Sometimes you get struck by an existential terror so acute the only remedy is a good old fashioned fairy tale. And since I found a whole Lotte Reiniger collection while trying to justify continuing to pay for a Criterion subscription, and since actually using said subscription is a great reason to keep paying for it, I figured why not watch The Very First fairy tale cartoon (as far as we Know).
When you hear ‘oldest surviving animated feature film’ you expect more historical curiosity than real entertainment but please believe me: this rules. It’s just plain old fairy tale fun. There’s an evil wizard, an abrasive but helpful witch, a beautiful demon princess, a flying horse, Aladdin for some reason. So much of the creature design is so fun. The hairy elephant thing that Achmed saves Aladdin from is so good. The evil wizard turns into a pointy toothed kangaroo at one point and that too, is just delightful.
The animation, too, is just really cool. As with any stop motion adjacent thing, you spend a good chunk of time trying to figure out how the hell they did some of this. Some of the movements are so smooth it’s hard to remember it’s all paper, and some moments, like Achemed’s rippling cape, or the witch wriggling her nose, seem constructed simply to show off how far this art form could be pushed with the technology of the time. And it really is Quite Impressive.
The two shorts I watched before I got sick of wearing my headphones were ‘The Flying Coffer’ and ‘The Marquise’s Secret.’ The former is a Chinese fairytale, the latter? A skincare ad. And I must say, if someone sold me skincare with cool little papercut puppet things maybe I would care more about skincare. Probably not. But maybe! ‘The Flyer Coffer’ is….rough. Tonally inconsistent and drops a plotline halfway through. But it’s also one of her earlier works and like. I wouldn’t want to be judged on my so-so early work either. It will be interesting to see the rest of the shorts in conjuncture with the feature film, the progression in quality ip to it.
Anyways: I do rec these! At least Prince Achmed. It’s super fun. Just keep in mind that like, it is an Orientalist fairytale from 1929 and adjust content expectations accordingly. You already know if this is a thing you’d enjoy, really. If you, like me, have been thinking about watching this for a while and putting it off because very old films sometimes feel a little like homework: this one’s just fun! Give it a try!
Signing off,
Marlowe
Marlowe Writes 