20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1907) User Reviews

20,000 Leagues Under the Sea: Charmingly naff

[Platypuschow · 5/10 · 23 January 2019]

This is now the oldest feature I've ever seen beating my previous record of 1915 and in its defense it did kind of exceed my self imposed low expectations.

A french short standing around the 10 minute mark it is the first on screen adaptation of the Jules Verne classic of the same name.

A loose adaptation it see's one mans journey into the depths as he comes face to face with mermaids, seahorses and all manner of aquatic life.

Being 1907 as you can imagine the sfx are limited but in their defense they're better than I expected. However on the flip side the camera quality is appalling, very dark in some places while oddly light in others causing it to be rather difficult to follow what's going on at times. Granted this is to be expected but it doesn't take away from my previous statement.

Also as you'd expect this is a silent film (In the literal sense so no music either). This is something I can only take in very small doses (Which this is) as I find sitting in silence rather frustrating.

This is a harmless 10 minutes that will be very eye opening to anyone unfamiliar with early cinema.

The Good:

Certainly has its charm

SFX are quite good all things considered

The Bad:

Hard to make out a lot of what is taking place

Silence is deafening

Amusing, only if one can tolerate its atrocious picture quality

[Zbigniew_Krycsiwiki · 6/10 · 30 May 2014]

Short film has little to do with Verne's original story, but it is still amusing, if one can tolerate its atrocious picture quality. If you can, you'll faintly see mermaids dancing a few feet under "water", before the lead does battle with octopodes (not "octopi", even though that does sound funnier) and we wake up, to find it was all just a dream.

This film is said to be incomplete, with only ten minutes' worth of its supposed original eighteen minutes runtime known to exist, and what footage does still remain is in a horrible, degenerate state. Scenes are very blurry and washed out, much of the footage is almost completely white, and nearly unwatchable. Blurry, high contrast, flickery, and without any real detail at all, this looks like a high generation copy. Some segments look like they have been solarised. The dancing girls drift in and out of focus, which does add a bit of an eerie effect to their segment, but probably was not meant to have such an effect. The sets and costumes look like they might have been impressive for a 1907 production, but again it's difficult to tell with such poor quality film- all the more reason why a restoration would be beneficial.

For fans of Méliès' trick photography, and fans of very old cinema, this may hold some appeal, but be prepared to endure a poor quality print before you dive in to this one.

A misleading French title...

[planktonrules · 6/10 · 20 September 2011]

Oddly, the English title for this is "Under the Seas"--even though the French title is translated as "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" ("Deux Cent Milles Sous les Mers"). However, when you see the film, you see that it really has nothing to do with the Verne novel--and the English title was more appropriate and less misleading.

When the film begins, it's obvious that this one is in among the worst condition of any of the films from this Georges Méliès DVD collection. It's very fuzzy and bleached out--and it's a real shame. As the rest of the films looked like they'd been restored, perhaps this one was beyond their ability to repair.

Like some of the shorts on the "Georges Méliès Encore" DVD, this one has optional narration in order to explain what is occurring. While normally I don't recommend it, in this case it's worth using (at least in the beginning). A man enters a sub and the submarine slowly descends as the crowd watches. Then, you see what is supposed to be an underwater scene. It's done using stop-motion, real fish and painted images. It must have been pretty cool back in 1907--but it looks pretty dated today. Then, things get weird. Starfish turn into dancing girls--yes, dancing girls! Sadly, the ship scares them off! But, at least the guy in the boat gets to see some mermaids--and leaves the boat (and seems to be breathing just fine!). Then, he wanders about the set--acting as if he's seeing a magical underwater garden. A bit later, he's attacked by octopi--who also turn into women. How can all this be?! Not a bad film by 1907's standards, but the underwater scenes when seen today are amazingly cheesy and a bit quaint. Worth seeing, but not exactly among Georges Méliès best.

Sea Fantasy

[Cineanalyst · 21 August 2013]

Movies based under the depths of the sea were hokey stuff before the brothers George and Ernest Williamson invented underwater photography for Universal's adaptation of Jules Verne's work, "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" (1916). Méliès' films were often aimed towards children and the otherwise inclined to playful humor, so there's really nothing anymore fake or silly about Méliès having a man, with no underwater gear on, fighting creatures on the seafloor, than there is with characters on the Moon, in outer space, Hell and elsewhere in his other fantasy-adventure films. On the other hand, perhaps this one makes more nonsense than usual, and that's why it's framed as a dream.

Two superior underwater early films are Méliès's own "The Kingdom of the Fairies" (Le royaume des fees) (1903) and Pathé's "Down in the Deep" (Le pêcheur de perles) (1907). Pathé's film is especially similar to "Under the Seas" in that there's a man underwater encountering much nonsense, but Pathé's film includes more-cinematic effects, including some of the tricks Méliès had been using for years to better effect in other movies.

