Dance espagnole par 'La Belle' Otero

This film (1896-1899) of a Spanish dancer accompanid by a mandolinist is first known from the 1899 Pathé catalogue simply as "Danse espagnole". It has nothing to do with Félix Mesguich's tale of how he photographed the Belle Otero in August 1898 in Saint Petersburg, which, because she iwas dancing in the film with a high-ranking army officer, caused a scandal and led to his expulsion from Russia (the film was almost certainly conifiscated). Mesguich worked for Lumière not for Pathé and Mesguich was obliged to leave Russia "sans baggages" so vey certainly without the film. The Lumière film may nevertheess have survived as a short film, available in more than one place on the internet, does, if genuine, show the dancer accompanied by guitar (as described by Mesguich) with a military of figue of some sort clowning around in the background. This is certainly not the Pathé film.

The Pathé film, which probably does not genuinely feature Caroline Otéro, was however advertised in their 1900 and 1901 catalogues as Danse espagnole (la belle Otéro). The 1901 caalogue even talks of "la danseuse bien connue " but thereafter the film was described, almost certainly more honestly, as Danse espagnole (genre belle Otéro) or in the English version of the catalogue (1903-1904) as Spanish Dance (Otero's Style). The 1901 catalogue describes yje dancer as accompanied by two mandolinists but a surviving still shows just one mandolinist and a tambourinist.