Реферат: Max Linder
MaxLinder
(1883-1925)
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RepkaNick form 11 ”B”
MaxLinder
(1883-1925)
About Linder
As I have never seen a Max
Linder film, I cannot write anything about him.I have thus
reproduced here two separate articles. Sufficeto say, Walter Kerr in
The Silent Clowns (see books page) rates him asa true pioneer of
film comedy (e.g. the joke of being unveiled ona statue used by
Keaton in The Goat and Chaplin in City Lightswas first used by
Linder).
b. Gabriel-Maximilien
Leuvielle Dec 16 1883, Caverne, France. d.1925.
At 17 he left high school to
study drama and soon after began an actingcareer on the Bordeaux
stage. He moved to Paris in 1904 and startedplaying supporting parts
in melodramas. In 1905 he embarked upon aparallel career in
Pathe films. For three years he spent his daysin the film
studios and his evenings on the stage, usinghis real name in the
theater and the pseudonym Max Linder on thescreen. By 1908 he had
given up the stage to concentrate on hisincreasingly successful
screen career. By 1910 he was aninternationally popular comedian,
possibly the best-known screen comic on eitherside of the Atlantic
in the years before WW I. Typically playing adapper dandy of the
idle class, he developed a style of slapsticksilent screen comedy
that anticipated Mack Sennett and Chaplin andset the premises of the
genre for years to come. Ferdinand Zecca, LouisGasnier, and Alberto
Capelani were among the directors of hisearliest films.
By 1910, Linder was writing
and supervising, and from 1911 also directing,all his own films. His popularity was at its peak in 1914, when he was calledto arms. Early
in the war he was a victim of gas poisoning andsuffered a serious
breakdown. The injury was to have a lastingeffect on his physical and mental well-being. He returned briefly to Frenchfilms, but
finding his popularity vanishing, he accepted abid from Essanay and
left for the US late in 1916. Continuous illhealth hampered the American phase of Linder's career from the start. In mid-1917,after
only three films, he was felled by doublepneumonia and spent nearly
a year recovering in a Swiss sanitarium. Whenhe returned to the US
in 1921, he formed his own production unit,releasing through United
Artists. But after making only three moreAmerican films, including
the celebrated parody (of Fairbanks’ The ThreeMusketeers) The Three Must-Get-Theres, he returned to Europe, where he marriedthe
daughter of a Paris restaurateur in 1923.Linder made two more film
appearances: one in France, the other inAustria, but realized his career was finished. In 1925 he entered a suicidepact with his wife.
Their bodies were discovered side by side in aParis hotel. He
remained forgotten for years, until the 60s,when many of his old
films began turning up, affording filmhistorians an opportunity to
evaluate his career and his contributions tothe evolution of screen
comedy.
Biography from
Quinlan’s Film Comedy Actors
With his foxy brown eyes
matched by a like moustache, cane, elegantcutaway coat, silk cravat,
kid gloves and gleaming top hat, Max Lindercould have been every
inch the French boulevardier who “walked alongthe Bois de
Boulogne with an independent air”--had not, infilms, everything
gone wrong for him. Max Linder was France’sfirst great film
comedian. But not for him any kind of dressthat smacked of the
circus clown. Max was always debonair, even inthe face of disaster.
His early films in France, of which he madescores, are cameos of
catastrophe, little gems which work a varietyof gags on a single
situation, such as taking a bath, gettingdressed, or (quite often,
as the wolfish Max pursued his prey) chasing adamsel. He was
enormously popular in the early 1900s. And, hadnot war intervened,
he would perhaps have been happily entertainingcontinental audiences
into his sixties, competing with such upstartsas Jacques Tati and
Fernandei. Linder spent the early part of hislife in America, where
his father had gone to plant vineyards. Whenthe business failed the
family returned to France and Max completed hiseducation there. He
was a natural athlete (once pole-vault championof South West
France), an ability that was to stand him ingood stead in the more
energetic of his comedy capers on screen.Leaving high school in
1901, he studied drama for two years beforebeginning a stage career
under his real name. But by 1905 he was playingminor film roles as
Max Linder, progressing to comic leads by 1907and international fame
by 1910. His style of comedy somewhatforeshadowed that of Chaplin
(one of his greatest fans) and his dapper,disaster-prone dandy would
later prove a useful prototype for CharleyChase. These were the
golden years for Linder, who directed all hisown work from 1911 to
1917. But the war changed everything. Lindernot only received severe
shrapnel wounds but was the victim of seriousgassing, which left him
with moods of black melancholia in betweenpatches of inspiration.
With his work output and his popularity inFrance diminishing, a
partially recovered Linder accepted an offer towork in America in
1916. After three of a projected run of 12two-reelers, however, his
health broke down again. Returning to thecontinent after a dire
battle with double pneumonia, the ailing Maxentered a convalescent
home in Switzerland for a year. Refusing toretire despite continued
fragile health, Linder returned to America,formed his own production
company there and made three feature filmswhich contain much of his
best work. The first, Seven Years Bad Luck,contains an extended
sequence involving a mirror with no glass whichpredates several such
scenes with other prominent American comedians,notably The Marx
Brothers in Duck Soup. The last of the three,The Three
Must-Get-Theres, a triumphant parody of Dumas’sfamous
swashbuckler, contains sustained actiontomfoolery which makes the
Richard Lester version 50 years later pale bycomparison. But the
films were only moderately successful withAmerican audiences and
Linder found trouble getting his workdistributed. Disconsolate after
a deal with Samuel Goldwyn fell through, Maxreturned to France.
There was one more film here and one in Austriabut the
once-confident Linder was becoming anincreasingly forlorn figure.
There was talk of another film but Linder andhis young wife entered
into a suicide pact and, a few weeks short ofhis 42nd birthday, were
found dead together in a Paris hotel.Fortunately, in later years his
daughter Maud launched a battle to bring hisgenius to a fresh
audience, resulting in two compilation films,Laugh With Max Linder
in 1963, and The Man in the Silk Hat 20 yearslater.
Filmography
Year Title
1905 La premiere sortie d'un collegien
1906 Le premier cigare d'un collegien
1906 Le poison
1906 Le pendu
1906 Les contrebandiers
1907 Idee d'apache
1907 Une mauvaise vie
1907 La mort d'un toreador
1907 Sganarelle
1907 Lavie de Polichinelle
1907 Les debuts d'un patineur
1908 Larencontre imprevue
1908 Une conquete
1908 La tres moutarde
1909 Un mariage a l'americaine
1909 Le petit jeune homme
1909 See the picture!
1920 Le feu sacre
1921 Seven Years Bad Luck
1921 Be My Wife
1922 The Three Must-Get-Theres
1923 Au secours!
1924 Clown aus Liebe/Le roi du cirques (GB andUS: Max, King of the Circus)