View source for The Pillar of Fire

{{Other uses|Pillar of Fire (disambiguation)}}
{{Infobox film
| name           = The Pillar of Fire
| image          = Danse du feu (1899).webm
| caption        = 
| director       = [[Georges Méliès]]
| producer       = 
| writer         = 
| starring       = 
| studio         = [[Star Film Company]]
| released       = {{Film date|1899}}
| runtime        = 1 minute
| country        = France
| language       = Silent
}}
'''''The Pillar of Fire''''' ({{langx|fr|'''Danse du feu'''}}), initially released in America and Britain as '''''Haggard's "She"—The Pillar of Fire'''''<ref name=MM>{{citation|last1=Malthête|first1=Jacques|last2=Mannoni|first2=Laurent|title=L'oeuvre de Georges Méliès|year=2008|publication-place=Paris|publisher=Éditions de La Martinière|isbn=9782732437323|page=340}}</ref> and also known as '''''La Colonne de feu''''',<ref name=RKO/> is an 1899 silent [[trick film]] directed by [[Georges Méliès]]<ref name=Yumibe/> based on [[H. Rider Haggard]]'s 1887 novel ''[[She: A History of Adventure]]''. It is an early [[fantasy film]] depicting a [[devil]].

==Summary==
A devil cavorts in a large fireplace, kindling a fire. Out of a giant skillet rises a young woman in voluminous white robes. As smoke rises in the fireplace, the woman begins a [[serpentine dance]]. Her skirts take on the appearance of flames until, finally, she disappears in a burst of fire.

==Production==
''The Pillar of Fire'' was the first film to be based on [[H. Rider Haggard]]'s 1887 novel ''[[She: A History of Adventure]]''.<ref name=RKO>{{citation|title=RKO Radio Pictures Horror, Science Fiction and Fantasy Films, 1929–1956|first=Michael R.|last=Pitts|location=Jefferson, NC|publisher=McFarland|year=2015|page=284|isbn=9781476616834 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WzCvBwAAQBAJ&pg=PA284}}</ref> Rather than attempting to tell the whole story of the novel, Méliès used one of its characters as inspiration for a trick film,<ref name=Costa>{{citation|first=Antonio|last=Costa|chapter=Pour une interprétation iconologique du cinéma de Méliès: 'vues dites à transformations' et trucages|editor1-last=Malthête|editor1-first=Jacques|editor2-first=Michel|editor2-last=Marie|title=Georges Méliès, l'illusionniste fin de siècle?: actes du colloque de Cerisy-la-Salle, 13–22 août 1996|location=Paris|publisher=Presses de la Sorbonne nouvelle|year=1997|page=170|isbn=9782878541403 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1n9W-3XrdPAC&pg=PA170}}</ref> recalling the scene in the novel in which Ayesha stands amid flames.<ref name=Intro>{{citation|first=Norman|last=Etherington|chapter=Critical Introduction|title=The Annotated She: A Critical Edition of H. Rider Haggard's Victorian Romance with Introduction and Notes|year=1991|location=Bloomington|publisher=Indiana University Press|page=xxxvii|isbn=0253320720 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ypE2N4Qfq9IC&pg=PR37}}</ref> At least six other adaptations of ''She'' were made in the silent era.<ref name=Intro/>

==Release==
The film was released by Méliès's [[Star Film Company]] and is numbered 188 in its catalogues.<ref name=MM/> While the film was marketed in America and Britain as ''Haggard's She'', emphasizing the connection with the popular novel, it was offered simply as ''Danse du feu'' in France, with no mention of Haggard.<ref name=Costa/>

Like many of Méliès's films, ''The Pillar of Fire'' was offered in a [[film colorization|hand-colored]] print with coloring designed and directed by [[Elisabeth Thuillier]]. The surviving hand-colored print of the film is an ornate example of Thuillier's work for Méliès.<ref name=Yumibe>{{citation|last=Yumibe|first=Joshua|title=Moving Color: Early Film, Mass Culture, Modernism|location=New Brunswick, NJ|publisher=Rutgers University Press|year=2012|page=72|isbn=9780813552989 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cpvymkXtt1AC&pg=PA72}}</ref>

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
*{{IMDb title|id=0000235|title=The Pillar of Fire}}
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZSiYfO7wvI ''The Pillar of Fire''] on [[YouTube]]

{{She: A History of Adventure}}
{{Georges Méliès}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pillar of Fire}}
[[Category:1899 films]]
[[Category:1890s fantasy films]]
[[Category:French silent short films]]
[[Category:French black-and-white films]]
[[Category:Films based on She: A History of Adventure]]
[[Category:Films directed by Georges Méliès]]
[[Category:Articles containing video clips]]
[[Category:1899 short films]]
[[Category:1899 French films]]
[[Category:Demons in film]]
[[Category:Trick films]]


{{1890s-France-film-stub}}

{{Wikipedia attribution|original_title=The Pillar of Fire|access_date=2026-03-07}}