Max Linder

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Max Linder, around 1917

Max Linder (real name Gabriel-Maximilien Leuvielle ; born December 16, 1883 in Saint-Loubès , Gironde department , † October 31, 1925 in Paris ) was a French film actor , screenwriter , director and pioneer of comedy films . After André Deed , he was the second star comedian in France and in film history, and before Asta Nielsen he is the first international film star ever. With his character Max he was the typical womanizer of France at the beginning of the 20th century.

Live and act

At the age of five, Linder contracted cholera and nearly died. Even in school he practiced acting and skipped a few lessons. He attended a conservatory in Bordeaux for two years and then played minor roles in theaters in Paris until 1908. In 1905 Linder began his film career while acting on the side for the Pathé Frères . After 1908 he was exclusively a film actor.

Max Linder in Seven Years Bad Luck

At first he only got supporting roles, but after developing his film character, the charming dandy Max , Linder became the biggest star of the Pathé comedies from 1907. Even in the breakneck situations he often got into in his films, Max never lost his stylish demeanor. He always appeared in a top hat , tuxedo , ice cream gloves and with a correctly trimmed mustache. The first short film to focus on this character was Les débuts d'un patineur , but Linder had previously been seen in the same style, e.g. B. in Le pendu and as an extra in Lèvres collées .

The great international breakthrough came around 1909, when Linder's name first appeared in contemporary film reviews. From 1910 a long series of films was made, all of which had the name "Max" in the title. Linder was the first film actor whose name was mentioned on advertising posters. In the same year he built his own cinema in Paris. The Cinéma Max Linder still exists today. From 1911 he produced the Max films on his own. By 1913 Max Linder had successful appearances in variety shows all over Europe and also shot numerous one- and two-acts as well as the feature film Max and Love ( Le duel de Max , 1913) during his European tours .

After 1914, Linder lost much of its popularity due to the now much lower film output and the rise of American comedy films. He went to the First World War as a soldier and suffered severe physical damage from poison gas attacks. Two years later, despite his ailments, he went to Hollywood and took on roles in three short films by the Essanay studio . But since these did not meet with the expected approval, he returned to Paris. In 1919 he made his second feature film, Le Petit Café .

In 1921 he tried again with his production company Max Linder Inc. to gain a foothold on the US market and in 1921/22 created the feature films Seven Years Bad Luck , Be My Wife and The Three Must-Get-Theres , which, however, had only moderate success. The latter, a parody of the film The Three Musketeers starring Douglas Fairbanks , was at least a critical success. Linder was allowed to use the sets from the Fairbanks production for this film . Directed by Abel Gance in 1923 and released the following year, the short horror comedy Au secours! was his last acting climax. His last film Der Zirkuskönig was made in 1924 in the Rosenhügel film studios in Vienna .

On August 3, 1923, Linder married 17-year-old Hélène Peters. Their daughter Maud Linder was born on June 27, 1924 . However, the marital happiness only lasted for a short time, as Max Linder was neurasthenic and suffered from severe depression. As early as February 1924, the couple had attempted suicide together using poison, but they were saved. In October 1925, Linder cut his wife's left artery and then his own in a Paris hotel, after both of them had previously taken heavy doses of morphine. Hélène died before the emergency doctor who had been called could help, Linder a few hours later in the hospital.

Until the 1960s, Max Linder was almost forgotten, although he had played an extremely large role in the film comedy and still underestimated today. Charlie Chaplin called him his teacher - Chaplin's early film appearances are clearly stylistically influenced by Linder - and Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd also found inspiration in Linder. His daughter Maud Linder made two documentaries about her father, which received a lot of attention at various film festivals.

The exact number of films Max Linder has appeared in is unknown. According to rough estimates by film historians, there should be between 300 and 500, most of which are considered lost .

