J'accuse! (1919 film)

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J'accuse!
Theatrical poster for J'accuse! (1919).
Directed by	Abel Gance
Written by	Abel Gance
Starring	Romuald Joubé Séverin-Mars
Distributed by	Pathé United Artists (USA)
Release date(s)	April 25, 1919 (1919-04-25)
Country	France
Language	silent French intertitles
IMDb profile

J'accuse! is a 1919 silent film directed by Abel Gance. Romuald Joubé stars as Jean Diaz, a poet-soldier who survives the First World War. A pacifist epic, the film features the dead soldiers of the war rising from their graves to confront the living. Jean Diaz asks the terrified population how they have profited from the war, shouting "J'accuse!" ("I accuse!").

While filming a pivotal scene in which the dead stand together to form the word "J'accuse," a French general asked Gance who he was accusing. Gance answered, "I am accusing war. I am accusing man. I am accusing universal stupidity."

The dead soldiers who rose from their graves at the climax of the film were played by real soldiers who were on leave from the front. In a macabre coincidence, most were killed after they returned to the battlefield.

Gance remade J'accuse! with sound in 1938.

A new restoration of the film was produced by Lobster Films Studios, Paris, working in collaboration with Netherlands Filmmuseum and Flicker Alley. They culled materials from the Lobster Collection, the Czech archive in Prague, the Cinematheque Francaise, and the Netherlands Filmmuseum to make the best possible and most complete edition of the original 1919 edit of the film.

[edit] References

Gill, David; Brownlow, Kevin (Producers / Directors). (1996). Cinema Europe: The Other Hollywood [Documentary]. Photoplay Productions, Inc. Retrieved on 2007-10-05. Event occurs at 54:30 in Ep. 1: Where It All Began.

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