The film "Annabelle Serpentine Dance" (often just called "The Serpentine Dance") was one of the earliest sensations when it debuted back in 1895. This dance was a huge sensation on stage and once filmed, folks poured into theaters to see it. And, like most early films that were successful, other filmmakers stole the idea liberally. In fact, some would even take the original film and claim it was theirs! The problem was so rampant (and practically everyone was doing it) that American Biograph put a watermark on their films...a giant AB in the bottom corner...in order to prevent others from saying the film was created by them!
The problem of theft was so bad that the innovative filmmaker Georges Méliès even resorted to stealing, I mean 'borrowing', the idea! This is rather ironic as he was one of the most copied and stolen from filmmakers of his day and many of his films were copied by Edison as well as his most famous copycat, Segundo de Chomón....and many of their films are indistinguishable from the work of Méliès...though more often than not, the work wasn't quite as good as the French master filmmaker's.
Here in "La Colonne de Feu", Méliès takes the Serpentine Dance and makes it his own. Like at least a hundred other films by Méliès, this one begins with a magician or conjurer working at his craft...with a giant frying pan this time. After a little hocus pocus, the Serpentine Dancer appears and begins her weird but mesmerizing dance....a dance you just need to see to appreciate. Well worth seeing...but clearly a rip-off!
The problem of theft was so bad that the innovative filmmaker Georges Méliès even resorted to stealing, I mean 'borrowing', the idea! This is rather ironic as he was one of the most copied and stolen from filmmakers of his day and many of his films were copied by Edison as well as his most famous copycat, Segundo de Chomón....and many of their films are indistinguishable from the work of Méliès...though more often than not, the work wasn't quite as good as the French master filmmaker's.
Here in "La Colonne de Feu", Méliès takes the Serpentine Dance and makes it his own. Like at least a hundred other films by Méliès, this one begins with a magician or conjurer working at his craft...with a giant frying pan this time. After a little hocus pocus, the Serpentine Dancer appears and begins her weird but mesmerizing dance....a dance you just need to see to appreciate. Well worth seeing...but clearly a rip-off!