For Don Carlos

Pour Don Carlos, black and white, tinted French silent melodrama, 1921, dir: Musidora, Jacques Lasseyne, Language: French intertitles, Subtitles: Hungarian, 80’

...

SCREENINGS

09.24. 20:15
French Institute

Directed by Musidora, Jacques Lasseyne
Screenplay by Musidora
Director of photography: Frank Daniau-Johnston, Léonce Crouan
Cast: Musidora, Stephen Weber, Abel Tarride
Genre: melodrama
Production: Société des Films Musidora

In terms of plot, this film may be particularly familiar to opera lovers: the core of the story is, after all, Tosca. Even though the male protagonist is not a painter but a soldier, Alegria. Tosca was written for the great actress Sarah Bernhardt who played many seductress roles, whereas this work was designed for one of the greatest stars of the silent era, Musidora, whose cult still thrives to this day. Proof of this is the film itself, restoration of which was initiated by the society of friends of Musidora. The superbly restored, sepia work is set in the Basque country at the time of the Carlist uprising of followers of Don Carlos de Bourbon. The lengthy and yet completely entrancing seduction scene of the femme fatale Musidora, who made a name for herself starring in Les Vampires (she is also credited as director in Pour Don Carlos), shows why she became the most celebrated actress of the age.

La Cinémathèque de Toulouse

Introduction: Franck Loiret director, Cinematheque de Toulouse