Au secours! (1924)
Directed by Abel Gance

Film Review

Between his two most celebrated films, La Roue (1923) and Napoléon (1927), the avant-garde filmmaker Abel Gance knocked out this amusing short film, reputedly as a result of a bet with the comic star Max Linder that he couldn't make a film within three days.  This was to be one of Linder's last films - he committed suicide with his wife the following year (on 31st October), unable to cope with his violent mood swings.  Au secours! (1924) is an atypical piece for Linder, more serious that most of his work.  In some scenes, the film is genuinely disturbing, although it does allow the comic genius plenty of opportunity to display his unrivalled penchant for unpredictable slapstick.

Whilst the film was obviously made in a hurry, Gance still manages to impress with his artistic flair and inventiveness, employing some of his familiar motifs for both dramatic and comedic effect.  The long point-of-view tracking shot which takes us to the haunted castle has become one of the standard clichés of the horror genre, and the multiple exposure which Gance employed so successfully on J'Accuse (1919) to animate the skeletons of the dead is reused here to create a similar ghoulish effect.  The most sublime visual gag is the one where Max leaps up onto a chandelier and goes up and down like a yoyo, compressing and stretching the field of view like a concertina as he does so.  Most of the other gags date back to Georges Méliès, although Gance and Linder hone them to perfection - the one where Max knocks the head off a waxwork footman is horrifically convincing. 

Like its comic star, Au secours! is a film with a dangerously split personality.  In the last few minutes of the film, it becomes noticeably darker in tone, and Max looks genuinely terrified as a truly gruesome Neanderthal-like monstrosity suddenly starts to menace his wife.  Of course there's a final devious twist and it all ends with smiles, but before we get there Gance and Linder do their damnedest to scare us out of our wits.  Not only is this one of the first comedy-horror films, it is unquestionably one of the most enjoyable and most visually interesting.  You would expect nothing less from two of the unrivalled giants of silent cinema.

Film Synopsis

Max is relaxing on honeymoon with his bride Renée when he suddenly feels inclined to drop in on his club.  He arrives at the club just as the Count de Mornay offers a bet that no one can spend a night in his haunted castle.  Max accepts the wager, which only requires him to spend one hour in the castle (from 11 pm until midnight) without calling on his friends for help.  But within minutes of his arrival at the castle, Max is tormented by ghostly apparitions and menacing monstrosities.  Yet he is determined to win his bet, and even when he knows his life may be in peril he refuses to call for help.  Then, just a few minutes before midnight, he receives a phone call from his wife.  In a panic, she appeals to him for help, telling him that a grotesque fiend is menacing her in her bedroom...