The Mystical Flame
About The Mystical Flame
A juggler, played by Méliès, throws a skull into the air and catches a handkerchief, which he turns into a napkin and then a tablecloth. A liveried servant comes out of the cloth, brings a low table, and magic powder on it blazes up around a living woman. She dissolves when the servant proposes marriage. The juggler reappears, his chair rolls off by itself, he blows the servant away in smoke, and he dances out.
Cast & crew
More about The Mystical Flame
Star Film catalogue number 472. Sold in the United States as The Mystical Flame, and also listed as The Mysterious Fire, with Méliès as the juggler. S. Lubin handled the American release.
Themes
Making
The woman is produced in the flame, stepped down from the table to show she is alive, and then sent back up before she vanishes.
Technique
Substitution splices, multiple exposures, and dissolves carry the transformations from skull to cloth to woman.
Preservation
A print survives.
Notes
- Méliès reused this forced-perspective backdrop soon after in The Witch's Revenge.
- The American catalogue called the woman in the fire, and her fading, the main trick.
- A print survives, and the film is in the public domain in the United States.
Scenes
- Powder on the low table flares, and a woman stands in the flame.
- She fades while the servant is proposing, and the juggler's empty chair then rolls away.
