Abel Gance: The Charm of Dynamite

A documentary about cinematic relics that itself has become outdated, when Kevin Brownlow made this TV program on silent-era French filmmaker Abel Gance, he was closer in time to the three films of Gance's covered here--"J'Accuse!" (1919), "La Roue" (1923) and "Napoléon" (1927)--than we are today, in 2021, to this 1968 production. Heck, almost a century on, we're nearly as far removed now from Gance's "Napoléon" as Gance and his film were from the actual Napoleon Bonaparte. Fortunately, too, film preservationists and scholars like Brownlow have expanded our understanding of silent cinema and restored more extant prints of those three Gance pictures since 1968. Justly assuming viewers wouldn't have access to these films at the time, fairly lengthy plot summaries and clips are shown, although especially in the case of "J'Accuse!," it seems as though they didn't even have enough material at the time to go into much detail on that production (fortunately, as with the other two, this has since changed with quality reconstructions available on home video and, perhaps, even longer versions of the other two to come.)

Just as inspiration for Brownlow's subsequent efforts, after first being transfixed as a teenager watching a 9.5mm two-reel cut, in restoring "Napoléon" to over five-and-a-half-hours length, "Abel Gance: The Charm of Dynamite" was worthwhile, as well for his further efforts in documenting silent cinema in books, such as "The Parades Gone By" written the same year as this program, and documentaries, including the incredibly more-thorough "Hollywood" (1980) and "Cinema Europe: The Other Hollywood' (1995). An entire field devoted to research on silent films has become established since and which barely existed when Brownlow initially set out to document and preserve this heritage. In 1968, however, they weren't even quite sure what the proper speed should be for silent films, and even though it's pointed out here that Gance's films should be played at a slower rate, they're nonetheless shown sped-up here at the sound-film pace of 24 frames per second--a habit that for generations promoted an impression of silent cinema being overly archaic or ridiculous.

Interviews of Gance as well as of Napoleon himself, Albert Dieudonné, are also worth watching. Best of all, though, may be the footage of the production of "Napoléon," Gance being ahead of his time in all sorts of manner, had the filming of his film filmed itself. What today has become a common making-of-documentary subject for home-video extras and promotion materials. Of particular interest in this case are some of the production's extraordinary camera setups, including a camera harnessed to a cameraman, various dolly and hanging-camera shots, and the vertical stack of three cameras to capture the "Polyvision" triptych climax. Even more behind-the-scenes footage may be seen in the subsequent documentary "Abel Gance and His Napoléon" (1984) by Nelly Kaplan.

I just saw this 1968 documentary on Turner Classic Movies. While I learned some interesting things about this director as well as the way he made films, I was surprised how poor the overall production was. On the plus side, showing film of Gance and his cameramen shooting some actual scenes was amazing--particularly when they discussed his amazing innovations. However, on the negative side, there was the very dull narration (both the voice and script), the film seemed to lack depth and told us practically nothing about Gance himself, and finally because it was so incomplete a record of Gance's films. It was all just so superficial and dull and inadequate. Some of the incompleteness is not the fault of the documentarians, but they mention several "lost films" of Gance's that were shown immediately after the documentary on TCM--and fully restored. This recent restoration begs the question "why doesn't TCM now make a documentary given that they now have better and more complete film stock?".

My advice--you'd do better to do an internet search on Gance or find a book about him. This film just doesn't do much to inspire, enlighten or entertain.

While agreeing by and large with the other reviewers about the poor quality of the documentary, it is nevertheless an astonishing testimony to how greatly our knowledge and understanding of silent film has increased since 1968.

This after all was made by THE Kevin Brownlow, the man responsible for the successive meticulous reconstructions of Gance's Napoléon (and I can well remember the sensation that caused by the first 1980s version) and also the man who in more recent times has provided superb documentaries. Hollywood: A Celebration of the American Silent Film (1980) which still does not entirely escape the existing US mythology on the subject but makes some remarkable steps in the right direction as well as providing invaluable interviews with a galaxy of silent heroes who nearly all, rather spookily, died within a few years of the film (almost as though they had solely remained alive and, for the most part, on remarkable form, in order to make that film). Then (Brownlow's crowning glory) Cinema Europe: The Other Hollywood (1995) where finally we really begin have a full picture of the achievement of the silent era. And finally an honorary Oscar in 2010 "for the wise and devoted chronicling of the cinematic parade" whatever on earth that may mean. Cinematic parade??!!!?

There are of course some good things here (essentially the interviews with Gance and Dieudonné and the archive footage all of which it would be good to see in better quality) but it is almost comical to see how it was then necessary to explain everything and yet say so little about films that are now universally regarded as great classics of the cinema. It is hard now to conceive that in 1968 virtually no one had seen any of these films.

So, if one begins with Commencini's La valigia dei sogni (1953), the sad, sad story of a man who spends his time trying to save silent films (fragment by fragment) from the shredder and a film way,w ay ahead of its time in appreciating the value and importance of the then fast disappearing heritage. Then this cranky little documentary of 1968 where Brownlow seems not yet even to understand the importance of showing silent films at the correct speed. Then the incredibly belated academic awakening in the 1980s (with noble exceptions of course).....and one begins to appreciate what an extraordinary revolution has occurred.

There is an extremely good account of the making of Napoléon, Nelly Kaplan's 1983 documentary Abel Gance et son Napoléon.

Abel Gance: The Charm of Dynamite (1968)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Mildly interesting documentary about the career of director Abel Gance. The documentary shines a spotlight on three of the director's biggest films: J'Accuse, La Roue and Napoleon. For its time I guess this film isn't too bad but considering some of the documentaries out there now I must say that this one was pretty disappointing. These films of Gance's were hard to see when this film was made so there are countless clips of all three films shown and sometimes these clips go on for minutes at a time. The problem with this is that we get to hear very little from Gance himself who is being interviewed throughout the film. I'd much rather hear from the director on how he created these films instead of just seeing the film clips. Of course, seeing these clips were harder to see back in the day so perhaps I'm being too hard on this film.