"By the end of the war, Houdini had more serious competition to worry about than 'frauds and

cheapskates doing imitation handcuff acts' ...something had to be found to replace his vaudeville act not only as a money-maker, but also to keep his torch of fame burning bright. And in 1919 the answer was obvious -- he should become a movie star." William Lindsay Gresham Houdini:The Man Who Walked Through Walls 1959 PART ONE: THE MASTER MYSTERY
Many performers have enjoyed the luxury of becoming film stars as a secondary career. But few made the transition as effortlessly as Harry Houdini. While at the height of his fame in the late 1910s, the jump to screen stardom was not a difficult one to make. Once the decision had been made, he simply waited for the right opportunity. He didnt aspire to be a matinee idol. He merely consented. Beyond the worldwide recognition of his name, Houdini was armed with a physical talent that audiences -- even those who had seen him perform live -- were eager to study up close. And it was a talent that would not be hindered by the medium's lack of sound. The cinema was a feather just waiting to be plucked by Houdini and placed in his cap. The greater challenge was sustaining his cinematic fame. His first film would be virtually guaranteed to be a hit, but could he forge a long-term career for himself in the film industry? As shrewd a businessman as he was flamboyant a showman, Houdini sought to insure his success by involved himself in every facet of filmmaking: acting, writing, directing, promoting. This meant every film in which he starred bore his indelible signature but, as he was not an experienced filmmaker, this was not always a blessing. The first major vehicle to bear Houdini's name was The Master Mystery, a fifteen-chapter serial that began unspooling the week of January 6, 1919. But this was not Houdini's first exposure to motion pictures. He had already been engaged in numerous filmic projects extending back to the infancy of the medium. If we date the origin of cinema to the Lumire Brothers' exhibition of the Cinmatograph on December 28, 1895, the medium was only five years old when Houdini made his

screen acting debut. It was 1901, and Houdini was enjoying a successful European tour when he appeared in a film entitled Merveilleux Exploits du Clbre Houdini Paris (Marvelous Exploits of the Famous Houdini in Paris), produced by the Path Frres film company. Walking along a Parisian street with his wife, Bess, Houdini breaks up a mele between the police and a drunkard. Houdini is taken off to prison and bound in a straitjacket. He quickly slips out of the device, only to be locked in a series of manacles, from which he also escapes. From his shoe he takes a key, which he uses to escape the stone cell. The next time Houdini appeared on film was May 6, 1907, undressing, being bound in chains and climbing to the top of the Weighlock Bridge in Rochester, New York. Houdini commissioned the film as a visual record of his successful leap and underwater escape. He would later screen this footage (featured on disc 3 of this collection) as part of his stage act -- a daring escape too enormous to fit into the typical vaudeville house.

man, secured his wrists with handcuffs and bound his arms tightly. The crowd, believing it had to do with a band of lunatics, shouted for police assistance. Four policemen, who had been dozing on duty at the side of Notre Dame, suddenly woke up and ran towards the wildly gesticulating crowd. In the meantime, the principal lunatic, by the aid of a ladder, had climbed to the roof of the Morgue. He stood there for a moment with his enchained hands held above his head, while the four policemen below looked helplessly on: Come down, said one policeman, coaxingly. The man's reply was to plunge headlong into the river. He is gone without a doubt, was the general comment of the spectators of the incident. There was an immediate rush to the bank. Two working men and a policeman flung off their coats and plunged in, hoping to save the madman when he came to the surface. He appeared presently with his arms freed from the chains, and before the police could reach him was rescued by a boat which put out from the opposite bank. On reaching shore, he jumped into the motor, and was driven on. The police, however, discovered Houdini's identity, and he is said to be prosecuted for being improperly dressed and for bathing in the Seine during prohibited hours.

This second film was often shown alongside another crude Houdini production. A revisitation of his Merveilleux Exploits, the untitled two-minute fragment (featured on disc 3 of this collection) was shot on location on the streets of Paris, in April 1909. Much more elaborate than the Weighlock Bridge jump film, it is comprised of seven shots (instead of two) and embellishes its stunt with a bit of dramatic intrigue. In an undated article entitled Handcuff King Dives into the Seine from Top of the Morgue, an unidentified newspaper provided an account of the film itself, as well as the making of the film:
The many idlers who were basking in the sunshine close to the river noticed an automobile pull up at the Morgue. A man clad in the briefest of bathing costumes descended, to the wonderment of the spectators. Two fellow passengers gripped the scantily-clad

