Seven Footprints to Satan
Directed byBenjamin Christensen
Screenplay byBenjamin Christensen[1]
Story byBenjamin Christensen[1]
Based on7 Footprints to Satan
by Abraham Merritt
Produced byWid Gunning
Starring
CinematographySol Polito[1]
Edited byFrank Ware[1]
Production
companies
First National Pictures, Inc.[1]
Distributed byFirst National Pictures, Inc.[2]
Release date
  • January 27, 1929 (1929-01-27)
CountryUnited States[2]
Box office$129,950[3]

Seven Footprints to Satan is a 1929 American mystery film directed by Danish filmmaker Benjamin Christensen. Based on the 1928 story of the same name by Abraham Merritt, it stars Thelma Todd, Creighton Hale, William V. Mong and Sheldon Lewis. It was released both as a silent film with a Vitaphone synchronized music-and-effects accompaniment and also in an entirely silent version.[2] The film survives in an alternate sound version known as an International Sound Version. The sound disks for this foreign sound version are apparently not extant.

Plot

Jim and his fiancee Eve, a young society couple, are kidnapped on the eve of Jim's departure for Africa and brought to a mansion that is home to a strange and glamorous cult with a hooded leader called "Satan." Jim is put through a number of strange adventures in the old house and tries to maintain his courage. During the course of the film, Jim encounters an old witch, a dwarf, a gorilla and a strange shaggy creature called "The Spider". In the end, he is confronted by Satan himself who puts him to a final test. It is revealed to be a hoax played on Jim by his uncle Joe, Eve, and his uncle's employees to convince Jim to forget his adventure plans, stay at home, work for his uncle, and settle down with Eve.

Cast

Production

Seven Footprints to Satan was adapted from the 1928 novel 7 Footprints to Satan by Abraham Merritt.[1][2] The screenplay was written by director Benjamin Christensen under the name Richard Bee.[1][4] Initially overjoyed that his story would be adapted into a film, Merritt later spoke about the film in a 1933 interview, stating that he "sat through the picture and wept. The only similarity between the book and the picture was the title. The picture likewise killed the booksale [...] for people who saw the picture felt no impulse thereafter to read the book."[5][6]

Christensen cast actor Creighton Hale in the role of Jim in an attempt to capitalize on Hale's having starred in The Cat and the Canary, an earlier similar "old dark house" film.[4]

Release

The silent version of the film was released on January 27, 1929 while the Vitaphone version was released on February 17, 1929.[7]

The original running time of Seven Footprints to Satan is in question. [8] In his book Thrills Untapped: Neglected Horror, Science Fiction and Fantasy Films, 1928-1936, Michael R. Pitts noted that most contemporary reviews stated the film had a 60 minute running time seemingly referring to the sound version of the film.[8] The silent release is listed as 5,267 feet, 168 feet shorter than the sound release of 5,405 feet.[8]

Pitts described the film as a "box office flop",[9] with a gross of $129,950.[3]

Pitts proposes that the film was originally shot at supposed "silent" speed, 18fps, and ran 75 minutes when projected at that speed; if shown at 24fps, however, the film runs only 60 minutes and the audio was created to accompany the film shown at 24fps. However, by 1929 almost all American silent films were produced to be projected at 24 fps, and the silent versions of sound films distributed to "unwired" theatres not yet equipped for sound films were often shorter than their sound counterparts, sometimes drastically so (as in the case of Warner Bros. The Terror, in which the original all-dialogue sound version of 7,774 feet was also issued in a silent format of 5,443 feet).

The 2022 Serial Squadron Blu-Ray restoration of the feature is presented at their "silent" speed of 18fps and runs 75 minutes.

Critical response

Pitts described that contemporary critics were overall "not impressed" with Seven Footprints to Satan.[10] A review in Film Daily described the film as a "has of weird and wild doings in a mysterious house with a lot of phony thrills."[10] Movie Age opined that "Maybe we haven't seen all the so-called mystery-drama-thrillers so far released, but of those what we have seen, this Seven Footprints to Satan is one of the poorest. There is not a convincing situation in it, and the explanation of it all at the end takes the cake...no rhyme or reason."[10] A review in Variety similarly called the film "all hokum", noting "another of those fright producers, wholly baffling from start to finish. An utterly moronic sound film appealing to all the passions."[10] One reviewer in Photoplay stated that they loved the title of the film but found it "just a hodgepodge mystery story"[10]

A review in Harrison's Reports commented that "People will no doubt enjoy this picture provided they don't take it seriously. It is one of the wildest mystery trapdoor melodramas that has been produced in many a moon."[10]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Pitts 2018, p. 235.
  2. 1 2 3 4 "Seven Footprints to Satan". American Film Institute. Retrieved January 13, 2020.
  3. 1 2 Donati, p. 35.
  4. 1 2 Workman & Howarth 2016, p. 345.
  5. ↑ Soister, Nicolella & Joyce 2014, p. 508.
  6. ↑ Soister, Nicolella & Joyce 2014, p. 509.
  7. ↑ Munden 1997, p. 698.
  8. 1 2 3 Pitts 2018, p. 239.
  9. ↑ Pitts 2018, p. 237.
  10. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Pitts 2018, p. 238.

Footnotes

  • Clarens, Carlos. An Illustrated History of Horror and Science-fiction Films. Putnam.
  • Donati, William. The Life and Death of Thelma Todd. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company.
  • Munden, Kenneth White (1997). The American Film Institute Catalog of Motion Pictures Produced in the United States, Part 1. University of California Press. ISBN 0520209699.
  • Soister, John T.; Nicolella, Henry; Joyce, Steve (2014). American Silent Horror, Science Fiction and Fantasy Feature Films, 1913-1929. McFarland. ISBN 978-0786487905.
  • Pitts, Michael R. (2018). Thrills Untapped: Neglected Horror, Science Fiction and Fantasy Films, 1928-1936. McFarland. ISBN 978-1476632896.
  • Workman, Christopher; Howarth, Troy (2016). Tome of Terror: Horror Films of the Silent Era. Midnight Marquee Press. ISBN 978-1936168-68-2.
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