Émile Reynaud's third animated film is the oldest preserved animated film in film history. Un bon bock & Clown et ses chiens fell victim to the inventor and artist's disappointment at the oblivion of his Théâtre Optique, though at least a few images of the former have survived.
In Pauvret Pierrot, Reynaud tells a short story of the trickster, but ultimately successful in his scheme, of minstrelsy, superstition, and fear, and he does so in a comedic style of classical storytelling. In a single scene, Pierrot has three acting characters dance across the screen, amusing and shocking his audience.
The work is not only a piece of history, but also a work that stands on its own, meant to be viewed in the splendor of its time, the Théâtre Optique, the beauty of the cosmopolitan city of Paris at the time, and the burgeoning entertainment wonders of modern technology, and it is then that all of its beauty comes to the fore. This brief (surviving) birth of the animated film is a small masterpiece in itself, a trailblazer, a beautiful work of entertainment art and a nostalgic-romantic, a tongue-in-cheek look at two times gone by at once, on three different levels. A look that motivates a smile on the face. A funny hoax that made history.
In Pauvret Pierrot, Reynaud tells a short story of the trickster, but ultimately successful in his scheme, of minstrelsy, superstition, and fear, and he does so in a comedic style of classical storytelling. In a single scene, Pierrot has three acting characters dance across the screen, amusing and shocking his audience.
The work is not only a piece of history, but also a work that stands on its own, meant to be viewed in the splendor of its time, the Théâtre Optique, the beauty of the cosmopolitan city of Paris at the time, and the burgeoning entertainment wonders of modern technology, and it is then that all of its beauty comes to the fore. This brief (surviving) birth of the animated film is a small masterpiece in itself, a trailblazer, a beautiful work of entertainment art and a nostalgic-romantic, a tongue-in-cheek look at two times gone by at once, on three different levels. A look that motivates a smile on the face. A funny hoax that made history.