This film is cute and watchable even today--and that's something you CAN'T say about many of the very early movies--particularly those of George Albert Smith. Most films of the day are of pretty mundane topics or are only about one or two minutes long. This film, in contrast, is longer and actually tries to have Mary Jane try to be a slapstick comedienne. She is a cook and doesn't seem to do anything right. While not great or amazing like the contemporary films of Georges Méliès, this is still pretty good and watchable--particularly the slapstick ending! Plus, films like this eventually led to films like those of the later and much more famous slapstick comedians, so historically it's pretty important.
10 Reviews
Amusing, albeit archaic, comic short
jamesrupert20146 February 2020
After a mishap with the boot blacking, a young woman uses paraffin to light the stove with fantastic, and fatal, results. George Albert Smith's silly four minute opus was quite a sophisticated film for the time, with scene changes, close-ups, split-screen, dissolves, and special effects (double exposures and substitution splices). Star Laura Bayley seems to be having fun, mugging to the camera with a shoe-polish mustache or prancing around as a ghost. One wonders if the scene of the young woman dramatically exiting the house via the chimney inspired similar scenes six decades later in Disney's 'Mary Poppins' (1964). Watch for the falling boots and the inquisitive cat. Silly fun, then and now.
100% of domestic accidents happen in the home...
JoeytheBrit8 December 2008
This early British comedy is fairly entertaining on first viewing but doesn't hold up well to scrutiny upon repeated screenings. That's not really a criticism of the film itself as the state of the nascent industry back in 1903. Films were still fairly primitive, the idea that they might tell a narrative instead of simply capturing glimpses of real life still a new one.
Influential Brighton filmmaker George Albert Smith brings plenty of tricks and innovative ideas to this tale of a dotty housemaid (played by his wife) who manages to blow herself up by lighting the kitchen stove with paraffin before returning from the grave to frighten passers-by.
Smith combines long, medium and close shots to tell his tale which looks at first like a variety act before the 'mishap' sparks a quick succession of camera trickery that moves the story onto a supernatural aspect.
Influential Brighton filmmaker George Albert Smith brings plenty of tricks and innovative ideas to this tale of a dotty housemaid (played by his wife) who manages to blow herself up by lighting the kitchen stove with paraffin before returning from the grave to frighten passers-by.
Smith combines long, medium and close shots to tell his tale which looks at first like a variety act before the 'mishap' sparks a quick succession of camera trickery that moves the story onto a supernatural aspect.
All the Tricks
Cineanalyst8 March 2008
George Albert Smith was one of cinema's most important pioneers--laying down much of the foundation of film grammar, including helping to introduce the multi-shot film, parallel action, the close-up, point-of-view shots, some trick photography effects, and other elements of editing and camera positioning. A good number of his innovations are on display in this short film, "Mary Jane's Mishap". If it can be said about such an ancient piece of cinema, this is Smith's masterpiece, in addition to being one of the most advanced films of its time (although many of Smith's movies and most movies from this era are lost or generally unavailable).
The first scene of the sluttish housemaid consists of a lot of scene dissection for 1903--cutting between a long shot of the kitchen and various close-ups of the housemaid's comedic actions and expressions, or, rather, the mugging of the camera by the director's actress-wife. (By the way, I find her performance, albeit outdated, has grown on me with repeated viewings.) These close-ups of expressions come from the tradition of early single shot films that were simply of facial expressions, of which Smith made quite a few--exploiting the novelty of the medium close-up made popular by Edison's "The Kiss" (1896). In "Mary Jane's Mishap", there's good match on action for continuity between the shots, too. Smith had already pioneered this structure in "The Little Doctors" (1901) and its remake "Sick Kitten" (1903), but few other filmmakers explored this kind of scene dissection at the time. Edwin Porter's film "The Gay Shoe Clerk" (1903), which was heavily influenced by Smith's work, is one exception.
There are nine shots, plus a tenth for the splice to accomplish the trick shot of replacing the actress with a dummy to shoot up the chimney, in the some two minutes of the first scene of "Mary Jane's Mishap". This is why I'm so hard on the photographed plays of the 1910s, because by 1903, they were already making films like this with complex and innovative visual and filmic ways of telling a narrative. Coincidentally, "Mary Jane's Mishap" was released the same year as "The Great Train Robbery". That film pioneered how to edit scenes together to serve form; this film did a similar service for the shots within the scene.
