18: The Wheel *

La Roue

FR, Dir: Abel Gance

Original Screenplay

The Wheel marks the first hiccup in this challenge to watch all 1001 films from the list. Up to this point all the films on the list have been easily found on YouTube but I knew as I edged closer to the present day this would no longer be the case and some films would require a bit more searching. The problem is that The Wheel doesn't seem to have been released in the UK in any format. It looks like you can get it fairly easily in the US and a fancy blu-ray has recently been released in France (where the film originates from) but there's nothing here in the UK and there's no way I can afford the extortionate prices of having a copy shipped over. 

This project is going to take me some considerable time and so there is a reasonable chance the film will become available before I reach the end and if it does I shall seek it out. In the mean time, I've done a fair bit of reading up on the film and watched the few clips that are on YouTube to give me as good an idea about the film as I can get without actually seeing it.

The plot revolves around a man, Sisif, finding a young girl, Norma, in the aftermath of a train crash and adopting her, raising her alongside his own son, Emil. As Norma grows older Sisif falls in love with her, as does Emil and she is shipped off to marry someone else. The marriage doesn't work out and she runs off with Emil who ends up fighting the husband with both men falling over a mountain precipice. It all sounds very melodramatic and takes it’s cues from Greek tragedy- Sisif is a version of Sisyphus and there's nods to the likes of Oedipus too. 

Whilst the story is quite old-fashioned the editing and the filming were far more modern. Director Abel Gance uses very short shots edited together to build tension in scenes like the opening train crash which most have felt incredibly fluid and revolutionary to audiences at the time. As Emil clings to a mountain with Norma helplessly looking down at him his life literally flashes before his eyes and there's a montage of short of the two characters together, again something that just hadn't been done before. 

One commentator I heard talking about the film describes it as both brilliant and self-indulgent. Gance was clearly a very talented director finding new ways to shoot and edit films but at the same time any director who choose to insert an image of himself directly looking at the camera during the opening titles is bit showy. Even from what I've seen it seems like that he sometimes played with directorial flair too much instead of focusing on the story. 

It's certainly a fascinating film that likely inspired subsequent directors but it seems like it's story doesn't always match the same level as it's direction.