A Venetian Tragedy (Un Drame a Venise). 1906. Directed by Albert Capellani.

(1/23/00)

I enjoyed this film. It's main asset is its picturesque quality. The stagey sets create a stylized atmosphere of a renaissance Venice. The whole thing has a precious quality, as if we were watching scenes enacted in a dollhouse.

There is nothing remarkable about the plot. It's infidelity and a beggar's revenge. The plot merely serves to keep the film moving--and it does.

The film has a strange ending. The husband, having killed the lover, confronts the wife who opens her robe to reveal a strange costume at the sight of which the husband falls to his knees, weeping. I didn't understand what that was all about.