An Extraordinary Dislocation

An Extraordinary Dislocation (1901)

Dislocation mystérieuse

A clown performs various feats of magic based on his ability to detach and reattach different parts of his body.

Date of release
1901-02-01
TMDB
6.1 / 10 (31)
Runtime
2m
Genres
Comedy, Fantasy
Director
Georges Méliès

Casting

Interesting facts

Dislocation Extraordinary, also known as Extraordinary Illusions, is a 1901 French silent trick film by Georges Méliès. It was sold by Méliès's Star Film Company and is numbered 335–336 in its catalogues.

Production and themes

The film is one of many in which Méliès plays with the idea of living body parts separated from their body; living dismembered limbs had been a feature of stage magic for some time, notably in the work of Nevil Maskelyne, one of Méliès's major influences. For Dislocation Extraordinary, Méliès combined this stage-magic tradition with the stock character of Pierrot, a commedia dell'arte character.

The special effects were carried out with substitution splices and multiple exposures, aided by a black cloth background.

The film's Pierrot is played by André Deed, a music-hall acrobat. He worked with Méliès for some years, leaving in 1904 when he was hired by Pathé, to whom he revealed some of Méliès's secrets for special effects. Deed's later work includes the Cretinetti (Foolshead) series. Méliès returned to Dislocation Extraordinary's "free-floating limbs" in 1903, when he featured them again in his film The Infernal Cakewalk.

Read on Wikipedia · Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

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