Meet Me at the Fountain

Last updated
Meet Me at the Fountain
Meet Me at the Fountain screenshot 1.jpeg
Directed by Siegmund Lubin
Produced bySiegmund Lubin
Starring Gilbert Sarony
CinematographySiegmund Lubin
Release date
  • 1904 (1904)
Running time
5 minutes 34 seconds
Country United States of America
LanguagesSilent
English intertitles

Meet Me at the Fountain is a 1904 American silent short comedy film written, produced, and directed by Siegmund Lubin. Actors in the movie included Gilbert Sarony, a well-known cross-dressing performer. The film was inspired by Wallace McCutcheon's 1904 film Personal. [1]

Contents

Plot

The film starts with a title reading 'A remake of "Personal" in which a man advertises in the newspaper for a wife, asking interested parties to "meet me at the fountain"'. It is followed by a middle close-up of the man drafting the advertisement, a middle shot of the man posting it, and again a middle close-up of the man getting ready in front of a mirror. This is followed by a full shot of the man waiting at the meeting point in front of a fountain. First comes a nanny, pushing a baby stroller. He bows low and wants to kiss the baby but she pushes him away.

Meet Me at the Fountain: streetcar shot Meet Me at the Fountain screenshot 2.jpeg
Meet Me at the Fountain: streetcar shot

A number of women arrive, he begins to greet them but when they become too insistent, he runs away, chased by the group of women. He catches a streetcar, jumps over a fence, runs up a flight of stairs, climbs up a tree, then a wall but they keep following him. He finally falls into a river where one of the ladies follows him and helps him get out of the water, she is the winner.

The film ends with a medium close-up of the bride and bridegroom all dressed up, which reveals that the bride is actually a man dressed as a woman. The two men French kiss.

Production and analysis

This is the third film shot in the United States in 1904 showing a man placing an advertisement in order to get married and ending up being chased by a group of women. The first was Personal, directed by Wallace McCutcheon Sr., for the Biograph Company and the second was a remake, How a French Nobleman Got a Wife Through the New York Herald Personal Columns , directed by Edwin S. Porter for the Edison Manufacturing Company.

Meet Me at the Fountain: Bride and bridegroom Meet Me at the Fountain screenshot 3.jpeg
Meet Me at the Fountain: Bride and bridegroom

Siegmund Lubin, who was trained as an optometrist and had built his own camera and projector combination started in 1896 distributing films notably from Thomas Edison in Philadelphia. From 1897 he started making films and in 1902 formed the Lubin Manufacturing Company. This film is mostly composed of outdoors wide shots and includes at the beginning and at the end medium close-ups shot indoors.

While the film is presented as a remake of Personal, it includes a greater variety of shots and more importantly presents an unprecedented twist at the end with the shot revealing that the bride is played by a man, celebrated female impersonator Gilbert Sarony. [2]

Related Research Articles

<i>Seven Brides for Seven Brothers</i> 1954 film by Stanley Donen

Seven Brides for Seven Brothers is a 1954 American musical film, directed by Stanley Donen, with music by Gene de Paul, lyrics by Johnny Mercer, and choreography by Michael Kidd. The screenplay, by Albert Hackett, Frances Goodrich, and Dorothy Kingsley, is based on the short story "The Sobbin' Women", by Stephen Vincent Benét, which was based in turn on the ancient Roman legend of the Rape of the Sabine Women. Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, which is set in Oregon in 1850, is particularly known for Kidd's unusual choreography, which makes dance numbers out of such mundane frontier pursuits as chopping wood and raising a barn. Film critic Stephanie Zacharek has called the barn-raising sequence in Seven Brides "one of the most rousing dance numbers ever put on screen." The film was photographed in Ansco Color in the CinemaScope format.

<i>The Great Train Robbery</i> (1903 film) 1903 American western film by Edwin S. Porter

The Great Train Robbery is a 1903 American silent film made by Edwin S. Porter for the Edison Manufacturing Company. It follows a gang of outlaws who hold up and rob a steam locomotive at a station in the American West, flee across mountainous terrain, and are finally defeated by a posse of locals. The short film draws on many sources, including a robust existing tradition of Western films, recent European innovations in film technique, the play of the same name by Scott Marble, the popularity of train-themed films, and possibly real-life incidents involving outlaws such as Butch Cassidy.

The following is an overview of the events of 1899 in film, including a list of films released and notable births.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Edison Studios</span> Defunct American film production organization (1894–1918)

Edison Studios was an American film production organization, owned by companies controlled by inventor and entrepreneur, Thomas Edison. The studio made close to 1,200 films, as part of the Edison Manufacturing Company (1894–1911) and then Thomas A. Edison, Inc. (1911–1918), until the studio's closing in 1918. Of that number, 54 were feature length, and the remainder were shorts. All of the company's films have fallen into the public domain because they were released before 1928.

<i>The Man Who Knew Too Little</i> 1997 film by Jon Amiel

The Man Who Knew Too Little is a 1997 spy comedy film starring Bill Murray, directed by Jon Amiel, and written by Robert Farrar and Howard Franklin. The film is based on Farrar's 1997 novel Watch That Man, and the title is a parody of Alfred Hitchcock's 1934 film The Man Who Knew Too Much and his 1956 remake of the same title.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Siegmund Lubin</span> American motion picture pioneer

Siegmund Lubin was an American motion picture pioneer who founded the Lubin Manufacturing Company (1902–1917) of Philadelphia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lubin Manufacturing Company</span> American silent motion picture production company

The Lubin Manufacturing Company was an American motion picture production company that produced silent films from 1896 to 1916. Lubin films were distributed with a Liberty Bell trademark.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arthur Lubin</span> American film director (1898–1995)

Arthur Lubin was an American film director and producer who directed several Abbott & Costello films, Phantom of the Opera (1943), the Francis the Talking Mule series and created the talking-horse TV series Mister Ed. A prominent director for Universal Pictures in the 1940s and 1950s, he is perhaps best known today as the man who gave Clint Eastwood his first contract in film.