Apparently, Houdini suggested that the film was a carefully choreographed stunt performed without a break, without the authorities' permission, filmed as it happened. But this is highly unlikely, since it would have required the involvement of at least six cameras (and cameramen) strategically placed to capture every angle of the action. More than likely, he filmed with a single camera, with the usual breaks between set-ups (which disproves the belief that the gendarmes were actually chasing him). These early efforts may have been primitive, but they planted the idea in Houdinis mind that feats of escape could make for exciting cinema, setting into motion the career of Harry Houdini the actor. Beyond expanding his popularity and increasing his wealth, the cinema held another possibility for Houdini. It would allow him to shape his own persona beyond that of a clever illusionist. He fancied himself an inventor, patriot, humanitarian, and master criminologist, but these qualities were not so easily conveyed in stage appearances and interviews. The movies would allow Ehrich Weiss to be sure that the public recognized Houdini as the physical and intellectual superman he wanted to be. Thus did his protagonists invent and operate a variety of high-tech devices, including a hidden microphone, a television camera, diving suit, gas-powered bullets, a submarine, etc. In 1917, The Moving Picture World announced that, The famous self-liberator has accepted the offer of the Williamson

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Brothers, and will be featured by them in an international drama of thrills in the air, on land, and underwater, receiving for his services the largest sum of money ever paid to any one performer for a single motion picture. The salient details were withheld, which is unfortunate, since the deal was never consummated. The article continued, An author whose virile fiction marks him as one of the greatest men of letters of the present day has been secured to prepare the story for this super-picture in which Houdini will be starred. This suggests a writer of the ilk of Arthur Conan Doyle, originator of Sherlock Holmes. Doyle and Houdini would become friends, but by most accounts, their correspondence didn't begin until 1920, and even then they were united not by the cinema, but by investigations into the spirit world. Liverpool-born John Ernest and George Maurice Williamson are best known for pioneering the science of underwater photography, as showcased in Stuart Paton's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1916). They were just completing The Submarine Eye (1917) when the Houdini project was announced. The article explains that the film was to be shot in the clear waters of the West Indies, where Houdini would escape from the steel-and-glass tube integral to the Williamsons' underwater photography. If the test is successful and Houdini performs the impossible, there will be photographic evidence of it incorporated into the picture of which he is the star. Apparently, the challenge was never conducted, and the film was never made, though his 1920 film Terror Island (written by Arthur Reeve and John Grey) borrowed several elements from the aborted 1917 project. Undaunted by the collapse of the Williamson Brothers deal, Houdini began pursuing an acting career in earnest. According to biographer Kenneth Silverman, entrepreneur Harry Grossman introduced Houdini to producer B.A. Rolfe over lunch. Rolfe had made a number of melodramas at Metro Pictures, including several directed by Tod Browning. Rolfe and Grossman suggested that Houdini capitalize on his penchant for daring escapes by starring in a cliffhanger-style serial. Rather than put the project under studio control, they opted to form their own company, the Octagon Film Corp., and produce it themselves. The film would then be sold via states rights distribution, a model in which a small company (without a large distribution/exhibition network) would lease distribution rights to small companies in specific territories. This system allowed for the producer to keep a larger share of the box-office, but (as Houdini would later discover) made it very difficult for them to get an accurate accounting of the films actual earnings. Though he was a notorious micro-manager, Houdini had

the good sense to rely upon experienced filmmakers to craft this freshman effort. This would not always be the case.

Arthur B. Reeve was the creator of Craig Kennedy, Scientific Detective, an all-American super-sleuth whose exploits began in the pages of Cosmopolitan Magazine in 1910, and continued through a variety of pulp magazines and more than a dozen novels into the 1930s. In 1914, Reeve's story The Exploits of Elaine (another Craig Kennedy adventure) became one of the earliest and most successful film serials, in the tradition of The Perils of Pauline, released earlier that year. To Houdini, Reeve was the perfect candidate to craft his onscreen persona. He (along with melodrama writer Charles Logue) was engaged to write a treatment for a fifteen-chapter serial, punctuated by daring escapes: from a straitjacket, chains, a diving suit, a garrote, suspended over a vat of acid, beneath a descending elevator, within a collapsed cave, strapped to an electric chair, nailed inside a packing crate dumped in a river. The movie would showcase Houdini's greatest escapes, reenacted within a melodramatic framework, stretched out over the course of fifteen weeks. The film was shot in and around Yonkers, New York. The story follows the efforts of secret agent Quentin Locke (Houdini) to expose an elaborate plot masterminded by Herbert Balcom (Charles Graham) to corner the technology market buy buying patents and then suppressing the inventions. In solving the mystery and winning the heart of the beautiful Eva Brent (Marguerite Marsh), Locke escaped a variety of tortures, repeatedly eluded the grasp of criminal henchmen known as emissaries, and waged war against a seemingly indestructible robot: the automaton. As serials went, it was not very much worse than most, wrote biographer William Lindsay Gresham (author of Nightmare Alley). Entitled The Master Mystery, Houdini plays not only a mechanical genius, but a man who fights for the rights of other entrepreneurs. Gresham observed, Teddy Roosevelt had waged strenuous war against trusts which stood in the way of progress and were suspected of buying

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the Censors Report on disc 1). The states rights distribution plan, as it often did, proved to be a problem. By [Houdinis] arithmetic, the picture grossed $225,000, with a net of $80,000, to half of which his contract entitled him, atop his salary, wrote Silverman. When the money failed to come, he decided the partners had squandered it and were trying to cheat me out of my 50% profit. He was forced to sue Octagon for $43,000. As depositions and affidavits stacked up, the remaining partners sued one another over the sale of territorial rights...the company, having produced one picture, went bankrupt. Rolfe gave up filmmaking to pursue a musical career as a trumpet player and band leader. Houdinis early romances with the cinema had ended badly, but he was undaunted. Having gotten a taste of screen stardom, he knew he wanted more.

