Histoire d'un crime (1901)

Directed by

Ferdinand Zecca

Genre

drama film, silent film, crime film

Country

France

Runtime

5 min

Rating

5.8 of 10 from 51 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

A man commits a murder. The film shows his crime and his eventual capture. It uses realistically grim settings.

starkrealisticgrimfocusedearly silentpioneeringdramaticvisually basic

What happens

Histoire d'un crime is a 1901 French silent film directed by Ferdinand Zecca and distributed by Pathé Frères. The film stars Jean Liézer as the murderer and was based on a contemporary tableau series titled "L'histoire d'un crime" at the Musée Grévin. Histoire d'un crime is considered the first crime film and among the first to use seedy, realistic settings. Film historian Don Fairservice has noted Histoire d'un crime was "very influential." Zecca had convinced Charles Pathé that other film subjects could supplement the Pathé documentaries. His other films included comedies, trick films, or fairy tales, such as Les Sept châteaux du Diable, both 1901, and La Belle au bois dormant in 1902, as well as social dramas like Les Victimes de l'alcoolisme (1902), Au pays noir (1905) and reconstructions of actual events, the most famous being La Catastrophe de la Martinique (1902). Histoire d'un Crime is also considered the first film to feature a flashback. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

Trailer

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