Cinema's first pictorial director, Maurice Tourneur, produced one of his most extravagant creations in Paramount Pictures March 1918 "The Blue Bird." Using every special effect trick in the book, Tourneur emerged with an enduring children's classic that have some ranking it as one of the best fantasies ever seen on the screen.
Based on symbolist Maurice Maeterlinck's 1908 play of the same name, "The Blue Bird" is about two well-off children who refuse to lend their pet bird to a less fortunate neighbor for the day. That night while sleeping, the two experience a dreamy Dante-like journey through three phases of the spiritual world, escorted by a fairy. Upon waking up, the siblings become aware of the preciousness of a loving and giving heart.
Behind Tourneur's on-screen magic was his favorite art director Ben Carre, who designed his sets in astral perspectives. Labeled the "poet of the screen," Tourneur stood apart from his contemporaries by framing his multiple images of costumed actors and special effects in a unique aesthetic atmosphere.
"The most beautiful shots I ever saw on the screen were in Tourneur's pictures," claimed director Clarence Brown. "He was more on the ball photographically than any other director." Tourneur's influence is enormous in modern cinema. Today's Harry Potter films, the movies of director Guillermo del Toro as well as most fantasy motion pictures have been impacted by Tourneur. He went on to make several additional highly-regarded movies in Hollywood, but his creativeness was never shown in a more positive light than in "The Blue Bird" and in his previous Mary Pickford movie, 1917's "The Poor Little Rich Girl."
To appreciate Tourneur's skill, a viewer only has to look at two later versions of "The Blue Bird," Shirley Temple's 1940 film and Elizabeth Taylor's (with Jane Fonda, Ava Garner and Cicely Tyson) 1976 movie to see his 1918 motion picture is far superior than those expensive remakes.
Based on symbolist Maurice Maeterlinck's 1908 play of the same name, "The Blue Bird" is about two well-off children who refuse to lend their pet bird to a less fortunate neighbor for the day. That night while sleeping, the two experience a dreamy Dante-like journey through three phases of the spiritual world, escorted by a fairy. Upon waking up, the siblings become aware of the preciousness of a loving and giving heart.
Behind Tourneur's on-screen magic was his favorite art director Ben Carre, who designed his sets in astral perspectives. Labeled the "poet of the screen," Tourneur stood apart from his contemporaries by framing his multiple images of costumed actors and special effects in a unique aesthetic atmosphere.
"The most beautiful shots I ever saw on the screen were in Tourneur's pictures," claimed director Clarence Brown. "He was more on the ball photographically than any other director." Tourneur's influence is enormous in modern cinema. Today's Harry Potter films, the movies of director Guillermo del Toro as well as most fantasy motion pictures have been impacted by Tourneur. He went on to make several additional highly-regarded movies in Hollywood, but his creativeness was never shown in a more positive light than in "The Blue Bird" and in his previous Mary Pickford movie, 1917's "The Poor Little Rich Girl."
To appreciate Tourneur's skill, a viewer only has to look at two later versions of "The Blue Bird," Shirley Temple's 1940 film and Elizabeth Taylor's (with Jane Fonda, Ava Garner and Cicely Tyson) 1976 movie to see his 1918 motion picture is far superior than those expensive remakes.