''The Untamable Whiskers'' (french: Le Roi du maquillage, lit=The King of Makeup), also known as ''The King of the Mackerel Fishers'' and ''Les Moustaches indomptables'', is a 1904 French
silent trick film directed by
Georges Méliès
Marie-Georges-Jean Méliès (; ; 8 December 1861 – 21 January 1938) was a French illusionist, actor, and film director. He led many technical and narrative developments in the earliest days of cinema.
Méliès was well known for the use of ...
. The film is a showpiece for Méliès himself, drawing quickfire sketches of various characters and magically transforming into them.
Plot
Georges Méliès, after greeting the audience, makes a rapid-fire chalkboard sketch of his head, but adding a long medieval wig. Striking a pose, a wig matching the drawing magically appears on his bald head. Next Méliès draws an elderly, heavily bearded man, and then a monocled gentleman with sideburns, magically transforming into each character. Writing "''comic excentric''" (a French phrase for an eccentric comedian) on the board, he next becomes a clown, then a whiskery naval type in a
bicorne. Finally he transforms into the
Devil and disappears into thin air.
Production
Unusually for Méliès's work, ''The Untamable Whiskers'' is framed entirely in a
medium shot. The film testifies to Méliès's skill at quick drawing; he had already put this skill to use in the ''
A Lightning Sketch
''A Lightning Sketch'' (french: Dessinateur) was a series of four 1896 French short silent films directed by Georges Méliès and released by his Star Film Company. Each film showed an artist—very probably Méliès himself—drawing a caricatu ...
'' series, now presumed
lost
Lost may refer to getting lost, or to:
Geography
*Lost, Aberdeenshire, a hamlet in Scotland
* Lake Okeechobee Scenic Trail, or LOST, a hiking and cycling trail in Florida, US
History
*Abbreviation of lost work, any work which is known to have bee ...
.
The film's special effects depend on
substitution splice
The substitution splice or stop trick is a cinematic special effect in which filmmakers achieve an appearance, disappearance, or transformation by altering one or more selected aspects of the mise-en-scène between two shots
while maintaining th ...
s and
dissolves as well as on Méliès's talents for drawing, makeup, and character acting.
[
]
Release
The film was released by Méliès's Star Film Company
The Manufacture de films pour cinématographes, often known as Star Film, was a French film production company run by the illusionist and film director Georges Méliès.
History
On 28 December 1895, Méliès attended the celebrated first publi ...
and is numbered 552–553 in its catalogues. It was sold in the United States as ''The Untamable Whiskers'' and in Britain as ''The King of the Mackerel Fishers'',
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Untamable Whiskers
1904 films
Films directed by Georges Méliès
French silent films
French black-and-white films
Trick films