Magician's Cavern, The (1901)
*** (out of 4)
aka L'antre des esprits
Once again Meiles plays a magician who turns a skeleton into a dancing woman. This is yet another magic show from the master Meiles and once again he delivers a lot of great gags and some terrific effects. The highlight of the film is when he suspends the woman in air and then walks under her to show that there's nothing there holding her up. This effect holds up quite well as does another sequence where the magician gets sucked up into the air. Credit should also go to Meiles the actor because just watching how graceful he is adds a lot of character to these films. Just when you think the film is over there are a couple encore tricks, which are very entertaining as well.