Les locataires d'à-côté (1909) User Reviews

Mighty weird!

[planktonrules · 8/10 · 18 August 2012]

When you watch the earliest silent films, you really need to adjust your expectations. What might seem like a very inconsequential film today might have been a huge hit and innovative title in its day. That's how it often is with the films of the French filmmaker and animator, Émile Cohl.

"Next Door Neighbors" is one of first split-screen films--showing two couples who are in an adjoining apartments at the same time. At first it looks like they simply built the set that way--then later it's obvious that a true split-screen was used.

One couple gets nosy and want to know what the two young lovers are doing next door. So, they decide to drill a hole in the wall! They are discovered and the weird young couple use magic to play a joke on them--as all the older couple see is weird animation. They get the landlord, but when he peeks through, all he sees in the couple. This happens again and again, but it's not the end of the story. It's all mildly amusing but excellent for 1909--and worth a look.

By the way, this film has significant nitrate decomposition--which is not at all unusual for older film stock. It's not so bad that you can't enjoy the film, however.

Nice Mix of Animation and Split Screen

[Michael_Elliott · 1 June 2015]

The Next Door Neighbors (1909)

*** (out of 4)

Fun use of split-screen effects as the left side of the frame features a young couple while the right side features an old couple. The split screen makes it appear that you're looking at two different apartment buildings and when the old couple decides to spy on the young, that portion of the screen switches over to animation with various things used to get even on those doing the spying. Overall this here is a pretty neat little gem especially when you consider it was made very early in the animation days and adding in the split screen was a nice bonus. Is this a great movie? I certainly don't think so but there are certainly a lot of memorable moments including one where the animated figure puts a water hose up to the next apartment and the old couple gets water poured on them.