Louis Feuillade | Fantômas | Les Vampires | Judex
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Louis Feuillade was a prolific director of French silent films. Feuillade worked in many genres, including comedy and realistic dramas. but today he is most admired for his spectacular serials. These often pitted master criminals against great detectives. Feuillade's work is of very high quality, and is still gripping and entertaining today.
A detailed discussion of Feuillade's staging technique, can be found in David Bordwell's book, Figures Traced in Light (2005).
The article on Edwin S. Porter also explores points of similarity between Porter and Feuillade.
Feuillade followed the traditions of earlier filmmakers. The comedy short La Course des sergents de ville / The Policemen's Little Run (Ferdinand Zecca, 1906) alternates exteriors shot on Paris streets, with artificial but interesting looking studio sets representing interiors. This is the same ground plan as in Feuillade. The Paris exteriors, with their vast facades, ornate architecture and deserted streets, look almost as eerie in this comedy short as they later will in Feuillade. They seem to be concealing mysterious secrets. They convey a strong atmosphere. Zecca's police climb up some of these buildings, and walk along the roof, just as in later Feuillade. But while Feuillade has his daring villains along real building facades, Zecca cuts to cardboard imitations, in the campy manner of the 1960's Batman TV show. Of course, Zecca is aiming for slapstick comedy, not thrills like Feuillade, and it is hard to tell if he intends these climbs along phony walls to be as silly as they now look, or not.
Juve contre Fantômas (1913). This hour long film is Chapter 2 of Feuillade's serial Fantômas. It deals with the "duel" of wits between master criminal Fantômas, and the policeman Juve who is trying to capture him. The scenes capture the elaborate, often Art Nouveau look of pre World War I France, with overdesigned, fantasy bedrooms, elaborate metal work gates and fences, and people dressed to the max as boulevard dandies and fashionable ladies. Much of this looks dream like, other parts seem expressive of sexual fantasies - and French design of the era on the whole does seem designed to promote sensual gratification. Into this paradise of the upper middle classes come the most outrageously melodramatic plots by Fantômas, including snakes in the bedrooms and armies of sinisterly dressed hoods. The counter plots by Juve often seem equally outré. These scenes evoke bizarre fantasies and unconscious desires.
The scenes in the bedroom recall those of Conan Doyle's "The Adventure of the Speckled Band" (1891). Feuillade brings this to life with a surreal flair.
One can see why the Surrealists were fascinated by Feuillade's work. The still shows a couple about to enter a room through a door. Two men inside, dressed in black, are pressed against the wall on either side of the door. They are waiting to capture the man and woman as soon as they enter the door, and have some sort of hood or net they are ready to throw over their heads. The men are dressed identically in some black satiny material from head to toe, including hoods over their heads, and are clearly part of some army of bad guys. The couple, on the other hand, are dressed for the French boulevards of the era. The man, although in a fashionable suit, looks brave and courageous, and is clearly some sort of hero. The woman is a heroine; her face is in deep shadow from a hat or veil, however. Her appearance recalls Gaston Leroux's mystery novel, Le Parfum de la dame en noir (1909) ("The Perfume of the Woman in Black"); I always thought this was one of the most perfectly titled of all mystery novels.
The room looks empty of furniture or ornament. The couple are about to step from the Normal World, represented by the hall, into the Abnormal World, represented by the room. Melodrama is going to take over their lives completely. If the couple represent normalcy, they do not represent simplicity however. They look like a romantic couple, and look as if they have very complex feelings and desires. Their complex fashionable clothes suggest an elaborate personal history. So does the staircase seen behind them through the door. The small region of the shot seen through the open door, which includes the couple and the diagonal staircase, seems far more complex than the broad, empty expanse of room which they are entering. So do their elaborate clothes contrast with the minimalist, identity concealing uniforms worn by the bad guys. The deep focus of staircase behind the couple suggests a long history in time, a past, in other words; whereas the blank wall behind the two bad guys suggests that they are at year zero, or pastless.
