Fantômas in the Shadow of the Guillotine (1913)

Fantômas in the Shadow of the Guillotine (1913), directed by Louis Feuillade, 3 stars

Apparently, Louis Feuillade made 45 or so films per year on average during his career, about 800 in all.  Granted, almost all of them are shorts, but taken as a unit, that’s still quite a magnum opus.  I mention this only to apply some sense of scale to my familiarity with his work.  As of today, I’ve seen one scene from another film (“The Vampires”) and this.  Thus, I am nowhere near qualified to accurately assess the merits of this film against Feuillade’s prolific output overall.  What I can say, however, is that I was pleasantly entertained for the film’s 54 minutes, which follows the elicit actions of our antihero, Fantômas, aka Gurn, as he eludes Inspector Juve and company after first boldly robbing Princess Danidoff of jewelry and cash, and afterward murdering and then attempting to dispose of the body Lady Beltham’s husband.  I think that if I’d known more of the back story I’d have been in a better position to understand what was happening and why.  Since I’m not familiar with the Fantômas series of books, on which this and other Fantômas films are based, I simply went along with the plot, assuming that characters had more compelling reasons for doing what they did than I could see evidence of on screen.  I hope I’m not giving too much away by revealing that about half way through the film, Juve catches up with Gurn, and from that point forward, Fantômas plots an elaborate escape from jail so as to avoid a death sentence by guillotine—all this with the help of Lady Beltham whose husband he has killed.  I can see how audiences might feel favorably disposed toward the title character, although my single foray into Fantômas filmdom did not produce that result. He’s brazen, he's bold, and what's more, he’s French, but for me, at least so far, he's lacking a certain je ne sais quoi.  Since the DVD set that includes this film also contains four additional Fantômas titles, audio commentaries, and more, I wouldn't be surprised to find myself liking him more as I get to know him better over time.

Oh, yes.  Fantômas has some wonderful business cards.  They start out blank, but words appear under certain mysterious circumstances. It would be interesting to hand cards like that to my customers.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fantomas for more info or http://www.gutenberg.org/files/27794/27794-h/27794-h.htm to read the book on which this film is based.