(Note: The print available from the Flicker Alley DVDs is in very bad shape--having a bleached look that makes it difficult to view. Some other prints on these DVDs include severe bleeding of the filmstrip and still others only exist as fragments of their originals. I say this as a compliment to those behind the collection of Méliès DVDs--allowing those interested to become near-completists of the cinema magician's existing oeuvre.)

The First Film Adaptation Of The Jules Verne Sci-fi Classic

[IPreferEvidence · 6/10 · 22 July 2011]

Its looks awesome as many other Melies' films do but its hardly very true to the book.

Obviously you can't go that deep into the book in such a short time but as some other films like Frankenstein(1910) managed to do it so I don't see why Melies couldn't other than the fact that this is from a time when title cards were not used yet.

Basically what we get is a montage of Melies style painted backgrounds and creatures which keeps you interested for a few minutes.

Recommended for fans of OLD sci-fi and fans Melies or Verne, or if you just have a few minutes to spare

Early 'underwater' adventure from Georges Méliès

[jamesrupert2014 · 6/10 · 26 February 2020]

Yves (Manual), a fisherman, dreams that he is taken by a sea-nymph to a submarine and appointed captain. He departs for the depths with a crew of women and encounters surreal visions of dancing naiads (ballerinas from the Théâtre du Châtelet). Unfortunately Yves wrecks the submarine (not shown) and sinks to the bottom where he is accosted by giant fish and crabs before exploring the fantastical sea-bottom. He eventually is attacked by an octopus as the undersea denizens and Gods take revenge for all the fish he has taken from their watery home. Finally he awakens. Clearly inspired by Méliès' famous countryman Jules Verne's best known book '20,000 Leagues Under the Sea', (hence the parodying alternate French title 'Deux cent mille lieues sous les mers'), the film is an imaginative fantasy although by 1907, submarines were real and look little like the film's fanciful craft. There are a variety of special effects including superimposition of the submarine over images of real fish. The version I watched was washed-out in places and, although not one of the auteur's best fantasy films, the old film is still enjoyable in a quaint, nostalgic way.

20,000 Dancing Girls Under the Sea

[Hitchcoc · 5/10 · 23 May 2015]

Pretty much the same as the Trip to the Moon, only now we are heading in the other direction. A man who seems to be a mime gets in a submarine after dancing around and bowing and showing off in front of another array of women, wearing a kind of military uniform. Before he reaches the bottom, we see all kinds of sea creatures floating around (cardboard cut outs, I guess) and, most importantly, mermaids (dancing girls). In reality, a third of this already short feature is a bunch of prancing and posing. Once our hero gets to the bottom, he is inundated with dangerous fish, crabs, and anemones. This has nothing to do with the Jules Verne book, but Melies probably could have cared less. It's another groundbreaking little film, though it is none the worse for wear. It also has the most tired of clichéd endings.

Melies Skips the Moon and Heads Under the Sea

[PCC0921 · 7/10 · 21 November 2022]

The film industry was only 11 years old at this point in time. Film director and illusionist, Georges Melies had already made hundreds, maybe thousands of films, by this point in film history. It is a shame the quality of this film (at least the version I saw), is so bad today. This film has not weathered the sands of time well. From what I have read, the current state of this film is missing certain parts to it. Parts that may be lost forever. The full runtime was 14 minutes, but only ten minutes has survived to today. There is a whole beginning that is missing. The whole point of the film is a fisherman falls asleep and dreams all of what is happening, which you never see in the film's current condition. The version I saw also looked like the emulsion was wearing off on the film cells. The whites and blacks were very muddy and the exposure seemed way blown out.

The film follows many of Melies cliches', like dancing girls leading a parade, of sorts, as the crew climbs onto the submarine, that takes them on this adventure. Dancing creatures are found on their mission too. Lots of parading and celebrating. It is reminiscent of Melies' legendary, A Trip to the Moon (1902), but by 1907 was starting to look repetitive. Being an illusionist, he utilized a lot of the spectacle of theater in a lot of his films. He always had dancing or singing acts set up on a stage in between the moments of fantasy. It was the special effects he used, which was really the draw for his films. It was the experimentation by a pioneering spirit, that was his strong point.