PART TWO: THE GRIM GAME, TERROR ISLAND,THE MAN FROM BEYOND
up inventions and killing them; Houdini was a great admirer of T.R. The ideology seems of clear derivation. Upon its original release, The Master Mystery ran slightly longer than five-and-a-half hours. Several episodes are lost, or only exist in fragmentary condition. Thus the Kino International edition runs slightly less than four hours (238.5 min.) One fragment that exists in particularly poor quality can be seen in The Censors Report (in which Houdini is dangled over a vat of acid). The first episode, The Living Death, premiered in New York the week of January 6, 1919. The Moving Picture World reported, To say that the opening was auspicious is to use terms which do not adequately describe the facts. It was a tremendous success." The film packed the three thousandseat Proctor's Theatre in Yonkers and another estimated three thousand were turned away. Billboard raved,This cracker-jack production will thunder down the ages to perpetuate the fame of this remarkable genius whose unparalleled achievements have reached from Aroostook, Maine, to Singapore, China, from Zululand to the Bering Straits. The serial opened in sixteen theaters throughout New York state. Because the film was independently distributed, box-office figures and details of its national exhibition are limited. It proved so successful in New York that it was rereleased in 1924. By that time, a state censor board had been established, and the film was subjected to numerous cuts to soften its depiction of acts that were deemed inhuman and might tend to incite to crime. (see
I think the film profession is the greatest... and that the moving picture is the most wonderful thing in the world. Harry Houdini

Motivated by the success of The Master Mystery, Houdini announced that an independent company would be formed, headed by Christian Hemmick of Washington, D.C., to make feature films with the magician as star. Houdini will write his own stories and he will be directed by Burton King. (The Moving Picture World, March 8, 1919) This company would be formed, and King would, in fact, direct one of the films, but this wouldnt happen for another two years. Instead, Houdini suddenly abandoned the idea and signed a deal with Famous Players-Lasky (ParamountArtcraft), and would begin filming a new project in Hollywood on May 1. This news came just two weeks after the announcement of the independent production company. Although the name of Mr. Houdini's director is not available at this time, it is said that the productions in which he will appear will offer high-class mystery stories, especially written for him and affording him the opportunity to properly present his most startling feats. (The Moving Picture World, March 22, 1919) Houdini departed for the West coast on April 16, 1919. His pay rate had escalated from $1,500 to $2,500 per week. As hot a commodity as he was, Famous Players-Lasky was reluctant to sign him to a long-term contract. Houdinis original contract with Famous Players called for only one picture, for although his ability in his particular

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line of work was acknowledged to be of the first order, its potential value as screen entertainment was a more or less uncertain quantity, especially so on account of the fact that his picture experience had been limited to one serial. (The Moving Picture World, September 13, 1919) Houdinis first studio picture was The Grim Game. Based again on a story by Reeve and Grey, and directed by Irving WIllat, the film continued The Master Mysterys formula of Houdini as a technical wizard with a knack for escaping any form of bondage, only this time in a single feature rather than a serial. Houdini made it clear he would not deviate from his established screen persona. And the characters he portrayed would always be thinly-veiled versions of himself. Lest the audience momentarily lose themselves in the drama, and forget who was playing the role, his characters names served as gentle reminders: Harry Harper, Howard Hillary, Heath Haldane. The following detailed plot synopsis appeared in the December 6, 1919 issue of The Moving Picture World:
Harvey Hanford, the part played by Houdini in The Grim Game, is a special writer on The Call, who is noted for his nerve and daring in gathering news. He has an eccentric millionaire uncle who lives with his ward, Mary, and will not let Harvey come near him. The old man knows that his nephew and his ward are in love with each other, and is opposed to the match. He is also aware that he is surrounded by three men, any one of whom would profit by his death. The first is his lawyer, Richard Raver, who has misappropriated some of the Cameron funds. The second is Dr. Tyson, his physician, who expects to marry Mary, heiress to the Cameron millions, when their owner dies. Clifton Allison, owner and publisher of The Call, is heavily in debt to Cameron, and the old man has threatened several times to drive him to the wall. A plan is hit upon by Harvey to work up a big sensation for the paper by getting the old man away secretly and then making it look as if he (Harvey) had murdered his uncle. After he has been convicted of the crime, Dudley Cameron will be brought back and circumstantial evidence will be given a heavy blow. The three men agree to this, but each one is determined that the old millionaire shall never return home alive. The scheme is set in motion and Harvey is arrested for the murder of his uncle. Then commences a series of Houdini escapes, the last one being a genuine thrill and the most dangerous of the Handcuff King's career. While trying to change in midair from one flying machine to another, the two airplanes crash into each other. This, of course, is an accident, but the camera caught it and also the dive to earth of the machines which followed. None of the actors in the accident

