies that dealt with voyeurism and similar themes are relatively common in the earliest years of cinema. Some of the early film-makers must have appreciated at once the implications of what they were doing, and the ironies that were often involved in making motion pictures that tell private stories to unknown audiences.

This one verges on becoming a morality play, but its dénouement is too buoyant to make it only that. It's also helped considerably by the on-screen performers, who act pretty naturally, without any really exaggerated gestures or theatrics. It comes across as though simply presenting the characters for what they are, rather than forcing judgments on the audience.

The technical side is also good. The "telescope" effect is believable, and as simple as the story is, the way that it is edited together works well. There are some physical defects in the print, but otherwise it all looks pretty good.