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Napoleon (1927)
Released By: MCA Universal Home Video   Rating: Not Rated   In Theaters: N/A
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Studio: MCA Universal Home Video
Genre: Drama
MPAA Rating: Not Rated
Director: Abel Gance
Language: English
Official Website: N/A
Theatrical Release: N/A
Home Video Release: N/A
Cast: Albert Dieudonne, Antonin Artaud
Published ID: 1526
UPC: 325919025312,
Plot: The chef d'ouevre of legendary French filmmaker Abel Gance, the 235-minute Napoleon was supposed to have been the first installment in a multipart film study of the French military hero. Each of the film's set pieces is treated like a movie in itself: the opening pillow fights and snowball battles, staged while Napoleon is still a schoolboy (played by Russian youth Vladimir Roudenko), are choreographed on a scale worthy of D.W. Griffith. The plot proper begins with Napoleon's adult years. From home island of Corsica, Lt. Napoleon (played as an adult by Albert Dieudonné, and old friend of Gance's) decides to side with the Republic during the French Revolution. He quickly proves his mettle in a preliminary skirmish with the British. Offered the office of commander of Paris, Napoleon declines: he does not subscribe to Reign of Terror, nor does he believe in doing battle against Frenchmen. He is thrown in prison, where he meets his wife-to-be Josephine; thanks to a series of governmental upheavals, both are set free. For the next few years, France's bureaucratic bean-counters and pencil-pushers constantly thwart Napoleon's dreams of glory. The film's climax is Napoleon's rallying of the dispirited French troops and his subsequent advance into Italy. Beyond its patriotic content, Napoléon was largely designed as a showcase for the revolutionary Polyvision process. Simply put, Polyvision utilized multiple images for dramatic effect. Sometimes this was accomplished in a fragmentary manner similar to the multiscreen techniques utilized in such 1960s films as The Thomas Crown Affair and The Boston Strangler. Polyvision could also manifest itself into a Cinerama-like triptych: three screens, side by side, sometimes offering a panorama, sometimes displaying three separate but thematically linked images. Napoleon's spectacular triptych finale was the crowning touch to the remarkable camera pyrotechnics seen throughout the film; Gance hated static scenes, so he mounted his camera on pendulums, horses, gyroscopes, et al., masterfully placing the spectator in the thick of the action. The film also boasts some of the silent era's best color tinting, with special emphasis on the red, white, and blue of the French flag. Except for limited European showings, Napoleon has not been displayed in its original form since its 1927 Paris premiere. At least 19 different versions of the film exist, some horribly mutilated (cut from 17 reels to eight) and scrambled, others haphazardly reedited by Gance himself. Filmmaker/historian Kevin Brownlow's 1968 book The Parade's Gone By renewed public interest in Gance's lost masterpiece, sparking a 15-year campaign to restore Napoleon, spearheaded by Brownlow and American director Francis Ford Coppola. The resultant restoration job is not perfect -- the triptych scenes had to be reduced to postage-stamp size because no existing screen can accommodate them -- but this Napoleon is probably the closest we'll get ever get to the original. The music for the restored version was composed by Francis Ford Coppola's father Carmine Coppola. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
IDDateTimeTitleReviewHelpfulVotesTotalVotes
This is the version we have. Watch it!
Added 6/16/2009
Yes, it's a little irritating to know that somebody, somewhere, is playing keepaway with a sizeable chunk of this jaw-dropping film, but what we have of Brownlow's labor of love is worth keeping your VCR connected for.
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
Gance's overblown masterpiece is available on DVD...
Added 1/1/2009
This is not so much a review as a notice that the "Zoetrope" version of "Napoleon" is available on DVD from Australia (I got my copy from EzyDVD). You should be able to get it for under $25. The DVD is Region 4, so you will need a multi-region DVD player, but it plays fine. I presume it is identical to this VHS version. I'm not a huge fan of this film (hence the three stars and the inevitable slating I'll receive), but it nevertheless deserves a worldwide DVD release so people can make up their own minds.
1 out of 2 people found this helpful.
Manifique!
Added 1/8/2008
Upon seeing the restored and re-released film in 1981, I placed this silent at the top of my list of favorite foreign films from the silent era. The use of triptych, color, and daring camera angles is breathtaking! Gance was one of film's innovative pioneering geniuses. Although at times the acting is a bit stilted, the viewer must remember that these actors are turn-of-the-century schooled; today's acting style is far different and more relaxed. The electricity sparks between Napoleon and Josephine. Finally, Coppola's score is unforgettable, haunting, and touching. This film is one to add to your film collection!
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
in the heart of the master pieces
Added 3/2/2007
Not only the history of Europe takes place in the images of this movie but also it is decided through the steps of a man. Like would Pierre Teilhard de Chardin say: aristogenesis.
0 out of 1 people found this helpful.
Gance needed a figure as powerful as "Napoleon" to fulfill his dream of super cinema...
Added 1/10/2007
Abel Gance's 'Napoleon' was premiered on April 7, 1927, at the Paris Opera House, the first movie to be accorded such an honor... It was been shown on a triple screen and to full orchestral accompaniment, running slightly under four hours...

Impressive as it seems, it was conceived as the first of a six-part biography running many hours and tracing the life of Napoleon from childhood to the bitter end in St Helena... Fortunately-for Abel Gance who directed and for us-the project was only completed to that moment where Napoleon enters Italy at the head of the French army, and the later and less pleasant aspects of his spectacular career were left unfilmed... The Little Corporal, after all, is a less controversial figure than the Emperor...

Gance needed a figure as emblematic and powerful as 'Napoleon' to fulfill his dream of super cinema...

'Napoleon' is a masterpiece of excess:

- The child Bonaparte keeps a pet eagle and wins a snow fight while at school in Brienne... In this sequence, the frame splits into nine subliminal images; as Napoleon watches his men entering Italy, the screen expands on each side to form a breathtaking panorama, then changes into three coordinated views of the scene...

- The National Convention seems to sway and rock as Napoleon makes his escape from Corsica in a storm-tossed sailboat...

- The Gallic of cabaret singers, Damia, leads French troops into battle personifying 'La Marseillaise'...

'Napoleon' is like one grand musical composition. It throbs with life...

That was Gance the great filmmaker who thought that film could do everything and who said to Kevin Brownlow: 'For me, the cinema is not just pictures. It is something great, mysterious and sublime.' Brownlow is known now not only as an English filmmaker and film historian but also as a great restorer of silent films, notably Abel Gance's 'Napoleon.'

1 out of 1 people found this helpful.
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