a film review
Be Natural: The Untold Story of Alice Guy-Blaché (2019) is an overdue act of recognition that revives the biography of a woman who came of age in the late 19th-century Belle Époque. In 1895 the Lumière brothers unveiled the cinematograph to the public in Paris, France. Their new, technological discovery projected the moving photographic image when operated inside a dark theater. This historic event changed culture forever.
At this time Alice Guy-Blaché procured a job at the film studios of Gaumont and began making films that moved beyond documentation and, instead, conveyed whimsical narratives. However, due to a series of unexpected historical and personal events, Guy-Blaché’s pioneering films were eclipsed and lost.
The film’s director, Pamela B. Green, was driven to create this film soon after hearing Alice Guy-Blaché’s name in a class on cinema history, only to find a disparity of documentation about her. What results is a largely animated documentary, informed by a collage of interviews, that manages to revive a vivid impression of 19th-century Paris.
The weight of this film emerges in a rare interview with Guy-Blaché: “Do you have any of the films you made? Do you have any in your possession?” Blaché responds: “Unfortunately no one can find them.” After Germany invaded Paris in 1940, Blaché’s documents were left in storage while Gaumont had lost all contact with her, leaving her out of their studio’s history. Prior to Be Natural, the legacy of Alice Guy-Blaché seemed to be more hearsay than truth.
Watch the movie here: BE NATURAL: THE UNTOLD STORY OF ALICE GUY-BLACHÉ (2019) Directed by Pamela B. Green
Jill Conner, New York
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