The Astronomer's Club has gathered for an important conference in its grand quarters. The architecture is a composite of Romanesque vaults carried on compound Gothic columns with Corinthian captitals and a smattering of Renaissance detail. The telescopes held aloft by members of the society turn into stools, and they sit down to business. The costumes are those of medieval wizards, complete with pointed hats. A plan to send a rocket from earth to moon is drawn on a chalkboard by the leader (Méliès). This provokes a general demonstration of agreement and dissent. The plan is accepted and five members are elected for the voyage. President Barbenfouillis and Messrs. Alcofrisbas, Omega, Micromegas, and Parafaragamus. They change into vivid nineteenth century outfits and depart. The scene dissolves to the factory where the rocket is being constructed. A workman hammers out part on an anvil. The future astronauts jubilantly inspect their craft. The painted interior of the factory, a glass roofed structure, duplicates the glass roofed interior of the Montreuil studio. The scene again dissolves to the roof of the factory where the scientists exlaim about the scene with its industrial chimneys belching real smoke. Another dissolve reveals the launch ramp where the spaceship will be loaded. The explorers arrive and after their farewells climb aboard. The corps de ballet, dressed in music hall sailor suits, push the projectile into the breech of the cannon. They wave cheerfully to the audience. In front of the giant cannon, resembling "Big Bertha" of World War I, an admiral raises his sword in preparation for firing. His "sailors" arrive. The cannon is fired. The good citizens of the town swarm in to wave goodbye. The scene dissolves to a view of the moon seen at a distance. The moon approaches through the clouds, suggesting a traveling shot. (...) Suddenly the rocket ship lands in the moon's right eye, causing the moon to grimace and shed a custard tear. The affect is that of a close-up that is rationalized by special circumstances, similar to Smith's rationalized iris clowe-ups in "Grandmother's Looking Glass". The unhappy face of the moon dissolves into a view of the lunar surface. The rocket lands again. Narrative continuity has been made subordinate to discreet sensation. (...) The spacecraft has landed in the Plain of Craters, a landscape full of fantastic rocky needles. The astronauts emerge from their craft, which promptly disappears. They look to the black sky. From below the horizon the earth rises into view. The leader of the expedition pokes at a moon rock, which promptly explodes in a puff of smoke. After the strain of their voyage the explorers decide to bed down. While they sleep, a comet crosses the heavens. The seven stars of the Big Dipper appear in the black sky to comment on the intruders. A double star passes by. An outraged Saturn peeking out of his ringed planet and Phoebe on her crescent moon (Bluette Bernon) appear in the sky. Phoebe causes a snowstorm which rouses the astronauts. They seek shelter in the interior of the moon. There they find an even more extraordinary landscape filled with giant mushrooms. The leader sticks his umbrella into the ground; it grows into an immense mushroom. This charming moment was taken from H.G. Wells' description of plants that grew with time lapse rapidity in "The First Men on the Moon": "Every moment more of these seed coats ruptured and even as they did so the swelling pioneers overflowed their rent distended seed cases and passed into the second stage of growth." The six intrepid adventurers are now attacked by the Selenite army, creatures who are half primate, half crustacean. These agile beings, played by acrobats from the Folies-Bergère, do flips, handstands, and disappear in clouds of smoke when poked by an earthling's umbrella. The Selenites capture the explorers and take them to their leader. From his splendid throne the king of the Selenites orders the execution of the intruders. President Barbenfouillis grapples with the king, who goes up in smoke. The adventurers excape in the confusion that follows. They are pursued across the lunar landscape by the Selenite army. The leader strikes several Selenites, who go up in smoke. At last they arrive at their spaceship poised on the edge of a precipice. All clamber aboard except the leader, who is still battling Selenites. Barbenfouillis grabs a line attached to the nose of the projectile, pulling it over into space, a Selenite still clinging to the ship. The Selenite army arrives and makes threatening gestures at the departing spaceship. The next three shots have an editorial linkage seldom found in Méliès' work. The spaceship falls toward the earth. It leaves the frame. In the next shot it reenters the frame and plunges into the sea, a real photographed sea. In the third shot the missile again enters the frame and lands on the bottom of the sea, this time a fish tank. The continuity of action and direction are maintained through all three shots. The second shot uses a cardboard silhouette manipulated in front of an acquarium, complete with tadpoles and jets of air blown through the water. The first and second shots with the white silhouette of the falling rocket, a Selenite still riding on its back, the expedition leader still clinging to a line in front, is more complex. The illusion could have been made in several ways. A negative of the sea could have been rear projected, a black cutout miniature of the spaceship passed in front of the image and clouds of smoke sent up from the bottom of the frame at the appropriate moment, but this seems not to have been the case because the smoke emerges from within the waves and the silhouette of the ship is white. The second possibility would have been to draw a black silhouette directly onto the 110 frames of the negative. This too seems unlikely, even with the use of a photographed template from which the figure could be traced. The delicacy and steadiness of the rope, in particular, is too fine. This leaves a third possibility, which is more consistent with Méliès' working methods. The falling object, either at full scale or more likely in miniature, was photographed against a black ground with jets of white smoke shot up from behind a mask placed over the lower quadrant of the frame. The resulting negative was then bi-packed (sandwiched) with the negative of the sea in the printer to generate a composite image. Tonal disturbances at the beginning and end of the sequence point toward manipulation in the printer. After the capsule has floated back to the surface, the scene changes to a miniature harbor in which a masted steamer tugs the floating spaceship into port. The final tableau, missing in most of the American prints, shows the town square and a jubilant celebration of the celestial voyagers. The heros are decorated, sailors and firemen parade by. A statue is erected in honor of the noble Barbenfouillis. The inscription on the statue reads "Labor omnia vincit" (work conquers all). No better motto for the motion picture career of Georges Méliès was ever devised. (ur Artificially Arranged Scenes. The Films of Georges Méliès av John Frazer 1979)