A comparison of shot counts between "Mary Jane's Mishap" and the more acclaimed and popular early films, Edwin Porter's "The Great Train Robbery" and Georges Méliès's "Le Voyage dans la lune" (1902) further illustrates the groundbreaking nature of Smith's film. "Mary Jane's Mishap" consists of 12 shots, with nine of those shots taking place within the first scene. Porter's film consists of 14 shots, which are all scenes in themselves. Thus, Porter's film consists of two more shots, but the film is about three times longer than Smith's film. Méliès's film, which is a couple minutes longer than Porter's film, consists of 16 shots, of which almost all were scenes in themselves. That's four more shots in about ten more minutes of nitrate.
In the rest of "Mary Jane's Mishap", Smith uses a wipe as a transition effect. I've only seen the wipe used earlier than this once--in Robert W. Paul's film "Scrooge; or Marley's Ghost" (1901). The view of the tombstone is an insert shot--a technique Smith was one of the first to pioneer. There are also a few typical trick effects here: the superimposed ghost, the stop-substitution effect, and the shooting up the chimney sequence.
Yet, to be critical, the shadows in the first scene make it obvious that the supposedly interior scene was filmed on an open-air stage, but this was typical in films until about the late 1910s. It's also evident that the film doesn't contain a very involving story, and it suffers in this respect if compared to such contemporary productions as "The Great Train Robbery" and "Le Voyage dans la lune". What narrative it has is essentially a bad joke on the Irish; Mary Jane is supposedly Irish, and the film makes fun of her (that is, of the Irish) being either illiterate or too stupid to realize the dangers of paraffin. Porter already used this story in his two-shot film "The Finish of Bridget McKeen" (1901), and one may call Smith's film a remake of it.
Nevertheless, this early film is exceptional. Yet, film enthusiasts and historians have neglected to give it much credit. It was so ahead of its time and unappreciated that many have believed D.W. Griffith when he claimed a decade later to have invented scene dissection, close-ups and other techniques. "Mary Jane's Mishap" is an excellent film for 1903; Smith pulls out all the then known tricks of film grammar for this one and then invents some more. Unfortunately, after about 1903, he gave up regular film production and spent the rest of his film-making career working on an inherently flawed two-color film process for Charles Urban called Kinemacolor. Hopefully, some of Smith's other films become available someday, especially his later ones, such as "Dorothy's Dream" (1903) (a fairytale film which supposedly was one of the first movies to use title cards) and "The Little Witness" (which the BFI lists as from 1905, but for which historian Stephen Bottomore lists as c.1903) (which from a still I've seen, had elaborately painted backdrops for the time and perhaps more of a plot than most of Smith's productions).
The first scene of the sluttish housemaid consists of a lot of scene dissection for 1903--cutting between a long shot of the kitchen and various close-ups of the housemaid's comedic actions and expressions, or, rather, the mugging of the camera by the director's actress-wife. (By the way, I find her performance, albeit outdated, has grown on me with repeated viewings.) These close-ups of expressions come from the tradition of early single shot films that were simply of facial expressions, of which Smith made quite a few--exploiting the novelty of the medium close-up made popular by Edison's "The Kiss" (1896). In "Mary Jane's Mishap", there's good match on action for continuity between the shots, too. Smith had already pioneered this structure in "The Little Doctors" (1901) and its remake "Sick Kitten" (1903), but few other filmmakers explored this kind of scene dissection at the time. Edwin Porter's film "The Gay Shoe Clerk" (1903), which was heavily influenced by Smith's work, is one exception.
There are nine shots, plus a tenth for the splice to accomplish the trick shot of replacing the actress with a dummy to shoot up the chimney, in the some two minutes of the first scene of "Mary Jane's Mishap". This is why I'm so hard on the photographed plays of the 1910s, because by 1903, they were already making films like this with complex and innovative visual and filmic ways of telling a narrative. Coincidentally, "Mary Jane's Mishap" was released the same year as "The Great Train Robbery". That film pioneered how to edit scenes together to serve form; this film did a similar service for the shots within the scene.
