Pathe developed a stencil tinting process sometime around 1905 which they felt gave them a competitive edge and made a number of films featuring fantastic scenarios that enabled them to include all number of garish colours to dazzle the audience's eyes. Here we have an Arabian Nights type of story in which a wizard steals a Rajah's casket. The film mixes interior and exterior scenes, and a number of trick effects that were no doubt acceptable for its day but look pretty amateurish today. Then, of course, once the stolen loot has been recovered, we are treated to Pathe's dancing girls. In the print I saw on the internet all the girls body flesh (i.e top of chest and legs) had been crudely painted over in red which was a little distracting to say the least. However, by the time the girls appear the story is effectively over anyway.
4 Reviews
Dazzling use of hand-tinted colour.
F Gwynplaine MacIntyre18 January 2008
I saw an incomplete version of this film in July 1996 at the Cinema Ritrovato festival in Bologna; they screened a 6-minute fragment (from the archives of Cinematheque Suisse) that had no captions. At the beginning of the fragment is a brief shot of a girl holding a card marked "Entr'acte" ... implying that this surviving fragment is the beginning of the film's second half.
'The Casket of the Rajah' appears to be a trick film similar to what Georges Melies was producing at this time, but with the atmosphere of the Arabian Nights: I was reminded of Raoul Walsh's wonderful 'Thief of Bagdad' film (which I much prefer to the Michael Powell one, even though I'm a fan of Powell).
Judging from this fragment, the entire film seems to be merely a vehicle for illusions and spectacles. An evil magician visits the rajah's palace to perform his magic tricks, but he also steals a valuable casket ... making his getaway aboard a dragon. The rajah pursues the wizard to a subterranean cavern which is full of dancing girls ... well, it would be, wouldn't it?
The magic tricks and the special effects in this 1906 effort are all -- by 21st-century standards -- very crude: the wizard's dragon seen here is much less impressive than the one in Fritz Lang's 'Siegfried' only a few years later. What's truly dazzling (in the print which I viewed) is the spectacular hand-tinting. The film-makers had the sense to use this conservatively in the early sequences. When the wizard's magic flame burns red and yellow, the effect is more impressive because the rest of the frame is monochrome. Later, as the wizard escapes on a green dragon (that breathes red flame), the wizard's robes become yellow and pink. Still later, the dancers' costumes change colour as they whirl like dervishes.
Although I found this extremely impressive, I was aware of the labour behind it. Women and girls were paid a pittance to ruin their eyesight, painstakingly hand-colouring one frame at a time ... taking days and weeks to create an effect which lasts only a few seconds on the screen. But that effect is very impressive indeed. However, since I saw only a brief fragment of this entire film, I shan't rate the movie.
'The Casket of the Rajah' appears to be a trick film similar to what Georges Melies was producing at this time, but with the atmosphere of the Arabian Nights: I was reminded of Raoul Walsh's wonderful 'Thief of Bagdad' film (which I much prefer to the Michael Powell one, even though I'm a fan of Powell).
Judging from this fragment, the entire film seems to be merely a vehicle for illusions and spectacles. An evil magician visits the rajah's palace to perform his magic tricks, but he also steals a valuable casket ... making his getaway aboard a dragon. The rajah pursues the wizard to a subterranean cavern which is full of dancing girls ... well, it would be, wouldn't it?
The magic tricks and the special effects in this 1906 effort are all -- by 21st-century standards -- very crude: the wizard's dragon seen here is much less impressive than the one in Fritz Lang's 'Siegfried' only a few years later. What's truly dazzling (in the print which I viewed) is the spectacular hand-tinting. The film-makers had the sense to use this conservatively in the early sequences. When the wizard's magic flame burns red and yellow, the effect is more impressive because the rest of the frame is monochrome. Later, as the wizard escapes on a green dragon (that breathes red flame), the wizard's robes become yellow and pink. Still later, the dancers' costumes change colour as they whirl like dervishes.