<i>Gullivers Travels Among the Lilliputians and the Giants</i> 1902 French silent film by Georges Méliès

Le Voyage de Gulliver à Lilliput et chez les Géants, released in the United States as Gulliver's Travels Among the Lilliputians and the Giants and in the United Kingdom as Gulliver's Travels—In the land of the Lilliputians and the Giants, is a 1902 French silent trick film directed by Georges Méliès, based on Jonathan Swift's 1726 novel Gulliver's Travels.

<i>Ramona</i> (1910 film) 1910 film

Ramona is a 1910 American short drama film directed by D. W. Griffith, based on Helen Hunt Jackson's 1884 novel Ramona. Through a love story, the early silent short explores racial injustice to Native Americans and stars Mary Pickford and Henry B. Walthall. A copy of the print survives in the Library of Congress film archive. The film was remade in 1928 with Dolores del Río and 1936 with Loretta Young.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Georges Méliès</span> French filmmaker and illusionist (1861–1938)

Marie-Georges-Jean Méliès was a French magician, actor, and film director. He led many technical and narrative developments in the early days of cinema.

<i>Maniac Chase</i> 1903 short film by Edwin S. Porter

Maniac Chase is a 1904 American short silent comedy film directed by Edwin S. Porter and produced by the Edison Manufacturing Company. The film is a remake of The Escaped Lunatic, a film directed by Wallace McCutcheon Sr. released at the beginning of 1904. This was one of two Biograph Company hits remade by Edison's company in fall 1904, the other being Personal, which was copied as How a French Nobleman Got a Wife Through the New York Herald Personal Columns.

Wallace McCutcheon Sr. was a pioneer cinematographer and director in the early American motion picture industry, working with the American Mutoscope & Biograph, Edison and American Star Film companies. McCutcheon's wealth of credits are often mixed up with the small handful of films directed by his son, Wallace McCutcheon Jr. (1884–1928).

How Brown Saw the Baseball Game is an American short silent comedy film produced in 1907 and distributed by the Lubin Manufacturing Company. The film follows a baseball fan named Mr. Brown who overdrinks before a baseball game and becomes so intoxicated that the game appears to him in reverse motion. During production, trick photography was used to achieve this effect.

The Bold Bank Robbery is a 1904 short crime film produced and distributed by the Lubin Manufacturing Company. The silent film depicts a group of burglars who plan and execute a successful bank heist. Company employee Jack Frawley was the film's director, also coming up with the story and serving as cinematographer; the cast's identities are unknown. The silent film was the first Lubin Manufacturing Company release to feature an original narrative.

Gilbert Saroni, also written Gilbert Sarony, was a cross-dressing performer in vaudeville as well as early Edison Manufacturing, American Mutoscope, and Siegmund Lubin films. In his obituary in Variety he was described as one of the first impersonators of the "old maid" type and was said to be "considered one of the funniest men in the show business."

<i>El heredero de Casa Pruna</i> 1904 Spanish film

El heredero de Casa Pruna(English: The Heir of the Pruna House, Catalan: L’hereu de Can Pruna) is a Spanish short silent film directed by Segundo de Chomón. It was shot in Barcelona in 1904 and released in Spain the same year, making it the first Spanish comedy film.

<i>The Widow and the Only Man</i> 1904 American film

The Widow and the Only Man is a 1904 American short silent comedy film produced by the American Mutoscope & Biograph Company and directed by Wallace McCutcheon, Sr.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1914 Lubin vault fire</span> Destruction of a film-storage vault

On the morning of June 13, 1914, a disastrous fire and a series of related explosions occurred in the main film vault of the Lubin Manufacturing Company in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Several possible causes for the blaze were cited at the time, one being "spontaneous combustion" of highly flammable nitrate film, which was the motion picture industry's standard medium for cameras throughout the silent era and for the first two decades of "talking pictures". Millions of feet of film were consumed in the flames, including most of the master negatives and initial prints of Lubin's pre-1914 catalog, several of the company's recently completed theatrical prints ready for release and distribution, a considerable number of films produced by other studios, inventories of raw and stock footage, hundreds of reels documenting historic events that occurred between 1897 and early 1914, as well as other films related to notable political and military figures, innovations in medical science, and professional athletic contests from that period. While this fire was not a decisive factor in Lubin's decline and bankruptcy by September 1916, costs associated with the disaster only added to the corporation's mounting debts, which led to the closure or sale of its remaining operations the following year.

<i>How a French Nobleman Got a Wife Through the New York Herald Personal Columns</i> 1904 film by Edwin S. Porter

How a French Nobleman Got a Wife Through the New York Herald Personal Columns is a 1904 silent comic film directed by Edwin S. Porter for the Edison Manufacturing Company. The film is a remake of the hit film Personal, produced by the Biograph Company earlier in the year. The film is a spoof of the "fashionable marriages" known to take place between cash-strapped European nobility and American heiresses.

References

  1. Review, synopsis and link to watch the film: "A cinema history" . Retrieved 1 May 2020.
  2. Eckhardt, Joseph P. (1997). The King of the Movies: Film Pioneer Siegmund Lubin. Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press. p. 50. Retrieved 12 March 2024.