The Reign of Terror
About The Reign of Terror
In Paris in March 1793, the Knight of Maison-Rouge, calling himself Citizen Morand, tries to get Marie-Antoinette out of the Temple. His brother-in-law Dixmer, a tanner who poses as a fierce republican, and Dixmer's wife Geneviève, the knight's sister, are in the plot. Lieutenant Maurice Lindey saves Geneviève from arrest. She is married to Dixmer without love and falls for Lindey, who loves her back. A tunnel is dug from a house Dixmer rents toward the Tower of the Temple. The rescue attempts fail. The queen faces the guillotine, and Lindey is pulled into the plot.
Cast & crew
More about The Reign of Terror
Albert Capellani directed and wrote the scenario from Alexandre Dumas's novel Le Chevalier de Maison-Rouge. Pathé issued it as a historical film in six parts and 60 tableaux, catalog number 6548, at 2,242 meters. Louis Forestier photographed it. Il Cinema Ritrovato times a print at 109 minutes at 18 frames per second. It opened at the start of 1914. The French title is Le Chevalier de Maison-Rouge.
Themes
Background
The story is set in the Terror, with the queen held in the Temple and a royalist plot running through a tanner's house.
Making
Capellani built the Revolution picture as a long Pathé literary adaptation, in the same line as the company's Mysteries of Paris, Les Misérables, and Germinal.
Reviews
The Bioscope (5 March 1914) treated the film as a major Pathé production and singled out the care of the settings and the acting.
Look
Louis Forestier photographed the studio sets and the exteriors.
Preservation
The Cinémathèque Française preserved the negative in 1987 and restored the film in 2010. A copy is on Wikimedia Commons.
Notes
- Paul Escoffier plays the knight, also called Citizen Morand. Marie-Louise Derval plays Geneviève Dixmer. Georges Dorival plays Dixmer. Henri Rollan plays Maurice Lindey. Léa Piron plays Marie-Antoinette. Mévisto plays Citizen Rocher. Jean Jacquinet plays General Santerre.
- The Bioscope of March 5, 1914, reviewed it under the heading 'A Wonderful Drama of the French Revolution' and wrote about the settings and the acting, including the extras.
- The Cinémathèque Française preserved the negative in 1987, then the only element known, and reconstructed the film in 2010.
Scenes
- The knight enters Paris as Citizen Morand.
- Workers dig a tunnel from Dixmer's rented house toward the Tower of the Temple.
- Lindey stops Geneviève's arrest and is drawn into the plot.
Influenced by
- Le Chevalier de Maison-Rouge (novel by Alexandre Dumas)
Also available
- Wikimedia Commons (Le Chevalier de Maison-Rouge (1914).webm)