A comparison of shot counts between "Mary Jane's Mishap" and the more acclaimed and popular early films, Edwin Porter's "The Great Train Robbery" and Georges Méliès's "Le Voyage dans la lune" (1902) further illustrates the groundbreaking nature of Smith's film. "Mary Jane's Mishap" consists of 12 shots, with nine of those shots taking place within the first scene. Porter's film consists of 14 shots, which are all scenes in themselves. Thus, Porter's film consists of two more shots, but the film is about three times longer than Smith's film. Méliès's film, which is a couple minutes longer than Porter's film, consists of 16 shots, of which almost all were scenes in themselves. That's four more shots in about ten more minutes of nitrate.
In the rest of "Mary Jane's Mishap", Smith uses a wipe as a transition effect. I've only seen the wipe used earlier than this once--in Robert W. Paul's film "Scrooge; or Marley's Ghost" (1901). The view of the tombstone is an insert shot--a technique Smith was one of the first to pioneer. There are also a few typical trick effects here: the superimposed ghost, the stop-substitution effect, and the shooting up the chimney sequence.
Yet, to be critical, the shadows in the first scene make it obvious that the supposedly interior scene was filmed on an open-air stage, but this was typical in films until about the late 1910s. It's also evident that the film doesn't contain a very involving story, and it suffers in this respect if compared to such contemporary productions as "The Great Train Robbery" and "Le Voyage dans la lune". What narrative it has is essentially a bad joke on the Irish; Mary Jane is supposedly Irish, and the film makes fun of her (that is, of the Irish) being either illiterate or too stupid to realize the dangers of paraffin. Porter already used this story in his two-shot film "The Finish of Bridget McKeen" (1901), and one may call Smith's film a remake of it.
Nevertheless, this early film is exceptional. Yet, film enthusiasts and historians have neglected to give it much credit. It was so ahead of its time and unappreciated that many have believed D.W. Griffith when he claimed a decade later to have invented scene dissection, close-ups and other techniques. "Mary Jane's Mishap" is an excellent film for 1903; Smith pulls out all the then known tricks of film grammar for this one and then invents some more. Unfortunately, after about 1903, he gave up regular film production and spent the rest of his film-making career working on an inherently flawed two-color film process for Charles Urban called Kinemacolor. Hopefully, some of Smith's other films become available someday, especially his later ones, such as "Dorothy's Dream" (1903) (a fairytale film which supposedly was one of the first movies to use title cards) and "The Little Witness" (which the BFI lists as from 1905, but for which historian Stephen Bottomore lists as c.1903) (which from a still I've seen, had elaborately painted backdrops for the time and perhaps more of a plot than most of Smith's productions).
A masterpiece of political comedy. (spoiler in last paragraph)
the red duchess19 February 2001
Warning: Spoilers
This famous black comedy was, sadly, the last film by early cinema pioneer, G.A. Smith. Like Dreyer, Bergman and Lang after him, he takes essentially theatrical material to create pure cinema. The setting seems stock Victoriana, as an inept scullery maid blows herself to smithereens (no pun intended!) with paraffin oil - the forbiddingly bare kitchen; the wink-to-the-audience broadness of the acting, from Smith's wife, star of so many of his films.
But it does what theatre could never hope to do- it shatters the restricted theatrical space as Mary Jane flies through the chimney; and it brings the dead back to life, just as cinema preserves and makes immemorial the transient. The film is also considered important as one of the first to use a vertical wipe, in this case creating a cartoon-like effect, as Mary Jane nudges the audience as she holds a can with 'PARAFFIN' written in huge letters (a joke borrowed by Beckett over fifty years later in his 'Act Without Words').
Perhaps even more intriguing than the film's formal originality is the ambiguity of the content. It seems to be a demonisation of women, of the new Woman or Suffragette, who was demanding the vote at this time in Britain, and victim of all kinds of establishment hatred and ridicule. This film seems to conflate two very real fears of the establishment - women and the working class - who, enfranchised, could have caused great damage to the status quo.
Before her accident, Mary Jane is messing around the kitchen, and gets some soot above her lip, creating a moustache, to her delight, as she looks in a very Lacanian mirror. The message is clear - women just want to be men, and steal their power: the result is the destruction of the home, either deliberately or through non-masculine incompetence. Against a gorgeous, 'Caligari'-bleached backdrop, Mary Jane is buried, 'rest in pieces', her class and gender roles shattered, as conservatives wag their fingers at her grave, warning of the dangers of giving women any kind of responsibility.
