This colorful and creative Georges Méliès feature takes a basic gag idea and uses it as the basis for several minutes of interesting and entertaining camera tricks. It is also one of the few surviving Méliès movies that have hand-tinted color, and while the color of the print has now somewhat faded, it still looks good enough to enhance the overall effect.
The story starts with a man renting an unfurnished room, and then most of it is simply a wide variety of visual effects as the tenant furnishes his new apartment with things that he amazingly pulls out of a carpetbag. It's interesting and very detailed, and if you've ever seen "Mary Poppins", the basic effect is remarkably similar to the scene in which Mary moves into the Banks home and furnishes her room. The special effects in Méliès's movie are not as polished, but on the other hand it gets even more mileage out of the idea.
This feature was made somewhat later than were most of Méliès's best-known movies, but it's easily one of the finest efforts of his later years as a film-maker. It takes one basic idea and makes it into an interesting and imaginative film.
The story starts with a man renting an unfurnished room, and then most of it is simply a wide variety of visual effects as the tenant furnishes his new apartment with things that he amazingly pulls out of a carpetbag. It's interesting and very detailed, and if you've ever seen "Mary Poppins", the basic effect is remarkably similar to the scene in which Mary moves into the Banks home and furnishes her room. The special effects in Méliès's movie are not as polished, but on the other hand it gets even more mileage out of the idea.
This feature was made somewhat later than were most of Méliès's best-known movies, but it's easily one of the finest efforts of his later years as a film-maker. It takes one basic idea and makes it into an interesting and imaginative film.