Filmography

Well-known short films (selection)

  • 1907: Les débuts d'un patineur
  • 1908: Vive la vie de garçon
  • 1908: Mon pantalon est décousu
  • 1909: Les surprises de l'amour
  • 1910: Max prend un bain
  • 1911: Max victime du quinquina
  • 1912: Max et son chien Dick
  • 1912: Max a peur de l'eau
  • 1912: Max et l'inauguration de la statue
  • 1912: Max et l'Entente cordiale (Entente cordiale) , u. a. with Harry Fragson
  • 1913: Max toréador
  • 1913: Le chapeau de Max
  • 1913: L'anglais tel que Max le parle
  • 1914: Max, professeur de tango
  • 1914: Max et la doctoresse
  • 1914: Max et sa belle-mère
  • 1914: Max au convent
  • 1915: Le Hasard et l'amour
  • 1917: Max Comes Across (USA, essanay )
  • 1917: Max Wants a Divorce (USA, Essanay)
  • 1917: Max in a Taxi (USA, Essanay)
  • 1917: Max entre deux feux
  • 1924: Au secours! (Director: Abel Gance )

Feature films (complete)

Compilation films

  • 1963: En compagnie de Max Linder . Director: Maud Linder .

Biographical films about Max Linder

  • 1983: L'Homme au chapeau de soie . Script and direction: Maud Linder. (German TV broadcast under the title The Man with the Silk Hat )
  • 2013: Max Linder - My father, the movie star . Script and direction: Jean-Michel Meurice.

literature

  • Charles Ford: Max Linder (Cinéma d'aujourd'hui, 38). Seghers, Paris 1966.
  • Jean Mitry : Max Linder . Anthologie du cinema, Paris 1966.
  • Maud Linder: Max Linder était mon père . Flammarion, Paris 1992, ISBN 978-2-08-066576-8 .
  • Maud Linder: Les dieux du cinéma muet: Max Linder . Editions Atlas, Paris 1992, ISBN 978-2-7312-1255-6 .
  • Frieda Grafe : "The discrete charm". In: Helga Barlach, Wolfgang Jacobsen (Eds.): Slapstick & Co. Early Comedies / Early Comedies. Argon, Berlin 1995, ISBN 3-87024-299-X , pp. 76-85.
  • Thomas Kuchenbuch (Ed.): Max Linder: An early star (mask and Kothurn. International contributions to theater, film and media studies). Böhlau, Vienna 2008, ISBN 978-3-205-77882-0 .
  • Maud Linder: Max Linder . Editions Montparnasse, Paris 2012. (= booklet for the DVD or Blu-ray box Le Cinéma de Max Linder )
  • Frank Scheide: "The Mark of the Ridiculous and Silent Celluloid: Some Trends in American and European Film Comedy from 1894 to 1929". In: Andrew Horton, Joanna E. Rapf (Eds.): A Companion to Film Comedy . Wiley-Blackwell, Chichester 2015, ISBN 978-1-1191-6955-0 , pp. 15-38.

DVD publications

  • Le Cinéma de Max Linder . Editions Montparnasse, Paris 2012. (Contains three DVDs or Blu-rays with ten short films by Max Linder from 1910–1915, the compilation film En compagnie de Max Linder (1963) by Maud Linder and the biographical film L'Homme au chapeau de soie (1983) by Maud Linder).
  • The Max Linder Collection . Kino Lorber, New York 2014. (contains the Linder films Max Wants a Divorce (1917), Seven Years Bad Luck (1921), Be My Wife (1921) and The Three Must-Get-Theres (1922) shot in the USA )

Web links

Commons : Max Linder  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Max Linder - My father, the film star on programm.ARD.de, accessed on January 17, 2018.
  2. ↑ Le Cinéma de Max Linder on the Editions Montparnasse homepage, accessed on January 17, 2018. (includes the full names of the titles of the short films on the DVD or Blu-ray)
  3. ↑ The Max Linder Collection (DVD) on the Kino Lorber homepage, accessed on January 17, 2018.
personal data
SURNAME Linder, Max
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Leuvielle, Gabriel-Maximilien
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French film actor and comedy film pioneer
DATE OF BIRTH December 16, 1883
PLACE OF BIRTH Saint-Loubès , Gironde department
DATE OF DEATH October 31, 1925
Place of death Paris