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Adventures of William Tell
The scene opens in an artist's studio where the unfinished statue of William Tell stands upon a pedestal. A clown appears and sticks a clay arm and clay head on the statue, thus completing it. He places a large brick on top of the head to make it stick. When he turns his back the statue turns into a living representation of William Tell. (Edison Catalog)
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Reviews
An absolute waste of money
In other words,this film is a surreal ride.
The biggest problem with this movie is it’s a little better than you think it might be, which somehow makes it worse. As in, it takes itself a bit too seriously, which makes most of the movie feel kind of dull.
It is interesting even when nothing much happens, which is for most of its 3-hour running time. Read full review
This is pretty funny. Another uncooperative statue like in the Pygmalion story, except in this one there is a kind of monster-man made from different parts. The things is that it's not too happy to be brought to life and resents the clown who is building him and strikes back. Now, wasn't William Tell a great archer who shoots an apple off his son's head? Other than putting a rock or something on this thing's head, there is absolutely nothing to connect it to the classic story.
Watching this short film, which runs for slightly under a minute, I rather thought of the creation of Frankenstein's monster than of Guillaume Tell to be honest. If the title didn't suggest it I'd really have never considered the creature to be the Swiss national hero. Anyway, the short film is an okay watch at best. Méliès has done better and worse on many occasions. The possibly most interesting thing was the frequent use of stunt dolls in this one, especially during that scene where Tell literally beats the living crap out of the clown. I took me definitely by surprise. It must be one of the most violent scenes from movies of the 19th century. Of course there's a shooting or beheading here and there and some boxing footage, but this was entirely different and came almost out of nowhere.
Adventures of William Tell (1898) *** (out of 4) aka Guillaume Tell et le clown A clown finds some body parts on the floor and puts them together building a man who eventually comes to life. This is a pretty good film from the great Melies and the special effects are nice but not among his greatest work. The editing is a lot more noticeable here than in other shorts so this takes some of the magic away but the film remains entertaining. The best sequence is when the man gets tired of the clown and just beats the pulp out of him. The effects here are much better done. There are plenty of laughs throughout and that charm of Melies is on full display.