Although I found this extremely impressive, I was aware of the labour behind it. Women and girls were paid a pittance to ruin their eyesight, painstakingly hand-colouring one frame at a time ... taking days and weeks to create an effect which lasts only a few seconds on the screen. But that effect is very impressive indeed. However, since I saw only a brief fragment of this entire film, I shan't rate the movie.
Aside from having absolutely no idea what was happening, it wasn't that bad a film!
planktonrules15 February 2014
Gaston Velle directed this insanely confusing film. There are no intertitle cards, so understanding what is occurring just isn't possible. This was annoying and I am curious how audiences reacted to this back in the day, as I cannot see how they would have understood it either.
The action seems to begin in some young rajah's court. I have no idea who he is, but some horned guy on a flying dragon-like creature holding a chest (this must be the rajah's casket...or not). Soon the young ruler and one of his people leave the palace to look for this horny guy. When they find him in the caves, the chest opens and dancing girls pop out. Soon, everybody is dancing and the film ends.
Aside from a few nice pieces of trick photography and some hand-stenciled color, there just isn't much to admire in this confusing mess.
The action seems to begin in some young rajah's court. I have no idea who he is, but some horned guy on a flying dragon-like creature holding a chest (this must be the rajah's casket...or not). Soon the young ruler and one of his people leave the palace to look for this horny guy. When they find him in the caves, the chest opens and dancing girls pop out. Soon, everybody is dancing and the film ends.
Aside from a few nice pieces of trick photography and some hand-stenciled color, there just isn't much to admire in this confusing mess.
Weird Arabian Nights Story
Tornado_Sam21 April 2018
Warning: Spoilers
"The Rajah's Casket" is a rather strange little film directed by Gaston Velle and produced by Charles Pathé in 1906. According to one of the other reviewers, the surviving footage of the film is fragmentary and most of the movie does not survive despite a somewhat coherent story. This is understandable because while it might appear complete, the film is rather straightforward in its storytelling and over in just a couple minutes--not including the rather lengthy section with the dancing girls at the end--so it is clear that there were a number of other scenes now lost from the print. It is thus probable that this was one of Pathé's 'full-length' fantasy features, maybe originally ten or twelve minutes.
The story deals with a sorcerer who comes to a Rajah's castle to entertain, and steals the Rajah's casket of the title. He makes his getaway on a cardboard cut-out dragon--a bad effect but at least breathing smoke out of its nostrils. A couple henchmen then go after the sorcerer and get the casket back, destroying the sorcerer in the process. And, for no reason at all, the dancing girls come out of the casket to finish with the grand apotheosis, typical of most early fantasy films due to mainly deriving from stage plays.
The surviving print is also poorly colored and sometimes not colored at all. Oddly, what color there is does not appear to be stencil-color which Pathé pioneered earlier in the 1900s, and goes for a sloppier style of splashing red paint onto the dancing girls. (As another reviewer said, this may have been to cover up the naughty bits although it may have also been for part of their costumes). In addition, while quite stagy, there is at least one innovative outdoor shot as the henchmen begin their journey, which sticks out from the rest of the theatricality this short is. As it is, the surviving footage is interesting and while the movie is not all there, the basic story is at least understandable.
The story deals with a sorcerer who comes to a Rajah's castle to entertain, and steals the Rajah's casket of the title. He makes his getaway on a cardboard cut-out dragon--a bad effect but at least breathing smoke out of its nostrils. A couple henchmen then go after the sorcerer and get the casket back, destroying the sorcerer in the process. And, for no reason at all, the dancing girls come out of the casket to finish with the grand apotheosis, typical of most early fantasy films due to mainly deriving from stage plays.
The surviving print is also poorly colored and sometimes not colored at all. Oddly, what color there is does not appear to be stencil-color which Pathé pioneered earlier in the 1900s, and goes for a sloppier style of splashing red paint onto the dancing girls. (As another reviewer said, this may have been to cover up the naughty bits although it may have also been for part of their costumes). In addition, while quite stagy, there is at least one innovative outdoor shot as the henchmen begin their journey, which sticks out from the rest of the theatricality this short is. As it is, the surviving footage is interesting and while the movie is not all there, the basic story is at least understandable.
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