The Christmas Angel: Difference between revisions
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[[Category:Films directed by Georges Méliès]] |
[[Category:Films directed by Georges Méliès]] |
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[[Category:Christmas films]] |
[[Category:French Christmas films]] |
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Revision as of 13:48, 31 March 2015
| The Christmas Angel | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Georges Méliès |
| Starring |
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Production company | |
Release date |
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| Country | France |
| Language | Silent |
Détresse et Charité, released in the United States as The Christmas Angel and in Britain as The Beggar Maiden, is a 1904 French short silent film directed by Georges Méliès. It was released by Méliès's Star Film Company and is numbered 669–677 in its catalogues.[1]
Plot
At Christmastime, a beggar girl wanders through Paris and collapses from hunger.
Two endings for the film were made. In the version for French audiences, the beggar girl freezes to death after her collapse, and her soul is brought to Heaven by the Christmas Angel of the title. In the version for British and American audiences, a couple passing by in an automobile rescue the girl, bring her home, and lavish gifts upon her family. As the film historian Elizabeth Ezra has noted, "these differences suggest that the American audience's predilection for a happy ending was already well in place by the turn of the century."[2]
Production
Méliès plays three roles in the film: a ragman, a beggar on crutches, and a coal seller. The main role of the beggar girl is played by Rachel Gillet. (According to the American catalogue, which repeatedly emphasizes that the film is set in Paris, the character's name is Marie.) The automobile seen in the British and American ending was reused in Méliès's later film An Adventurous Automobile Trip. Special effects used in the film include pyrotechnics, artifical snow, superimpositions, and dissolves.[3]
References
- ^ Malthête, Jacques; Mannoni, Laurent (2008), L'oeuvre de Georges Méliès, Paris: Éditions de La Martinière, pp. 334–356, ISBN 9782732437323
- ^ Ezra, Elizabeth (2000), Georges Méliès, Manchester: Manchester University Press, p. 62, ISBN 0-7190-5395-1
- ^ Essai de reconstitution du catalogue français de la Star-Film; suivi d'une analyse catalographique des films de Georges Méliès recensés en France, Bois d'Arcy: Service des archives du film du Centre national de la cinématographie, 1981, pp. 210–212, ISBN 2903053073, OCLC 10506429
External links
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