Fantômas: The Complete Saga

Although French director Louis Feuillade (1873–1925) was long forgotten, he's been rediscovered in the past quarter century, first in Olivier Assasyas's 1996 Irma Vep—revolving around a remake of Feuillade's serial Les Vampires—and now with this lovingly remastered release of his five Fantômas silent features from 1913–14 (Fantômas in the Shadow of the Guillotine, Juve vs. Fantômas, The Murderous Corpse, Fantômas vs. Fantômas, and The False Magistrate). Introduced in a series of books by Marcel Allain and Pierre Souvestre in 1911, Fantômas is a Moriarty-style villain and master of disguise who commits many murders in his ongoing quest for jewels and cash. Although pursued relentlessly (and frequently captured) by Inspector Juve and Juve's journalist friend, Fandor, Fantômas always manages to escape (sometimes aided by Lady Beltham, a victim infatuated with him despite his horrible acts). Feuillade's movies are often called serials because they form a continuous narrative, but they're more accurately thought of as a string of sequels that, to be honest, are of more historical than cinematic interest, since the plots are complex but repetitive (and often positively absurd), the cast (with René Navarre in the title role) is mediocre, and the direction unremarkable, although Feuillade is claimed to have originated many of the thriller conventions adopted by later filmmakers. DVD extras include two audio commentaries by film historian David Kalat, the Feuillade shorts “The Nativity” (1910) and “The Dwarf” (1912), a biographical featurette on Feuillade, and an image gallery. Definitely recommended for cinema history collections, this is optional elsewhere. (F. Swietek)[Blu-ray Review—Jan. 12, 2016—Kino, 2 discs, 355 min., not rated, Blu-ray: $49.95—Making its first appearance on Blu-ray, 1914's Fantômas features a nice transfer with 2.0 mono sound. Extras include two audio commentaries by film historian David Kalat, two of director Louis Feuillade's short films: 1912's “The Dwarf” (16 min.) and 1910's “The Nativity” (14 min.), a “Louis Feuillade: Master of Many Forms” featurette (11 min.), and an animated gallery of cover artwork from the Fantômas novellas. Bottom line: a fine extras package for this classic series.]