20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1916 film)

20,000 Leagues Under the Sea is a 1916 American silent film directed by Stuart Paton. The film's storyline is based on the 1870 novel Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne. It also incorporates elements from Verne's The Mysterious Island.[1]

20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
Newspaper advertisement for the film.
Directed byStuart Paton
Produced byCarl Laemmle
Written byJules Verne (novel)
Stuart Paton
StarringAllen Holubar
Jane Gail
CinematographyEugene Gaudio
Distributed byUniversal Film Manufacturing Company
Release date
  • December 24, 1916 (1916-12-24)
Running time
105 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageSilent film
English intertitles
Box office$8 million

On May 4, 2010, a new print of the film was shown accompanied by live performance of an original score by Stephin Merritt at the Castro Theatre, as part of the San Francisco International Film Festival.[2] In 2016, the film was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the United States Library of Congress, and selected for its National Film Registry.

Plot

A strange giant "sea monster" has been rampaging the seas. The American naval ship Abraham Lincoln is sent to investigate, but is rammed by the "monster" which turns out to be The Nautilus, the fantastic submarine of the enigmatic Captain Nemo, and "Rudderless, the Abraham Lincoln drifts on". Then, in "A strange rescue" he guides the sub to surface under those pitched overboard and his crew take them, including Professor Pierre Aronnax and his daughter (both of whom are French) below through a hatch in the surface of the deck. After they pledge not to escape, Nemo shows them the wonders of the underwater world, and even takes them hunting on the sea floor.

Meanwhile, soldiers in a runaway Union Army Balloon are marooned on a mysterious island not far from the submarine. They find a wild girl living alone on the island ("a child of nature").

The yacht of Charles Denver arrives at the island. A former Indian colonial officer, he has been haunted by the ghost of a woman (Princess Daaker) that he attacked years ago; she stabbed herself rather than submit to him. He fled with her young daughter and then abandoned the child on the island. The long-tormented Denver has returned to see what became of her.

One of the Union soldiers schemes and kidnaps the wild girl onto Denver's yacht. Another soldier swims aboard to rescue her. At the same time, Nemo discovers that the yacht belongs to Denver, the enemy he has been seeking all these years. The Nautilus destroys the yacht with a torpedo, but the girl and her rescuer are saved from the water by Captain Nemo.

In elaborate flashback scenes to India, Nemo reveals that he is Prince Daaker, and that he created the Nautilus to seek revenge on Charles Denver. He is overjoyed to discover that the abandoned wild girl is his long-lost daughter, but his emotion is such that he expires. His loyal crew bury him at the ocean bottom. They disband and the Nautilus is left to drift.[3]

Cast

Production

This was the first motion picture filmed underwater.[4] The underwater scenes were photographed by the Williamson Submarine Film Corporation in the Bahamas.[5] Actual underwater cameras were not used, but a system of watertight tubes and mirrors allowed the camera to shoot reflected images of underwater scenes staged in shallow sunlit waters.[6]

The film was made by The Universal Film Manufacturing Company (now Universal Pictures), not then known as a major motion picture studio. Yet in 1916, they financed this film's innovative special effects, location photography, large sets, exotic costumes, sailing ships, and full-size navigable mock-up of the surfaced submarine Nautilus.[7] The film took two years to make, at a cost of $500,000.[8] Hal Erickson has said that "the cost of this film was so astronomical that it could not possibly post a profit, putting the kibosh on any subsequent Verne adaptations for the next 12 years".[1]

References
  1. "20,000 Leagues Under The Sea (1916): Synopsis by Hal Erikson". Retrieved May 23, 2016. All Movie Guide review; Review from Hal Erickson, "All Movie Guide".
  2. "20,000 Leagues Under The Sea with Stephin Merritt – San Francisco Film Society". Retrieved May 5, 2007. San Francisco International Film Festival showing.
  3. Review, synopsis and link to watch the film "A cinema history". Retrieved June 7, 2014.
  4. Krista A. Thompson (February 22, 2007). An Eye for the Tropics: Tourism, Photography, and Framing the Caribbean Picturesque. Duke University Press. p. 161. ISBN 978-0-8223-8856-2. Retrieved September 15, 2013.
  5. Kinnard,Roy (1995). "Horror in Silent Films". McFarland and Company Inc. ISBN 0-7864-0036-6. Page 87.
  6. Library of Congress, A Pioneer Under the Sea by Brian Taves.
  7. "Internet Archive: 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea (1916)". Archived from the original on May 23, 2007. Retrieved May 5, 2007.
  8. Kinnard,Roy (1995). "Horror in Silent Films". McFarland and Company Inc. ISBN 0-7864-0036-6. Page 87.
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