The Melomaniac (1903)

What a waste of my time!!!

It's funny watching the elements come together in this complicated scam. On one hand, the set-up isn't quite as complex as it seems, but there's an easy sense of fun in every exchange.

There's a more than satisfactory amount of boom-boom in the movie's trim running time.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

This was so much fun. Melies is a music teacher/conductor. He comes on stage, followed by his musicians/singers. He carries around a huge treble clef. Once the dancing has stopped, he throws the clef in the air and it sticks on a giant music staff. Now he does the wackiest thing. He begins to throw heads (his head) up to the music staff and they form notes. He also throws the stems up. I'm not sure if he is a half note or a quarter note. But once complete, the singers turn to the audience and begin to use the French version of do-re-mi on cards in front of them. And then they stop and exit the stage in a frenetic dance. It is so much fun.

This is one of Melies' most unusual shorts in which he portrays a music teacher who is trying to teach his students some harmony by having various heads of his representing notes on a large series of lines above him. I've always wondered how those various heads keep popping up from his body like that. In the documentary film, The Magic of Melies, I found out Georges stops film in camera, covers his head with a black sheet to match the background, then starts film again. Of course, any technical problems are fixed in editing. The way short ends with all those musical head-notes flying around is one of the most awesome sights I've seen in silent movies. By all means, seek The Music Lover out!

Georges Méliès had such a marvelous imagination that you should never be surprised with anything that he comes up with, but even when you've seen dozens of his features, there's still a good chance that the next one you see could have something new. In this short feature, he combines visual tricks with copies of his own head, something he had already done in a number of previous comedies, with an amusing and creative musical setting.Méliès plays the leader of a marching band who shows them their music on a giant staff, using the heads and various other implements to write the music. It's funny, and the special effects are interesting and work quite well, as usual. (A previous reviewer has given a particularly apt description of the enjoyable trick with the heads.) It's a resourceful way to use a musical setting without having the benefit of the actual music or of any other sound, and it's also enjoyable to watch.

'The Melody Maniac' is one of the 'stunt' films of Georges Melies, in which the action is centred upon trick photography. This is one of his best efforts. It's a shame that this movie was shot silent, as music is central to this film's action ... and it would have been amusing to learn if the actors on screen (portraying band musicians) were actually able to play music competently.SPOILERS THROUGHOUT. This entire short film consists of a single camera set-up. Melies himself, in a magnificent uniform, plays the leader of a marching band. We see five parallel wires strung across the top half of the frame, forming a musical staff. With great fanfare, Melies goose-steps in from the left side of the frame, accompanied by his musicians ... all of them tootling furiously. The musicians take their positions. Standing directly under the musical staff, Melies pulls off his own head and throws it upwards so that it catches on the overhead wires. As soon as he loses his head, an identical head conveniently materialises at the end of his neck. (This effect is like one of those boxes of tissues: pull out the top tissue, and another one is conveniently sticking up to take its place.) Melies repeatedly pulls off his own head (a whole series of heads) and tosses them upwards to hang on the music staff. When the staff is full, his musicians play the notes. At this point, all the 'notes' (heads) vanish, and Melies continues the process to fill the staff again.Interestingly, the notes which Melies places on the staff are the opening bars of a real piece of music: namely, the British anthem 'God Save the King' ... or the American melody 'My Country, 'Tis of Thee' (same music, different words). The fact that Melies chose an Anglo-American melody, rather than a French one, suggests that he was actively courting the international market for his films. 'The Melody Maniac' is a delight, and I'll rate it 10 out of 10.