The still also reveals Feuillade's skill with visual composition. It combines rectangular forms with diagonals. Two symmetrical lines extend from a point midway along the top of the frame. One consists of the rail of the staircase, followed by the head and shoulders of the right hand bad guy. The other eventually takes in the crouched left hand villain, and his head and extended right arm. This sort of geometrically organized composition goes back to Titian and other Renaissance painters.
This analysis only begins to hint at the feelings this image stirs up in me. The door is a double door; one half is closed, one half is open, showing the couple, hall and staircase. Each half of the door takes up exactly the same space in the shot, the same size and shape. But one is just blank; the closed door; the other evokes all the complexity that can be revealed when closed doors are opened. I was fascinated by the architecture of buildings as a child, and have often seen complex rooms in my dreams. Feuillade captures this dream like feeling with uncommon skill.
However, the current version has a logically constructed story, one which is easily followed by viewers. It seems in a direct line with many movie crime thrillers since. Its story telling logic reminds one of the numerous crime shows on 1980's American television, for instance. Feuillade's exposition is in fact easier to follow than many 1930's Hollywood whodunits, which were often full of characters that were only briefly introduced.
Feuillade's plot is usually quite linear, with all events being made clear to the viewer, as they happen. Occasionally Feuillade will introduce a mysterious situation or character; but usually, within five or ten minutes, all the mysteries concerning this will be explained completely. This is a narrative strategy that seems identical with most subsequent crime films.
Costumes: Feuillade's favorite costumes appear here. The handsome villain is in full white tie and tails. Plus he is wearing a cloak, like Judex to come. The hero Philippe is dressed like the villain, but not as lushly (he is lacking a cape or top hat). This is the same pattern of costumes we see in Judex and his brother Roger in Judex: two men dressed similarly, but one not as spiffed up as the other.
Meanwhile, both the dancer and the bad guys are in body stockings, Feuillade's other favorite garb. Everything about such clothes is surreal. There are also hoods for the bad guys, and a bat head costume for the dancer. These two form a pair of related-but-different costumes.
The dancer's bat costume is a human impersonating an animal. Animal costumes fascinate many people. There is a dimension of fantasy here, including sexual fantasy. Like the Surrealists to come, Feuillade often explores hidden sexual feelings.
The costume also involves flying. People often experience flying in their dreams.
Architecture: The mirror is the dressing room is at an angle. This gives the effect of a polygonal shaped room: a Feuillade (and later a Fritz Lang) favorite. The mirror also reflects a second mirror, making a complex image. Feuillade's staging sometimes makes it easier to see a character in the mirror, than through a direct view.
The exit to the theater involves two whole rows of doors. This anticipates a bit the corridor in the Vallieres apartment in Judex, which has three doors. The theater has no less than two rows of door exits, one leading from the auditorium into the corridor, the second leading outside. The two rows of doors echo each other. They too form surreal variants. The two rows of doors form rhythmic pulses, one after the other. There are contrasts too: the inner row of doors is well-lit, full of both men and women, and full of innocent bystanders. The row of doors to the street is a night scene, it contains men only, and mainly involves the crook and the hero who pursues him.
Irma Vep winds up re-introducing herself to the Vampires, at their Howling Cat night club. Her dance has her wrapping herself in a black shawl: echoing the batwings used by the ballet dancer in "The Ring That Kills". Like the dancer, she can completely wrap the shawl around her figure.
At the end, she raises her arms, stretching them out. This echoes the triumphant gesture in Fantômas, where the villain spreads his arms and body in an X shape, after demolishing the building. Earlier in Les Vampires, when the two men at the railway yard carry Irma Vep after she's fainted, she also stretches her arms out wide, in a similar vivid gesture.
Even the names of the Four Just Men and Judex have similarities, with "Ju" in common. "Judex" means "judge" in Latin, so the names have a similar invocation of the search for justice.
However, Wallace might be more deeply liberal than Feuillade, at least in these two works. The villain in Wallace is a politician who is refusing to help poor refugees. The victims in Feuillade are middle class people who have been swindled by crooked financiers.