This film is no where near as good as A Trip to the Moon (1902), but is still an important artifact to see. Being based off of Jules Verne literary classic makes it interesting to see. First off, it is considered a parody, so don't feel that the subject matter is silly. It's supposed to be. One particular thing that caught my eye was seeing our hero, Ives, the fisherman, searching through a cave full of treasure. If you look closely and the bright emulsion lets up just a little, you can see that Ives is wearing a horizontally striped shirt. Even though this film is in black and white, it clearly foreshadows the famous red and white shirt that Kirk Douglas wears, in the famous Disney film, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954). Even though Douglas' character is named Ned, it still shows a connection to this film, with the striped shirt. This film is still a must see. Hopefully someone finds a better copy in a closet or an old factory somewhere.

6.9 (C MyGrade) = 7 IMDB.

Melies Take on the Novel

[Michael_Elliott · 27 August 2011]

20000 lieues sous les mers (1907)

*** (out of 4)

aka 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea

There's no question that this adaptation if more Melies than Jules Verne so fans of the classic novel really shouldn't come here expecting some sort of faithful version. What we see is the maker of a submarine who takes it to the bottom of the ocean where he witnesses various things ranging from mermaids to giant fish to sea horses. While at the bottom of the sea the man must figure out a way to reach land again. At just over 10-minutes there's obviously not enough time to be faithful to the novel but at the same time I don't think Melies would have been faithful had the film ran for two-hours. It's pretty clear that Melies is just wanting to use his bag of tricks at the bottom of the ocean and for the most part this makes for some entertainment. One scene that isn't very entertaining is a rather long sequence where we see some females doing a dance at the bottom of the ocean. I think the film is at its best when the director shows off the creations including the giant fish and a giant crab who attacks our hero. It should go without saying but these creatures certainly don't look real by today's standards but I think they contain a certain charm that really adds some value to the movie. The film never becomes too long, which is certainly a good thing and fans of science fiction should be entertained throughout.

Fragmentary Dream Film Unrelated to Verne

[Tornado_Sam · 1 August 2018]

By 1907 in the career of the French filmmaker Georges Méliès, a variety of factors had shifted since the late 1890's and early 1900's, which were now serving as the boundaries of the great Cinemagician's success. Years before, the fantasy setting and dream sequence that he was experienced at would have been an innovative factor, displaying a substantial amount of creativity on the part of the director; now, such films had more or less lost a good amount of their popularity, and the stagy theatricality and lack of shooting on location was becoming less and less desired. Méliès, despite his tendency to only be skillful in this craft, did however try to change with the times, creating such films as "A Desperate Crime", "Chimney Sweep" (both 1906) and "Robert McCaire and Bertrand" (1907), all of which featured shooting on location and chase scenes - elements that were showing popularity through companies such as Edison and Pathé. However, even "Chimney Sweep" despite its serious subject matter included a theatrical dream sequence inconsequential to the plot, while "Robert McCaire and Bertrand" featured numerous elements of the fantastic. The director simply couldn't give up his craft, which was further demonstrated in later years such as 1908 and 1909 (although 1908 did see him trying to adapt without success).

"Under the Seas" is then a little late for 1907, considering its fantasy setting (mixed with elements of science-fiction) yet for any Méliès fan, it certainly lives up to its potential. Of course, despite the title, there is little to connect this short to the Verne novel "20,00 Leagues Beneath the Sea", which, despite my not having read, is no doubt more involved plot-wise. In fact, considering the narrative of the film, it appears to have a connection in title only, which is then used to give Méliès an excuse to show off his effects in yet another filmic journey (this time being in the ocean). In the end, it comes off as a quaint yet charming film, which continues to show the imagination of cinema's first true auteur.

In "Under the Seas", the story centers on Ives, a fisherman (played by the Méliès actor and production assistant Manuel) who dreams he is given an opportunity to go on an expedition in a submarine under the sea. Once at the bottom, a series of bland sequences that mainly serve to show off the filmmaker's extraordinary creatures follow. There is a lengthy and unrelated scene in which some mermaids and nymphs dance around a star (choreography courtesy of Mme. Stitchel) as well as a stagy long shot in which Ives wanders around the set, studying ocean life which constantly fights back at him. Curiously enough, the fisherman isn't wearing a diving suit at all, adding an element of science-fiction to the movie.

What must unfortunately be said is that, as other reviewers have pointed out, the surviving print is clearly in a very poor, washed-out state to where the entire film appears to have been shot through fog. Contrasts are high in both light and dark areas, and as such the ability to enjoy the array of interesting imagery that is on display is limited to the audience. Not only this, and unlike most reviewers believe, the original film was indeed around thirteen minutes (according to the Star Film Catalogue numbers) and survives as a fragment, with the opening scene in which Ives enters his shack, falls asleep and is visited by a fairy currently considered lost. The majority remains, which at least gives us most of the story and makes the ending come as a surprising cliche due to no previous setup. Generally speaking, it overall is not as good as many previous fantasy films of Méliès, but would no doubt be much more enjoyable had the surviving fragment been in better shape.