were seriously hurt, and The Grim Game is able to show on the screen an "escape" that is a thriller of thrillers. The story is brought to a highly satisfactory close, and Harvey and Mary are united.

This spectacular scene was indeed an unplanned accident, and the studio was sure to capitalize on it. For years, Houdini took credit for the near-tragic wing-walk, but it was in fact performed by Robert E. Kennedy. Looking at the film today, one can easily distinguish between the actual collision footage and the staged close-ups of Houdini, taken while the plane was safely moored to the ground. But, considering the range of hairbreadth escapes already performed by the illusionist, it was not such a stretch to believe that he was performing the stunt himself. Exhibitors Trade Review wrote, There are more spectacular thrills in this five-reeler than are usually found in the average death-defying, hair-raising serial, and the exciting results thus gained are not due to trick photography, either. Take, for instance, the aeroplane chase in the grand climax, when Houdini, as the reporter hero, pursues the fleeing murderer. The two machines crash together at an altitude of 5,000 feet, and go whirling to earth and apparently certain destruction. According to an address delivered by Houdini himself, when the picture was exhibited at the Broadway Theatre, New York, it was his intention to drop by means of a rope into his antagonist's plane and capture him, but the two propellors became entangled. Houdini told Picture Show magazine, I was dangling from

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the rope-end ready for the leap. Suddenly a strong wind turned the lower plane upwards, the two machines crashed together nearly amputating my limbs. The New York Times reported that, at the New York premiere at the Broadway Theatre, Houdini appeared in person after the picture was shown and declared that he would give anyone $1,000 who could prove that the collision was not an authentic one. He explained that a real accident had occurred, but that they were saved only because the machines were 4,000 feet in the air and were able to right themselves before they reached the ground.

Only a brief fragment of The Grim Game exists today. Fortunately, it is the plane crash sequence, and it appears on disc 3 of Kinos collection. The Grim Game was released on August 25, 1919, at a running time of 53 minutes. Gresham cites domestic gross receipts of $150,000, with an additional $50,000 from foreign markets. Variety was less than thrilled with the film. This feature isnt up to expectations. It has a very serious fault in editorial construction, and, with one exception, Houdinis stunts do not seem more unusual than those given the screen by serial stars such as Antonio Moreno and Charles Hutchison. What really will get this feature by as something more than a good program filler came about by chance... the stars muscle contracting stunts are not effective in pictures for the reason no one is quite certain he is doing what he seems to do. Houdinis films are rousing entertainment, as long as he is plying his trade. Its only when the action slows that their weaknesses become apparent. As a motion-picture star, Houdini lacked one important talent acting ability, Gresham wrote. Audiences then, as now, insisted on their adventure stories well-spiced with romance and Houdini was much too bashful to kiss his various leading ladies without wincing, even with [wife] Bess standing off camera and cheering him on. His embarrassment was so evident that directors gave up on him. Romance before the camera was for Houdini a Grim Game

indeed. Biographer Kenneth Silverman concurs. Of The Master Mystery, he writes,His acting consists of three expressions: pucker-lipped flirtatiousness, open-eyed surprise, and browknitted distress. Although undeniably charismatic, Houdini never developed his dramatic skills. In a review of 1922s The Man from Beyond, The New York Times noted, It shows practically no acting at all. Its players merely register certain stereotyped expressions. Because of the success of The Grim Game, Paramount signed Houdini for another picture. Russell Holman was a press agent for Famous Players-Lasky when Houdini signed his new contract, and in 1953, recalled meeting Houdini. Five minutes after Adolph Zukor signed the contract with him, the famous Houdini walked alone into the publicity department and asked our boss for a meeting with the whole staff. The first words he said were, I regard you men as important as the people who make the picture, and Ill work as hard and as much for you as I do for the producer. Im at your service for anything, anywhere, any hour Im not working at the studio. Produced under the title Salvage, Houdinis second film at Paramount was released as Terror Island, and is probably Houdini's best film, certainly the most polished. Shot largely on location on the island of Catalina, it has an epic scale that perfectly suits Houdinis hyperbolic personality. Reeve and Greys story was directed by James Cruze, who would find renown for his epics The Covered Wagon (1923) and Old Ironsides (1926). Cruze was the most accomplished of the Houdini directors, and his is the only film that has a life of its own, and doesn't feel like an elaborate window-dressing designed to showcase its star. Location photography occurred on or around the island of Catalina.