Judex does have a headquarters full of high tech devices. And he uses advanced technology to bring the heroine out of her coma. In this sense, he anticipates Batman, who also was a master of high tech devices. Judex appeared during the 1910's, when interest in scientific detectives was at its peak. Such detectives appeared regularly in British and American prose mystery fiction. The Four Just Men were also expert users of technology.
Judex' striking style of dress, with a cloak and an unusual tunic, also anticipates such pulp heroes as the Shadow. The cape also anticipates all the comic book super-heroes who wore them.
Judex differs from the Shadow, Batman, and other later figures in that he is not a general purpose crime fighter. Instead, he is mainly concerned with avenging the ill deeds of the banker Favraux.
Brother Roger's clothes tend to be like the hero's, but less heightened:
When the banker is bound in a white shroud in Episode One, it echoes the black coverings used by women in Les Vampires. All of these wrap the entire body. The white / black duality echoes the change of male / female and involuntary / voluntary in this scene.
The heroine is associated with Feuillade's trademark "double doors, one open, one closed". She makes her entrance through such a door.
Kerjean is associated with white posts. First, in the cemetery. Then in the strikingly curved white fence he follows along the road.
Episode One: The Mysterious Shadow: When the heroine leaves Les Sablons, she exits the room through the "double door, one door open", and is seen through the glass framework. Soon, she also goes out the grilled gates, with one gate open, the other closed. These scenes where she wanders through the huge deserted estate at dusk are haunting. They have a dream-like quality.
The shot where she is trailed by the shadow of Judex is outstanding.
Episode Three: The Fantastic Dog Pack: The spectacular moving camera shot showing the dogs accompanying Judex's car, echoes an earlier moving camera sequence following a vehicle down a country road in Les Vampires. Such shots seem to allow for large scale camera movement in Feuillade.
In Les Vampires, we had humans dressing in animal costumes (the bat ballet). Here, we have animals that seem to be intelligent, and which convey messages and guide people. This is a surrealistic effect.
The mother says goodbye to the kids at the train station. First, the station building has many covered porticos. Then the train has a long row of doors. Both images echo the rows of doors at the theater in the ballet sequence of Les Vampires. The doors of the left train carriage are all closed, those of the right train carriage are all open: a variation on the Feuillade pattern of a "double door, one door open, one closed".
The mother is shown standing, with the moving train in the background. This echoes an even more surreal shot in Les Vampires, where Irma Vep lies down in the tracks, and a train passes over her. In both cases, the film links a woman with the high energy of a moving train. This is a surrealist linkage. It is unclear whether this image tries to contrast the still woman with the dynamic train, or whether it somehow tries to equate her with the train's propulsion.
Episode Four: The Secret of the Tomb: The underground lab reminds one of the many laboratories in the work of Edgar G. Ulmer to come. Like them, it is full of visually impressive high tech lab equipment.
Typically, Judex sits at the desk, while Roger stands next to it. The tall, vertical telephone is positioned so that it forms a phallic symbol in front of Roger's body, while a picture on the desk serves a similar function with Judex. The hat Judex always wears is a similar phallic symbol. So are the tall top hat and cane carried by Vallieres. The boat Judex pilots in the next episode is also strongly phallic, as is the boat pole he uses to steer to shore.
Episode Five: The Tragic Mill: Musidora's descent down the mill, recalls her ascent of a building wall in Les Vampires. Feuillade's camera concentrates with steady intensity on Musidora's progress in both scenes. She seems remarkably athletic.
The swimming scene in Judex is a relatively rare camera movement: the camera pans along with the swimming Musidora.
Earlier, the camera also traveled (panned?) along with Musidora, as she was carrying the heroine's unconscious body into the mill. After Judex rescues the heroine, the camera will be fixed in his boat, while the boat moves forward. This is a different sort of camera movement, this time fixed on the hero. Once again, the shot depicts transporting the unconscious heroine. This moody subject is made more atmospheric and trance like by the camera movements in both cases. Musidora's shot involves a forest, Judex's a river: two archetypal locations, laden with emotion. Both the mill and the forest are important settings in fairy tales. They return in Vampyr (Carl Theodor Dreyer, 1932).
