Le Tonneau des Danaïdes | 1900 | Fantasy, Comedy

Title: Le Tonneau des Danaïdes | 1900 | Fantasy, Comedy Director: Georges Méliès Studio: Star Film Company Starring: Georges Méliès Runtime: 1 Format: Silent, black-and-white, 35mm, 1.33:1 Country: France Language: Silent Genres: Fantasy, Comedy --- Chapters: 00:00:00 Stage and barrel setup 00:00:15 First entrances 00:00:35 Barrel fills 00:00:55 The reveal --- Summary: A magician presents a large barrel on a raised platform and invites eight women to enter it one after another. The barrel never appears to fill, creating the illusion of impossible capacity before the performer displays it to the audience. The short exemplifies Méliès’s stage-inspired screen magic, using precise staging and editing to produce a compact spectacle built around a single visual idea. --- Background: Produced and released by Méliès’s Star Film Company in 1900, the film belongs to his fantastique and comic trick-film vein, in which theatrical illusions were adapted to the new medium of cinema. The title alludes to the mythic Danaids, though the action is structured as a self-contained stage illusion. The film is frequently presented in curated compilations of Méliès’s shorts. --- Trivia: Surviving prints run roughly one minute; Il Cinema Ritrovato lists a duration of about 1 minute 17 seconds. Alternate English titles include The Dainaid’s Barrel and Eight Girls in a Barrel. The title refers to the Greek myth of the Danaids, who were condemned to the futile task of filling a bottomless vessel, an echo of the film’s “inexhaustible” barrel. A contemporary still from the film is preserved on Wikimedia Commons. The short appears in educational and broadcast anthologies of Méliès’s work, including selections presented by Arte/Educ.ARTE. --- Public Domain / Rights: Original Release: 1900 Original Studio / Distributor: Star Film Company Copyright Status: Public Domain Renewal: No --- Hashtags: GeorgesMelies SilentFilm PublicDomain FrenchCinema 1900 TrickFilm ShortFilm FilmHistory This video was sourced from Internet Archive. Originally uploaded by Georges Méliès. https://archive.org/details/le-tonneau-des-danaides-directed-by-georges-melies