The Barber of Seville (1904 film)

Le Barbier de Séville
Cover of a 1904 brochure advertising the film
Directed byGeorges Méliès
Based onThe Barber of Seville
by Pierre Beaumarchais
Release date
  • 1904 (1904)
Running time
22 minutes[1]
412 meters/1340 feet
295 meters/960 feet (abridged)[2]
CountryFrance
LanguageSilent

The Barber of Seville (French: Le Barbier de Séville),[3] also released as The Barber of Sevilla, or the Useless Precaution,[2] was a 1904 French silent film directed by Georges Méliès, based on the 1775 play of the same name by Pierre Beaumarchais.[1] It was released by Méliès's Star Film Company and is numbered 606–625 in its catalogues,[2] where it was advertised as a comédie burlesque en 7 actes, d'après Beaumarchais.[4] Like several other of Méliès's longer films, two versions were released simultaneously: a complete 22-minute print and an abridged print.[1]

As with his 1904 film Faust and Marguerite, Méliès prepared a special film score for The Barber of Seville, adapted from the most well-known arias from the Rossini opera.[5] Like at least 4% of Méliès's entire output (including such films as A Trip to the Moon, The Impossible Voyage, The Kingdom of the Fairies, and The Rajah's Dream), some prints were individually hand-colored and sold at a higher price.[6]

The film is currently presumed lost.[3]

References

  1. ^ a b c Hammond, Paul (1974). Marvellous Méliès. London: Gordon Fraser. p. 58. ISBN 0900406380.
  2. ^ a b c Hammond, p. 143.
  3. ^ a b Frazer, John (1979). Artificially Arranged Scenes: The Films of Georges Méliès. Boston: G. K. Hall & Co. p. 250. ISBN 0816183686.
  4. ^ Malthête, Jacques; Mannoni, Laurent (2008). L'oeuvre de Georges Méliès. Paris: Éditions de La Martinière. p. 170. ISBN 978-2-7324-3732-3.
  5. ^ Marks, Martin Miller (1997). Music and the Silent Film: Contexts and Case Studies, 1895-1924. New York: Oxford University Press. p. 72. ISBN 0195068912. Retrieved 21 July 2013.
  6. ^ Yumibe, Joshua (2012). Moving Color: Early Film, Mass Culture, Modernism. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press. p. 73. ISBN 9780813552965. Retrieved 1 August 2013.


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