Episode Six: The Licorice Kid: Little Jean's rescue from Cocantin's apartment recalls the kidnapping of the hero from his apartment in Les Vampires. Both are startling scenes that happen with great rapidity. While both are exciting to watch, one hopes that no one will try either stunt in real life. Both look very dangerous and hard to pull off.
While Cocantin is a bumbler, and none too honest, he turns out to be a loving father. This is one of the most appealing part of his characterization, both in Judex, and in his role in Les Vampires. He seems to represent a type: a man whose main virtue is devotion to his family, and who is otherwise struggling along unsuccessfully with life. Probably lots of audience members can identify with this.
Episode Seven: The Woman in Black: The hero's kidnapping in Les Vampires is followed by a scene of the hero in a box, being dragged by car through the streets of Montmartre; a similar incident in Judex concerns a box and the Licorice Kid. Both of these scenes are comic.
In general, the Prologue and first six episodes of Judex (the first 3 hours) seem more crime oriented; the last six episodes (the last two hours of the film) seem more like a domestic melodrama, focusing on the hero's messy personal life. I tend to like the earlier episodes more, but the whole film has interest. This episode marks the start of the domestic scenes, with flashbacks to the hero's childhood.
This episode takes place largely in the hero's homes: the ancestral Tremeuse mansion, and the Vallieres apartments. Both are heaped to the skies with Art Nouveau features. Once again, the presence of such design in a Feuillade film seems deeply creepy. The spectacular Nouveau staircase at the Tremeuse home seems to symbolize all of that dysfunctional family's emotional problems, for instance. And the bedroom decor at Vallieres' is equated visually with the hero's trauma over his family-romance conflicts.
The Vallieres apartment is in four linked sets whose geometry are precisely defined: something of a rarity in Feuillade serials. The long hallway corridor links to the hero's bedroom, his study and the heroine's room, in that order. The different rooms are the sites of different issues and relationship struggles of the family, a useful visual schematic in Feuillade's staging.
In addition to Art Nouveau, there are also classical elements in the Tremeuse mansion. There are Roman-looking busts everywhere. The mother makes her sons swear revenge, using the same salute as seen in Jacques-Louis David's painting set in Ancient Rome, The Oath of the Horatii (1784). This famous Neoclassical work would probably have been familiar to both Feuillade, and many of his viewers. The three adult brothers in David's work are swearing an oath to their father. Feuillade modifies this by having two young boys swear an oath to their mother. There are perhaps suggestions here that the young boys are being made unfairly to accept grown-up duties, and that also they are entering into a pact without fully understanding it. Feuillade perhaps suggests that the parents are exploiting their children here, that they should not be emotionally coerced into such a bad idea as revenge.
Episode Eleven: The Water Goddess: The scenes of Judex going bravely into danger are striking. He is standing up in the boat, like the famous painting of Washington Crossing the Delaware (1851) by Emanuel Leutze. This is not recommended in real life (it's unsafe): but it does make a striking image on film. Washington wears a cloak in the painting, like Judex.
Feuillade includes a whole long-held shot, showing the ship crossing the screen from right to left. Like the other water imagery, it seems to have an emotional-atmospheric-symbolic effect beyond any easily apparent significance.
The Water Goddess makes a parallel with Musidora's skill with swimming, earlier in the film. She is as good as Musidora is evil. Water is sometimes seen as a female symbol. It certainly has female associations in Judex.
Judex is bound on the boat. He is also hooded, like villains in earlier Feuillade serials. This gives him an affinity to these earlier characters - only he is a force for good, while they were a force for evil. An interesting cut to an external scene elides his unbinding: he is bound, there is a cut to outside, and when we return to him on the ship, his cords are loose. Perhaps Feuillade did not want Judex to look helpless, or dependent on another character.
Episode Twelve: Love's Forgiveness: The serial ends with forgiveness between the characters. One wishes that today's films would preach a similar lesson of love and non-violence! There are anti-war subtexts, too, in a film which insists that violence is not the way to solve problems.
In any case, Judex has features that suggest Lang's work:
By contrast, Feuillade's use of natural locations throughout Judex would NOT be followed by Lang, who preferred to shoot even his "exteriors" on studio sets.