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Motion Picture News wrote, The picture is nothing more or less than a wild serial compressed into five reels... One must accept it in a spirit of good nature and forget its improbabilities. (May 8, 1920) It starts off with zip, and it is carried on with enthusiasm, but Houdini is too intent on exploiting his tricks to realize that, even in sensational melodrama, it is dangerous to grossly falsify the admitted facts of nature, wrote The Moving Picture World, The spectator may concede much, but, for the sake of good entertainment, the unplausible, the impossible, should not be thrust down his throat. This Artcraft picture is less gruesome than its title might convey. In the main, it is only an excuse for bringing Houdini back to pictures to familiarize picture fans with the same accomplishments he has made equally familiar to vaudeville, wrote Variety's critic. Apparently the film was originally issued with a disclaimer of sorts, which does not survive today. As a matter of interest, the introduction offers an apology for melodramatic flavoring. In this respect, the authors do well to dictate their opinion beforehand that present-day audiences may have an aversion to it. Variety reported, But that scarcely absolves them from an almost incredible incompetency in providing a vehicle for Houdini which might prove less exasperating. The film earned a modest $111,000 in the U.S., plus another $54,000 overseas, according to Gresham, who added, The first-run gross of the average film with a popular star was $375,000. It was his last studio production.

After the release of Terror Island, Houdini spent some time in England, performing feats of magic, and exploring the possibility of psychic phenomena with acclaimed author Arthur Conan Doyle. Houdini had a mixed view of spiritualism. On one hand, he took pleasure in exposing the fraudulent workings of numerous mediums. Yet he experimented with clairvoyance as a means of communicating with his dead mother, and later encouraged his wife to attempt psychic communication with him after his own demise. The idea of life after death became the foundation of Houdinis next film, The Man from Beyond. But since Houdinis belief in the supernatural was tentative, the film assumes a confused, quasi-religious attitude toward reincarnation. The film was the first production of the newly formed Houdini Picture Corporation, of which Houdini was president. The companys formation was announced in the March 12, 1921 issue of The Moving Picture World: The purpose of the company is to make and release four feature productions a year, in which Houdini will be the star. The first release will be begun in a short time, the production being chiefly shot in the vicinity of New York City. According to Silverman, the business was capitalized at a half million dollars, offering fifty thousand shares of common stock at ten dollars each. Houdini had toyed with the idea of shooting adaptations of The Count of Monte Cristo or the works of Edgar Allan Poe, as well as a film about counterfeiters, but only the last of these projects would ever reach fruition (as Haldane of the Secret Service, in 1923). The Man From Beyond debuted on April 2, 1922, at a length of seven reels. Later that year, it was shortened to six reels, and it is the shorter version that is preserved at the Library of Congress in a 16mm print, and is featured in this collection. Burton King (The Master Mystery) returned to the director's chair, but the story (by Houdini) and screenplay (by Coolidge Streeter) afforded him no stalking robots and few opportunities for dramatic escape. Reflecting Houdini's curiosity about the hereafter, the story is a melodramatic meditation on reincarnation. Proclaimed in its ads as The Weirdest and Most Sensational Picture Ever Screened!, the film follows the adventures of Howard Hillary, who is discovered frozen in a block of ice on board a derelict sailing ship in the Arctic. The explorers chip Hillary out of the ice and reanimate him. He is taken back to civilization, where he disrupts the wedding of Felice Strange (Jane Connelly), who is identical in name and appearance to Hillarys 19th-century fiance. Felice is being married to the corrupt Dr. Gilbert Trent (Arthur Maude), who has masterminded a plot to seize Felices inheritance by kidnapping her father (Albert Tavernier).

