Carmen (1915)

Originally posted to Facebook on 5/24/2016

We had a busy weekend two weeks ago, so we didn’t get around to watching our second film from 1915 until this last weekend. The film we watched was Carmen, and it is the first movie we’ve seen directed by Cecil B. DeMille. Like Raoul Walsh from the previous week, DeMille had a long career in both the silent and sound era, including Cleopatra (1934), and The Ten Commandments -- both the silent version in 1923, and the 1956 version with Charlton Heston that used to be shown every year on TV. DeMille also had a memorable role as himself in Sunset Boulevard. However, unlike Raoul Walsh, he is probably more identified with his earlier, silent work than his later films.

There were two versions of Carmen released in 1915, as well as a parody (or “burlesque”) by Charlie Chaplin. The other non-parody was coincidentally directed by Raoul Walsh, but it is now lost. This film was based roughly on the opera, and its lead, Geraldine Farrar, was a famous opera singer. The backing music on our DVD was taken from the opera as well, and, although I know very little about opera, it is well-known enough that I recognized several pieces. The movie was fairly short, lasting about an hour, so the pacing was brisk. It is set in Spain approximately 200 years ago (i.e. 100 years before the movie was made) The plot concerns a group of gypsy smugglers (portrayed as always with nuanced sensitivity), including Carmen, and a town guard (played by Wallace Reid) that gets mixed up with them. Without spoiling anything, I will just say that it does not end well. Like our previous film from 1915, I don’t think I could really recommend this to a general audience, but we do seem to be in a run of films that are at least competently made and able to tell a coherent story.

Next week we will watch our third film from 1915, a version of Alice in Wonderland. We had previously seen a ten minute version from 1903, but films have totally changed in those twelve years, so I’m expecting a far more sophisticated version this time around.

Our list of upcoming films is shown here: https://bit.ly/2lZtfmT