Josh Keown | Night Terror Novels 🧛🏻♂️’s review published on Letterboxd:
Film #1 of October 2016 – Halloween Season of Horror!
No dialogue.
- N/A (N/A)
Found on YouTube here.
No matter how many of Méliès' films I see, they never cease to amaze me with how inventive and more often than not, technically impressive, they are.
The Merry Frolics of Satan (or The 400 Tricks of the Devil) is no different in this respect, however as one of the French maestro's longer outings, it also benefits from having a more developed and at least somewhat cohesive plot than many of his shorter films.
The film concerns two travellers who are endlessly tormented by Satan as they try to go on their merry way from place to place. He then forces them on a ride through the heavens, before taking one of the chaps on a literal highway to Hell where he is cooked alive on a spit. Grim.
As was typical of Georges Méliès's films, the audience is treated with a plethora of editing tricks, imaginative set design and creative prop use (the train and Satan's buggy are particularly ace), all of which really makes The Merry Frolics of Satan a joy to watch. Though I imagine the theatricality of the performances may detract from the enjoyment for some viewers, for me it enhances it. The only issue I did have, and I suspect it was as much attributable to the longer runtime, is that the cuts seemed a little more obvious than in a lot of his other works.
VERDICT; Whilst I wouldn't say this is Méliès' best offering (which isn't saying all that much, as most of what he produced was of a high quality), it is certainly one of the better ones.
It is without a doubt a great example of the wizard doing what he did best - creating movie magic.
4/5 or 8/10