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Hillary is placed in an asylum and subjected to harsh punishment (see The Censors Report on this DVD for more details). Hillary evades Trents henchmen, resists a seductive vamp (Blood and Sands Nita Naldi), and rescues Felice from the rapids on the brink of Niagara Falls, bringing the film to a suitably rousing climax. Gresham suggests that the film was inspired by a case, reported in The American Weekly, in which the body of a Viking, complete with winged helmet and flaxen beard...had been discovered in the Arctic, perfectly preserved after a thousand years. Today, The Man from Beyond is probably Houdinis least compelling film. But it was surprisingly well received in 1922. A thrilling melodrama, fantastic of theme and highly adventurous, has reached the screen in The Man from Beyond, gushed Motion Picture News. It carries a climax which reminds you of the one staged by Griffith in Way Down East. That is its big punch scene, but this is not to say that the picture is deficient in thrills. Far from it. Indeed the feature depends upon elemental action, for that is Houdinis way. It is an exciting moment and you are caught in a tight embrace of suspense. It is certain that the escape expert risked his life in staging these scenes. But that is an old trick to him. His power of bobbing up just a trifle the worse for wear after a hazardous adventure is a tribute to his uncanny ability to make his escape. Houdini did, in fact, perform his own feats of daring. In shooting the swim above Niagara Falls, Houdini was attached to a steel cable to keep him from being swept away. The swim in the rapids was supposedly shot simultaneously by eight camerastwo on the Canadian side and six on the American side. A photograph of Houdini and crew overlooking the falls has five cameras in the shot, so the claim of eight cameras may not have been a typical Houdini exaggeration. Houdini recycled his Grim Game publicity stunt and offered a $5,000 reward to any motion picture director or producer who provides a greater thrill than is to be seen in his special feature picture The Man from Beyond. There were no details as to how an ambitious director or producer might accept the challenge. The Arctic scenes were taken in Lake Placid, New York, where Houdini braved the cold weather to romp through the snow in little more than a swimsuit. Houdini had trained himself to endure frigid conditions in preparation for his underwater escapes by immersing himself in a tub of ice waterso this display of endurance was a relative cakewalk. According to the pressbook, an alternate ending was filmed, an entirely different finish to this picture than was called for in the original script. The unspecified ending was supposedly shot in the event that Houdini died during the

performance of the stunts. Houdini well realized the danger that confronted him and knowing that he might not be spared, he took no chances that his picture might never be shown. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle provided Houdini with a testimonial, which appeared in the official pressbook:
Dear Mr. Houdini, I have seen the Houdini picture The Man from Beyond and it is difficult to find words to adequately express my enjoyment and appreciation of it. I certainly have no hesitation in saying it is the very best sensational picture I have ever seen. It is a story striking in its novelty, picturized superbly and punctuated with thrills that fairly make the hair stand on end. From the opening scene showing the actual chopping of a frozen man from the center of a mass of ice and restoring him to life, to the closing scenes of the sensational rescue of the girl on the very brink of Niagara Falls, it holds one breathless. I consider The Man from Beyond one of the really great contributions of the screen.

This letter was written just before Houdini and Doyles friendship crumbled. While performing a sance, Lady Doyle claimed to have reached the spirit of Houdinis deceased mother. Houdini publicly refuted this claim (basically calling Lady Doyle a fake), which began a long-running feud

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between the two men. Because the Houdini Picture Corporation couldnt compete with the distribution apparatus of, say, Paramounts Publix theatre chain, he sold the film to states rights distributors (in the same manner as The Master Mystery). This makes it nearly impossible to estimate the films total boxoffice earnings, so we cannot gauge how successful the film was in comparison to his earlier efforts. From the beginning, Houdini planned to boost the films potential with personal appearances. An advertisement in the trade publication Motion Picture News states,HOUDINI AGREES to make personal appearances in conjunction with The Man from Beyond in a limited number of key cities. When The Man from Beyond played New Yorks Times Square Theater, he performed several of his signature acts (such as the needle trick and a straitacket escape), as well as a more elaborate illusion: his disappearing elephant act. This form of misdirection did not cause every viewer to ignore the films shortcomings. The Variety critic wrote, It is a five-reeler of about the grade of a serial built along lines of candid melodrama, but aspiring to higher appeal through its spiritual import, which deals in a rather stumbling way with the problem of the hereafter. The two things dont go together. The New York Times concurred, It is a stunt picture, but the trouble is it is not all stunts. It tries to be a dramatic composition and doesnt succeed. As much as he enjoyed being a film star, Houdini no doubt realized the new career path was fraught with challenges and had not been an unqualified success. But he was no quitter, and was already devising new ways to exploit his fame and realize the cinemas earning potential.

PART THREE: HALDANE OF THE SECRET SERVICE

For years, the motion picture industry had attracted Houdinis interest. Cinema was a means of achieving greater fame, assuring himself of some form of immortality. Even when he invested in a film processing lab in 1916, ego was to some degree at play. Houdini yearned to be an inventor, a desire that is reflected in the plots of his films. He filed patents for his inventions, including his milk can escape and a diving suit designed to permit easy underwater removal. In the 1914 audio recording featured on this DVD, one hears Houdini refer to his water torture cell as his invention. The Film Developing Company appealed to Houdini because it was founded upon a novel invention: a method of automated film processing, developed by Gustav Dietz. Offices were opened on Broadway, and a factory in Hoboken,

