The Fall of the House of Usher

A man receives a letter from an old friend and travels to a remote house. Roderick Usher lives there with his wife Madeline. He is painting her portrait, and as the picture advances she weakens; her life seems to be passing into the canvas. Madeline dies and is placed in the vault. Roderick believes she is not dead. Jean Epstein directs. The source is Edgar Allan Poe's story, into which Epstein also folded The Oval Portrait. What it is known for is the use of slow motion. Curtains, cloth and falling objects are shown slowed; Epstein uses it not as an effect but as the deformation of time. The house is not a set but a condition; the corridors keep lengthening, the wind blows indoors, and the space becomes the narrative itself. Luis Buñuel worked as an assistant on the film, quarrelled with Epstein and left; he made Un Chien Andalou shortly afterwards. It belongs to the last years of silent cinema and counts among the most cited works of French impressionism. Among Poe adaptations this is one of the furthest from its source; Epstein replaces the siblings of the story with a husband and wife. Who it is for: viewers interested in silent cinema and visual experiment. Who it is not for: the plot is weak, the narrative rests entirely on atmosphere, and the prints vary in quality.