Kiri-Kis (1907)

Must See Movie...

A Major Disappointment

A different way of telling a story

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Yes, already over a hundred years ago people very pretty elastic already it seems. The director here is Segundo de Chomón, one of the most influential silent filmmakers, maybe number 2 behind Méliès. Basically we watch a group of Japanese artists/athletes perform for 3 minutes. On the Youtube version I watched there is some Asian music played at the same time which makes this even more fun to watch. Of course, originally its is a silent film. The highlight here are certainly the colors, not only the ones of the people but also for example the flowers in the top corners. It all had an aura of lotus blossom to it. I guess it was not as common back in the early 20th century to go to the circus, so thumbs up for the filmmaker bringing the show to the masses with the help of this new medium film. Then again, it was not completely new in 1907, but still fairly new. For de Chomòn it's one of his more known films and he made this one basically in the middle of his career. He was really prolific between 1902 and 1913 and made over 200 films in that period. The key to enjoying this one here is to keep in mind when it was made. If it had been done today, I would probably only give it 4 stars max, but taking the year into consideration I will be a bit more generous.

This film, "Kiri-Kis", by Segundo de Chomón, was included in the three DVD set "Saved From the Flames"--a collection of mostly ephemeral movies that have managed to avoid turning to powder, catching fire or melting--something that usually happened with the nitrate film stock used up through the 1950s.Unlike most of the other 54 films from the set, this one is actually a fragment--or at least it was. I was impressed by the conservators that took a fragment of the original hand-colored film and re-created the entire film by using a black & white copy and coloring to match the original fragment! Bless these folks for going to all this trouble! The film consists of French folks dressed up as Japanese acrobats--complete with skin-wigs and a Japanese topknot hairstyle. When they appear on stage, they do lots of impossible acrobatics--all apparently done by actually filming the actors on their backs and the camera suspended above them! This is amazing film work for 1907 and it is well worth your time.

Before I watched this trick film by Segundo do Chomon on the "Saved from the Flames" DVD collection, I did read some of the comments presented here so I knew about the floor-disguised-as-wall illusion. Still, it's quite impressive to see these children and adults giving the impression they're doing unusual acrobatics in front of an audience supposedly watching this in a theater. The stencil-colors looked pretty good as well. I also learned from the other comments that these were Caucasians made up to look Japanese which I wouldn't have noticed by myself. So, no, I didn't find the characterizations to be offensive since it's just them doing "acrobatics". So on that note, I recommend Kiriki, Japanese Acrobats.

I know in today's world, this would be seen as very politically incorrect, but at the time, I think they were trying to make a humorous short using special effects.It's really cool and looks so good, that many people don't believe that it's from 1907. They think it's a modern piece that has been edited to look old.It is a very clever way make the viewer think that they are seeing amazing tricks. Even in today's technological world, this technique is still used in some cases as an effect. Very impressive.It's a must see.