The Perils of Pauline (1914)

Originally posted to Facebook on 4/25/2016

Peril of Pauline was our second film from 1914. It took a little longer for us to watch than planned. It was almost three and a half hours, broken up into nine episodes, so we watched several episodes last weekend, and then watched the remaining ones in the evening throughout the week. The plot was actually rather similar to The Mystery of the Kador Cliffs, which we watched a month or so back. Pauline (Pearl White) is the ward of Koerner (Paul Panzer), and has a large inheritance, which he presumably would keep were she to die. So he engineers various schemes to kill her. However unlike The Mystery of the Kador Cliffs, which handled this situation with some vague ambitions of naturalism, The Perils of Pauline uses it strictly as plot device for a series of tongue-in-cheek adventure stories. It is worth noting that the version we watched -- the only surviving version -- is significantly different from the one audiences saw in 1914. Originally it was almost seven hours long, broken up into twenty episodes. The version that we saw was re-edited down to nine for the European market in 1916. The structure was episodic though, so there is no great loss in continuity, but the print we saw is not in the greatest shape, and the speed at times was not adjusted properly, so action on the screen was often too fast. On top of that, The Perils of Pauline was marred by intermittent negative portrayals of various ethnic groups. Episode 2 had Pauline menaced by Native Americans, who are depicted as primitive and superstitious. In episode 3 Harry (Pauline’s fiance, played by Crane Wilbur) disguises himself by darkening his skin. In episode 5 and then later in episode 8 Koerner works with a group of malevolent gypsies to murder Pauline. All of this subtracted from the experience of watching the film, and Ben particularly was pretty vocal about how terrible the Native American episode was. All in all, Fantomas -- which is probably our most natural reference point for comparison, being the only other serial we’ve watched -- was superior in many ways, in that it had a clearer print, appropriately adjusted speed, and a refreshing lack of ethnic slurs.

The two serials were different in other ways as well. For instance, while both films were equally ridiculous and tongue-in-cheek, the approach in Fantomas was largely deadpan, whereas in Perils of Pauline everyone is openly enjoying the romp. Also, the stunts in Perils of Pauline were quite extensive in a way that wasn’t true in Fantomas -- there is an airplane crash, people climbing down a rope from a hot air balloon, car crashes, horses tumbling over with riders, and a variety of other dangerous looking action. Presumably at this time period a large fraction of it was probably achieved by putting people in real danger. There is also a brief striking shot taken from an airplane, showing the ground below, including a moving train. (Keep in mind the airplane had just been invented ten years earlier.) I can’t really recommend this film, but one can see how the light tone and the stunt-work might have contributed to its popularity. Trivia: Louis J. Gasnier, one of the two directors, directed some of the early Max Linder shorts, and later in his career directed Reefer Madness.

This next item on the list is our third film from 1914: Tillie’s Punctured Romance, which is the first film in which we’ll see Charlie Chaplin, as well as a bunch of other early comedy stars. The spreadsheet, as always, is here: https://bit.ly/2lZtfmT