French comedian Max Linder was looking for a big hit in the United States after his spotlight dimmed following World War One. The once-immensely popular filmmaker formed his own production company in the States, and in his first feature film where he wrote, directed and starred in, Linder released February 1921's "Seven Years Bad Luck." In retrospect, film critics have hailed the movie concerning a wealthy man about to be married who breaks a mirror, setting off a series of adverse events, as his best.
The movie contains a series of farcical situations displayed by a superstitious Max who always has his guard up. His staff realizes his anxieties when they break his dressing glass. To cover up the accident, they have a lookalike on the staff mimic his actions on the other side of the mirror's frame while Max is preparing for the day. Although his famous 'human mirror' sketch is not cinema's first to show such a complex technique, Linder's is the longest of its kind. The Marx Brothers, Lucille Ball, among others have mimic his classic routine to great success.
Another sequence analyzed for decades is Linder's escape from the police towards the end of the movie where he seeks refuge in a lions' cage. His friendliness with these large cats scare the police squad off. It's remarkable Linder not only shares the same space as the lions, he gets particularly friendly with one of them. Chaplin, a friend and an admirer of the French comic and met frequently in California developing gags for one another, has been noted adapting the lion cage scene in his 1928 "The Circus."
"Seven Years Bad Luck" failed to capture the enthusiasm of American audiences. Linder's popularity, which peaked from 1912 to 1914, was interrupted by the Great War. He was a dispatch driver between Paris and the front lines early in the war after trying to enlist in the French Army. In a number of differing accounts, Linder either was gassed, shot through the lungs, or came down with pneumonia. In any case, he was dismissed from the front and ended up entertaining troops. It was during this period he suffered from depression.
After a post-war Essanay Studio gig in the United States and a return home to France to open a movie theatre, both unsuccessful ventures, Linder decided to give it one more try to amuse American audiences. Thus was spawned 'Seven Years Bad Luck,' a film which later assessments proved very positive but failed to generate any contemporary interest in the States.
