Le avventure straordinarissime di Saturnino Farandola

Early feature length films are either heavy melodramas or grandiose epics. Italian films from the 10s are better known as epics about the roman empire. Well this one stands out; it's a surreal, plot less crazy adventure through the world featuring mad pirates, gigantic sea monsters, exotic Chinese people, American warriors and even a hot air balloon war (remember, this is before WWI)! The kind of stuff you'd expect to read from a suddenly mad Jules Verne, without any scientific precision though.

I expected this film a the theoretical "What if Méliès had made a feature-length film?". But this film does not have the charm of Méliès had ten years before this. It's way less poetic though certainly imaginative. It's more adventure oriented, and stands on it's own. But I'd like to think that this film, which may have even been a bit dated in 1913, wasn't made seriously at all. You'll certainly laugh just like people did way back in 1913, and that's arguably how the director intended it. It's camp fun, and could be the most archaic feature-length film I've even seen.