Georges Méliès

L’Affaire Dreyfus, Attentat contre maître Labori, 1899, 1m01s
Star Film Catalogue No. 212

Rennes, 14 August 1899. Maître Labori (Alfred Dreyfus’s lawyer), Colonel Picquart (the man who unmasked the real forger), M. Gast (Mayor of Rennes) and an unidentified woman are walking near a bridge. They stop for a chat, and the woman leaves. A man creeps up behind them, behaving suspiciously, but although the trio notice him, they don’t think anything of it. They turn to walk across the bridge, whereupon the man draws a gun and shoots Labori twice in the back. He runs off, pursued by Labori’s companions. Labori lies on the ground in agony, trying and failing to attract the attention of two passers-by - but a third comes to his assistance, and calls for help.

As with Suicide of Colonel Henry (L’Affaire Dreyfus, Suicide du Colonel Henry, 1899), this latest instalment of Georges Méliès’s Dreyfus Affair serial temporarily moves away from Dreyfus himself to focus on one of the supporting characters - in this case his lawyer, Maître Fernand Labori (1860-1917), who had already been depicted in the previous film, Dreyfus Meets His Wife At Rennes (L’Affaire Dreyfus, Entrevue de Dreyfus et de sa femme à Rennes, 1899).

However, his appearance here is in altogether more dramatic circumstances, since Méliès reconstructs an assassination attempt that befell Labori in real life on 14 August 1899, a week after Dreyfus’s second trial had commenced. However, the wounds proved superficial, and Labori was back in action by the 22nd. No less a figure than Marcel Proust claimed that the attempt on Labori’s life gave him an increased moral stature, since it proved that he was prepared to shed blood for the cause. One of Labori’s two companions is Georges Picquart (1854-1914), a crucial figure in the Dreyfus saga since it was he who first unmasked the real author of the ‘bordereau’, the incriminating document depicted in Dreyfus Court Martial - Arrest Of Dreyfus (L’Affaire Dreyfus, La dictée du bordereau, 1899).

In terms of mise en scène, the film’s action is played out against a backdrop of the bridge at Rennes, with another painted flat to the left creating a side alley for the would-be assassin to escape down. As in Landing Of Dreyfus At Quiberon (L’Affaire Dreyfus, Débarquement à Quiberon, 1899), Méliès is keen to establish at least a sense of realism, with various passers-by crossing the frame at regular intervals. The assailant himself, with his theatrically furtive, quasi-Groucho Marx stoop, is straight out of a comic strip caricature, but he’s on screen relatively briefly. There is a plausible rumour that Méliès himself is playing Labori.

The film then turns to an intriguing coda, taking up almost a third of the running time, whereby two passers-by completely ignore Labori as he’s writhing in agony on the ground. There’s a passing possibility that this might be deliberate (Labori would have been an extremely well known figure in Rennes by this stage of the trial), though it’s more likely that they simply don’t want to be involved. However, the third - dressed altogether more raffishly and with long hair and a beard - more than makes up for this by sounding the alarm.

Aside from some forgivable damage (mild blotching and scratching), this is one of the better prints in Flicker Alley’s Dreyfus cycle, resolving so much fine detail that it’s all too easy to see the join between the painted backdrop and the studio floor. Eric Beheim’s electronic score begins in chirpy early-morning mode before becoming more agitated during and after the assassination attempt, though it eschews overt nudging in a particular direction.

Links

• Internet Movie Database entry.
• BFI Film and TV Database entry on the whole cycle (including an invaluable synopsis sourced from assorted catalogues)
• Dreyfus Rehabilitated - a huge site about the Dreyfus affair that includes biographies of Fernand Labori and Georges Picquart.
• Wikipedia on the Dreyfus affair
• Who’s Who of Victorian Cinema - Stephen Bottomore’s entry on Dreyfus, which is a condensation of his Sight & Sound article.