New Jersey. Houdinis initial investment was $4,900 but the company was never able to turn a profit. In April, 1918, Houdini fired Dietz and attempted to improve upon the mechanism himself, assigning his brother, Theodore W. Hardeen, to run the company, all to no avail. In October, 1920, Houdini wrote to a friend, I have over 100,000 dollars invested in the F.D.C. but have never received a penny from same. This does not include the many weary months I spent in and around the place trying to make a success of what an ordinary man in the business would have known was a failure. My education is certainly costing me a high price. (Houdini to Harry Kellar, quoted in William Kalush and Larry Slomans The Secret Life of Houdini). Houdini to Kellar, October, 1921: It will be a Godsend for all of us if we get away from it [F.D.C.] in a legitimate manner. The only good of the whole thing is that it was the cause of my going into pictures. Let us hope that I have not made a serious mistake. It seemed only natural that, owning a film processing company, he should make his own films, rather than relying on the resources and expertise of a motion picture studio. He formed the Houdini Picture Corporation and produced The Man from Beyond (featured on DVD 2 of this collection). Even though The Moving Picture World had announced that the H.P.C. would produce four feature productions a year, in which Houdini will be the star, the filmmakers must have quickly realized how impossible it would be to live up to this ambition. So, Houdini sought other ways to keep the Film Developing Company busy, and to shore up his filmmaking empire. During his tours through Europe, he had discovered that there were many high-quality films there that might never be exported to the U.S. What they lacked in popular American stars, they made up for in production values. Thus did Houdini become the figurehead of yet another company: the Mystery Pictures Corporation, formed on December 27, 1921. Harry Houdini was the president. Hardeen was vice president and Harry H. Poppe served as secretary. Some Houdini filmographies erroneously list a 1921 feature, directed by and starring Houdini, entitled The Soul of Bronze. This is, in reality, a French film which he imported for distribution. Directed by Henry Roussel in 1918, Lme du bronze starred Harry Baur and Gaston Rieffler. Because the Mystery Pictures Corporation was shortlived and not very successful, it is unclear how many films they actually imported and modified for American distribution. Papers in the companys files include numerous clippings about Viktor Tourjanskys Pathcolor spectacle Les Contes de mille et une nuits (A Thousand and One Nights), which Houdini was also interested in releasing stateside.

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The heart loves many times, but the soul only once; and loving, sacrifices all. Misunderstood it comforts itself in the reigns of Crisisthe fountain of light, of knowledgeof the universal equilibrium; the eternity and the divine inspirations are for her and she shall return to this earth forced by her destiny to punish the bad and revindicate the rights of purity. Thus is the philosophic salvation of the human vindicated.

The companys most bizarre acquisition was Aldo Molinaris Il mistero di Osiris (1919), produced by the Vera Film company, in Rome, Italy. Details are sketchy but it appears that Houdini obtained the film when he purchased two boxes of films at an auction of unclaimed goods from Customs Services Seizure Room on October 26, 1921. It seems unfathomable that Houdini would acquire a print of the film, almost by chance, and then release it in the U.S. without permission of its creators butfrom the surviving documents among the Houdini papers at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center of the University of Texas at Austinit appears as though that is precisely what he did. Houdini translated the film into English and had new intertitles created, renaming the film Ashes of Passion. He also translated the novella that was published upon the original Italian release, entitling it Il Mistero di Osiris or The Mystery of the Jewel (Talisman). Houdini removed the original photograph from the cover and replaced it with a portrait of himself. Reading the introductory passage of the pamphlet, one can easily see what attracted Houdini to the film:
Many centuries before Christ, Egypt believed in the immortality of the soul and in this faith found the key to eternity. This great thought grew out of the Metempsicosi, the transmigrator of the souls; they (the souls) reincarnate themselves according to their destiny of good or bad. Thus it represents the harmony of the universe, and for it nothing in the world becomes lost. Out of this faith logically was born the legend of Carma, the legend of vendetta. Each fault is punished through centuries in successive reincarnations until justice is done.

The themes of eternal life and reincarnation in Il Mistero di Osiris coalesce beautifully with the subject matter of The Man from Beyond, which was in production at the same time Houdini was at work on the Italian film. Beyond such metaphysical concerns, the film was also a lavish costume spectacle, in keeping with the great Italian epics of the 1910s. Houdinis business secretary, Harry H. Poppe, submitted frames of the film to the Library of Congress to secure its American copyright (in Houdinis name, with Giovanni Deodata credited as author) on November 12, 1921. Very little is known about the release of Ashes of Passion or The Soul of Bronze. For that matter, we dont know much about the fate of The Man from Beyond, since it was distributed in the states rights model (in which regional companies licensed the rights to specific territories). From what we can tell, the film does not appear to have been as successful as his first commercial effort (The Master Mystery) or his two films at Paramount (The Grim Game and Terror Island). Much to his chagrin, Houdinis independent film compa-

