Vengeance du ciné-opérateur

The Cameraman's Revenge is an unusual short not because of the subject matter (adultery) or because it's animated (Winsor McCay had introduced Little Nemo on film by this time) but because it depicts bugs to tell the story! Ladislaw Starewicz had originally wanted to film actual bugs fighting but couldn't get them to do it on camera because of the hot lights they suffered through so he took dead ones and started using stop-motion techniques to manipulate movements to his satisfaction. This short does a good job of putting human characteristics on little creatures such as riding motorcycles, painting, filming, kissing, and dancing. Starewicz would also make Frogland (1922) and The Mascot (1933) but his first notable work would be this one. If you're interested in this and the other shorts mentioned, check your local library to borrow the DVD The Cameraman't Revenge and Other Fantastic Tales from Image Entertainment.

In this 1912 film, the main characters are insects (except for a vaudeville frog). Using, I assume, stop-action animation, we are told the story of two beetles who have a turbulent marriage. Mr. Beetle goes off to a nightclub where he cavorts with a beautiful dragonfly. In the process, he anger a grasshopper who is a filmmaker. The guy gets upset and films Mr. Beetle's dalliance. Mrs. Beetle also has an affair with an artist bug who comes to her house and is discovered by the cheating husband. There is indeed revenge. Had the story been told with regular actors, it would not have been much. What was done with early century technology is striking.

Władysław Starewicz's best known short is "Mest' kinematograficheskogo operatora" ("The Cameraman's Revenge" in English). The plot involves an extramarital affair, but the story gets told using insects! It goes to show that animation doesn't have to be "cute". Some of those cartoons from animation's infancy were outright surreal. More importantly, these shorts are more interesting than these animated features starring the celebrity of the moment. A trick that this one uses is the title of the movie getting shown in the theater (Russian-speakers will recognize it).

A nice little short. Check it out.

For animation buffs it's a must, but you don't have to be a specialist to enjoy The Cameraman's Revenge, a very early example of 'pixilation' by the hard-working pioneer Wladyslaw Starewicz. Starewicz and his helpers painstakingly manipulated a cast of flexible insect figures to tell this story, paving the way for the likes of Willis O'Brien, George Pal, Ray Harryhausen, and legions of modern digital effect creators.

The Cameraman's Revenge is only about 10 minutes long, but offers lots of amusing detail as the story follows the amorous adventures of two beetles from their home to a nightclub, a hotel, a cinema, and, eventually, a prison cell. There are two brief dance numbers at the nightclub performed by a frog and a dragonfly, a scuffle between a beetle and a grasshopper, and, for the finale, a large-scale donnybrook at the cinema, which ends with the projector bursting into flames. Pretty elaborate goings-on for 1912, when even John Bray and Winsor MacCay were just getting started, and Walt Disney was still in grade school!

This film, which is silent of course, also provides an interesting example of the impact title cards can have on the story being told. I've seen two versions of this film offered by two video companies, and watched them back-to-back, and although the image content itself is almost identical the title cards tell two very different stories. (And the plot outline someone provided on this film's IMDb page tells a third version of the tale, which suggests that there's another version out there somewhere.) The British Film Institute's print, which has rhyming title cards, tells the story of two sibling beetles, each secretly married, who hide this information from one another in order to inherit their late father's fortune. The Russian version tells a simpler story of a pair of beetles married to each other who are both guilty of infidelity. In the Russian version Mr. Beetle visits his girlfriend at the "Gay Dragonfly" nightclub, while in the English version brother Bill Beetle visits his wife at the music-hall. Personally, I prefer the straightforward-- and spicier --Russian story; the BFI version tries to cram too much plot into what should be a simple tale, and some of the rhymes are a bit awkward.

In any case The Cameraman's Revenge is a delightful and imagination film in whatever version you happen to find, and it would make an ideal lead-in to that other great animated work featuring beetles, Yellow Submarine.

The impressive animation alone would make this more than worthwhile, and the amusing story alone would make entertaining viewing for any fan of silent comedies. The two together make "The Cameraman's Revenge" a delightful classic that looks much better than practically anything made by the computerized studios of the present time.

The story itself is similar to many other short features of its era - 'Fatty' Arbuckle and other comics of the era made numerous entertaining movies with similar ideas. But having Mr. and Mrs. Beetle, instead of live actors, getting involved in the slapstick escapades with their various insect paramours and rivals makes it funnier and zanier. It works wonderfully well, because the animation is so detailed and painstaking. You can watch it several times and still appreciate the little details. Not only that, the puppet insects are made to act in very 'human' ways, while retaining the accurate form of real insects. It's an amazing and enjoyable combination.

Given how increasingly popular that animation has become, it seems surprising that this and Starewicz's other gems are not much better known and appreciated. This is one of his very best, and is well worth taking the time to see.