''A Spiritualistic Photographer'' (french: Le Portrait spirite) is a 1903 French short silent 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 ...

. It 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 477–478 in its catalogues. The film parodies the faked images of ghosts created by

Spiritualist Spiritualism is the metaphysical school of thought opposing physicalism and also is the category of all spiritual beliefs/views (in monism and dualism) from ancient to modern. In the long nineteenth century The ''long nineteenth century'' i ...

mediums; Méliès, a fervent critic of Spiritualism, here uses it as an opportunity to show off a new special effect, a transformation created with a dissolve on a white background. Stage magic tricks featuring a similarly mocking attitude toward Spiritualism were often performed in the French fairgrounds for which Méliès produced many of his films. The film's concept can be seen as the reverse of those in Méliès's films '' The Living Playing Cards'' and '' The Lilliputian Minuet''; in those films, living people come out of portraits, while in this case the portrait comes second. Méliès appears in the film as the magician. The gilded setting and stools used here reappear in several of his other films. The special effects were created with

pyrotechnics Pyrotechnics is the science and craft of creating such things as fireworks, safety matches, oxygen candles, explosive bolts and other fasteners, parts of automotive airbags, as well as gas-pressure blasting in mining, quarrying, and demolition. ...

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, dissolves, and multiple exposures. The film survives in the form of a 35mm paper print.

References

French black-and-white films French silent short films Films directed by Georges Méliès 1903 films 1900s French films {{1900s-France-film-stub