The Crazy Ray

The watchman on the Eiffel Tower wakes one morning to find Paris stopped. People are frozen where they stood: a thief mid run in the street, a waiter holding a glass, a man about to go off a bridge. Then a few others appear at the foot of the tower, all of them people who were in the air at the time. The city becomes their playground. René Clair writes and directs, in his first film. The premise is simple and its consequences are interesting. What happens to morality when time stops and nobody is looking. The group enjoys itself, then tires of it, then starts fighting among themselves. Clair treats this not as a science fiction device but as a question about what people do when they are unobserved. The Eiffel Tower is the real location and is used unusually for its moment; Clair films it as a structure people live on rather than as scenery. Versions differ. Copies of varying lengths circulated over the years, and which one represents the original cut is still argued about. It is a standard example of the restoration problems of silent film. Clair went on to become one of the best known directors in French cinema, and this first film is where his manner between humour and the fantastic begins. Who it is for: viewers interested in silent cinema, early science fiction and 1920s Paris. Who it is not for: the idea starts repeating after a while and none of the characters develops. The film rests essentially on one invention.