But Mary Jane has the last laugh, and rises from the dead to cause further havoc - Smith taking Freud's ideas about repression and applying them to the social context - the more you try to keep people down, the more they'll come back at you. The fact that the 'patriarchal' figure of the director uses his wife to tell this story is all the more remarkable.
But it does what theatre could never hope to do- it shatters the restricted theatrical space as Mary Jane flies through the chimney; and it brings the dead back to life, just as cinema preserves and makes immemorial the transient. The film is also considered important as one of the first to use a vertical wipe, in this case creating a cartoon-like effect, as Mary Jane nudges the audience as she holds a can with 'PARAFFIN' written in huge letters (a joke borrowed by Beckett over fifty years later in his 'Act Without Words').
Perhaps even more intriguing than the film's formal originality is the ambiguity of the content. It seems to be a demonisation of women, of the new Woman or Suffragette, who was demanding the vote at this time in Britain, and victim of all kinds of establishment hatred and ridicule. This film seems to conflate two very real fears of the establishment - women and the working class - who, enfranchised, could have caused great damage to the status quo.
Before her accident, Mary Jane is messing around the kitchen, and gets some soot above her lip, creating a moustache, to her delight, as she looks in a very Lacanian mirror. The message is clear - women just want to be men, and steal their power: the result is the destruction of the home, either deliberately or through non-masculine incompetence. Against a gorgeous, 'Caligari'-bleached backdrop, Mary Jane is buried, 'rest in pieces', her class and gender roles shattered, as conservatives wag their fingers at her grave, warning of the dangers of giving women any kind of responsibility.
But Mary Jane has the last laugh, and rises from the dead to cause further havoc - Smith taking Freud's ideas about repression and applying them to the social context - the more you try to keep people down, the more they'll come back at you. The fact that the 'patriarchal' figure of the director uses his wife to tell this story is all the more remarkable.
George Albert Smith Blows Up The Screen And His Wife
boblipton22 December 2019
Others here have praised George Albert Albert Smith for his innovative techniques in film making, and deservedly so. His experiments form the visual basis of modern screen grammar. Likewise, his wife, who played the sleepy, sloppy Mary Jane in this movie, give a performance that is tremendously advanced for the era. Clearly, Smith's experiments with close-up shots had convinced him that performers should keep their movements in strict bounds.
What the other reviewers have failed to mention is the essentially middle-class nature of this movie. It is not the lady of the house who blows the place up, but the maid-of-all-work. It's the perpetual complaint that "you can't get good help", usually with "anymore" appended. Not like when I was a youngster and people would murder each other to work for my grandfather. He would whip them daily, and they were grateful for it!
I used to hear the same thing when I was a child and no one thought I was listening.
What the other reviewers have failed to mention is the essentially middle-class nature of this movie. It is not the lady of the house who blows the place up, but the maid-of-all-work. It's the perpetual complaint that "you can't get good help", usually with "anymore" appended. Not like when I was a youngster and people would murder each other to work for my grandfather. He would whip them daily, and they were grateful for it!
I used to hear the same thing when I was a child and no one thought I was listening.
Quite Entertaining
Snow Leopard2 April 2002
This little feature from G.A. Smith is quite entertaining, and it is also nicely put together. Although the props and details are clearly from its own period, it also features a main character who could be at home in any era.
The story is a simple one, starting with Mary Jane (played by Smith's wife) as a kitchen maid who mugs for the camera as she goes about her chores. Although her antics are simple, it does a pretty good job for the era of making most of them work well. Then we see Mary Jane's 'mishap' and its macabre but amusing consequences.
Smith's wife proves to be a decent actress, and she makes her character pretty amusing. The mishap sequence also works well, with a clever special effect, and there is a good final gag. While it's nothing highbrow, it was made with skill, and it is still humorous nearly a century later.
The story is a simple one, starting with Mary Jane (played by Smith's wife) as a kitchen maid who mugs for the camera as she goes about her chores. Although her antics are simple, it does a pretty good job for the era of making most of them work well. Then we see Mary Jane's 'mishap' and its macabre but amusing consequences.
Smith's wife proves to be a decent actress, and she makes her character pretty amusing. The mishap sequence also works well, with a clever special effect, and there is a good final gag. While it's nothing highbrow, it was made with skill, and it is still humorous nearly a century later.