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nies appeared to have followed the path of the ill-fated Film Developing Company. Back when the Houdini Pictures Corp. was first unveiled in 1921, press reports declared that, On his last tour of England and France, Houdini had a cameraman with him and many shots were made... Some show him entering and emerging from noted prisons, landing from aeroplanes on foreign fields, a jam with the French police and several good scenes in London. This was all made with a view to utilizing the material in the forthcoming releases, and will serve to give an authentic foreign flavor to those scenes in which the action takes place abroad. This might seem like a clever way of injecting location flavor into a film, but without benefit of a script, such stock footage would function as little more than a gritty travelogue. Much of this footage did eventually appear, clumsily inserted into a film called Haldane of the Secret Service. As expected, it amounts to various shots of Houdini walking through various cityscapes looking concerned with some yet-to-be-scripted mystery. We see him aboard a doubledecker bus in Glasgow, on the streets of Hull, England, posed in front of Westminster Abbey, and slipping into a kiosk at the base of the Eiffel Tower. Haldane was the last project the Houdini Picture Cor-

poration would ever undertake, released by the low-budget Film Booking Offices (F.B.O., which would later evolve into R.K.O.) on September 30, 1923. As if cutting every conceivable corner, Houdini not only wrote and produced and starred in the film, he also directed it. With or without the location footage, the film is a rather stiff pot-boiler about a government agents pursuit of counterfeiters. The name of the primary character was most likely a tribute to Viscount Richard Haldane, who was a friend of Houdinis and Britains Secretary of State for War, and who was instrumental in the creation of the British Secret Service. It seems as though the film was actually shot concurrent with The Man from Beyond, but had sat on a shelf for two years. This is suggested by a letter from Houdini to Kellar in late 1921, in which he writes, My two pictures are finished. Now I must put them on the market and see how good they are. The market was not favorable. Biographer William Lindsay Gresham observed,While the critics were good to him in Beyond, what happened to Haldane shouldnt happen to a dog show. Perhaps the renown of Houdini is fading, or more probably the Broadway managers were wise to how bad a film this one is, Variety wrote, There is only one [escape], and that is a poorly staged affair showing the star free himself from a giant water mill.. With all due respect to his famed ability for escapes, the only asset he has in the acting line is his ability to look alert. The film was sold on the value of Houdinis name, and little else. Realizing that producing his own features (as the Houdini Picture Corporation) and acquiring foreign films for distribution (as the Mystery Pictures Corporation) were losing propositions, Houdini finally brought his commercial film career to a close. But he did not stop making films. He utilized the H.P.C. cameras to shoot 35mm motion picture footage of himself performing public escapes staged across the country (almost always in front of local newspaper buildings) to promote his stage appearances. An assortment of these filmed records appear in the Harry Houdini Archival Footage section of this DVD. Had he not met his untimely death on October 31, 1926, Houdini might have continued to dabble in filmmaking, and may have even undertaken another feature project. As it was, the cinema was a world of opportunity that never paid off for him. Kalush and Sloman wrote:
In retrospect, Houdinis involvement in movies, financially speaking, was a nightmare...He wound up

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in litigation over his fifty percent share of the profits for the hugely successful Master Mystery. When he branched out on his own and took charge of the productions, his quirky sensibility and attempt to run away from the elements that made him successful onstage doomed their success. The only positives from Houdinis involvement in motion pictures were that it spread his fame worldwide and greatly increased his vaudeville salary, ironically at a time when he had no real interest in performing again.

Some of Houdinis films (such as the filmed escapes) are remarkably well preserved, while others either exist in fragmentary form or in poor-quality 16mm prints (The Man from Beyond). In some cases, it is due to the lack of consideration the major studios paid silent films once sound revolutionized the industry, allowing (neither of the films Houdini made for Paramount exist in their entirety). Another reason is that, as a short-lived independent company, the Houdini Picture Corporation had no facilities to preserve the original film elements. In Kenneth Silvermans biography, Houdinis niece, Marie Hinson Blood recalls the fate of some of these archive prints. One day the fire inspector came on a routine inspection trip, and my father took him all over the house. When they got to the storage room, he asked my father what the metal

cases contained. My father very proudly said, I am Harry Houdinis brother-in-law and these are all the movies he made. They were old 35mm film and my father opened one up and showed the inspector. The inspector said, I am canceling all of your insurance. You could blow up this whole block as these films are very combustible. You must get rid of all of them immediately. My father was aghast at the whole thing. His beautiful home without insurancethese wonderful movies. Without discussing it with anyone else, other than my mother, who was just as heartbroken, during the night they took every one of the containers of film and put them in cartons in front of the house and stood there as the rubbish men hauled a fortune in Houdini films.

Special Thanks to Felicia Feaster, Renata Gibson, Rene Rodriguez Gresham, Brian Shirey, Rob Sweeney, Rick Watson; The Performing Arts Collection at the Harry Ransom Research Center of the University of Texas at Austin,The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center,The New York State Archives, a program of the State Education Department Additional research and editing: Sarah Callahan, Daniela Curr, Vincent Pirozzi, Ins Toharia Tern, Ishumael Zinyengere, students of the Jeffrey Selznick School of Film Preservation at George Eastman House.

Houdini and crew at Niagara Falls, shooting The Man From Beyond.

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