• Rex Ingram is the Irish director best known for The Four Horseman of the Apocalypse (1921) with Rudolph Valentino. The Magician is shot and set (largely) in Paris—and certainly had an influence on James Whale’s Frankenstein (even if The Magician seemed to borrow pretty liberally from Mary Shelley’s 19th century gothic novel).
  • A great set piece – the operating theater with forty onlookers
  • The film is about an evil magician/alchemist (Paul Wegener as Oliver Haddo) obsessed with the powers of real surgeon (Ivan Petrovich as Dr. Burdon) and a woman (Alice Terry as Margaret Dauncey)
  • The narrative is engaging- a great snake charming/bite scene, the massive gambling hall in Monte Carlo, kidnapping/possession
  • A wild crimson-tinted surrealism sequence with a red devil and tons of extras
  • Haddo’s lab starting at the 56-minute mark is where the expressionistic influence on Whale starts. There is a great von Sternberg-like (before his first archiveable work of course here in 1926) frame of a science beaker obstructing the frame
  • The Sorcerer’s tower, spiral staircase, lighting, smoke
  • It isn’t Demme, but at the 70-minute mark Haddo walks towards the camera in close-up as the camera backpedals
  • Highly Recommend- back end of a top 10 of the year quality