Fun, great effects
martinpersson9722 November 2023
Warning: Spoilers
This early piece of cinema is, indeed, very much worthy of looking into for any lover of film.
The script is simple, yet effective, as per usual with these early shorts - and what it offers in term of writing is pretty clever, well paced, and funny.
The effects are pretty revolutionary for its time, and you can very much see the cinematography, cutting and editing of later works taking form in ever interesting ways.
Overall, definitely a highly recommended piece, and one that I believe ever lover of film should look into, as most of these early features.
Give this a watch, for sure! The beginning of the art form.
The script is simple, yet effective, as per usual with these early shorts - and what it offers in term of writing is pretty clever, well paced, and funny.
The effects are pretty revolutionary for its time, and you can very much see the cinematography, cutting and editing of later works taking form in ever interesting ways.
Overall, definitely a highly recommended piece, and one that I believe ever lover of film should look into, as most of these early features.
Give this a watch, for sure! The beginning of the art form.
Beware the Paraffin
Tornado_Sam26 May 2017
George Albert Smith directed this rather silly comedy starring his wife playing a bucktoothed maid who lights the stove with paraffin. It is a very creative film for 1903 and using special effects and some very funny acting, it works very well.
The story-telling technique is also pretty important. While many films of the day (Melies's included) seldom used any sort of cutting to closeups and were normally very stagy, this short frequently cuts to closeup views of Mary Jane, such as when she accidentally rubs shoe-polish on her upper lip. This use of cutting makes it easier to see her facial expressions, which makes it all the more amusing. Laura Bayley does overplay the part a lot, but this sort of overacting was typical and is part of what makes the film work even today. D. W. Griffith is mostly known for innovating this kind of filmmaking, but as evidenced by this, Smith is equally important and needs more recognition.
The story-telling technique is also pretty important. While many films of the day (Melies's included) seldom used any sort of cutting to closeups and were normally very stagy, this short frequently cuts to closeup views of Mary Jane, such as when she accidentally rubs shoe-polish on her upper lip. This use of cutting makes it easier to see her facial expressions, which makes it all the more amusing. Laura Bayley does overplay the part a lot, but this sort of overacting was typical and is part of what makes the film work even today. D. W. Griffith is mostly known for innovating this kind of filmmaking, but as evidenced by this, Smith is equally important and needs more recognition.
An amusing film as well as an example of Smith being pioneering with his art
bob the moo27 February 2008
I watched this film on a DVD that was rammed with short films from the period. I didn't watch all of them as the main problem with these type of things that their value is more in their historical novelty value rather than entertainment. So to watch them you do need to be put in the correct context so that you can keep this in mind and not watch it with modern eyes. With the Primitives & Pioneers DVD collection though you get nothing to help you out, literally the films are played one after the other (the main menu option is "play all") for several hours. With this it is hard to understand their relevance and as an educational tool it falls down as it leaves the viewer to fend for themselves, which I'm sure is fine for some viewers but certainly not the majority. What it means is that the DVD saves you searching the web for the films individually by putting them all in one place but that's about it.
Casting his wife as the Mary Jane of the title, George Smith produced this engaging and technically impressive comedy. Longer than some of his other films this opens with a few minutes of his wife mugging like a good 'un with some boot polish. She is terrible by modern standards but silent movie acting is a different craft and it requires flamboyance and overacting which she delivers no doubt. After this we get some good effects as Mary Jane blows herself up leading to what I assume was a moral. However Smith marks himself out again by producing a "Carrie" moment half a century before De Palma was even put on earth.
It is a nice surprise and I'm sure it must have caused quite a stir at the time. Yet again another example of Smith being a pioneer of the art and not a bad little film at the same time.
Casting his wife as the Mary Jane of the title, George Smith produced this engaging and technically impressive comedy. Longer than some of his other films this opens with a few minutes of his wife mugging like a good 'un with some boot polish. She is terrible by modern standards but silent movie acting is a different craft and it requires flamboyance and overacting which she delivers no doubt. After this we get some good effects as Mary Jane blows herself up leading to what I assume was a moral. However Smith marks himself out again by producing a "Carrie" moment half a century before De Palma was even put on earth.
It is a nice surprise and I'm sure it must have caused quite a stir at the time. Yet again another example of Smith being a pioneer of the art and not a bad little film at the same time.
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