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Posted by Gerard S. Cohen (Member # 994) on 01-20-2002, 06:15 PM:
SHADOW MAGIC is a wonderful (semi) fictionalized
story of the first “moving picture man” in turn-of-the-
century China, his lovesick Chinese partner, and how
the locals responded to their first exposure to
moving pictures. Along with its basic virtue that
nobody gets killed and nothing gets blown up, it is a
wonderful homage to the joys of motion picture
exhibition! A sweet, gentle little tale, Shadow magic
spends much of its time exploring the real excitement
the solitary projectionist-editor-cinematographer has
for showing-- and ultimately making-- movies. Though it
starts off a little slow, and the opening sequences
don’t give much of a clue as to the nature of what
is to come, one comes away feeling deeply rewarded.
This is in in concept and structure an “old
fashioned” movie. The British itinerant portrayed is
clearly supposed to be one of the Lumiere
exhibitor-cinematorgraphers, and although the prop
projector/camera is all wrong, the story and
insights are so engaging that this does not become
irritating. In many ways, including the unusual choice
of material and the realistic scale of what is
portrayed this is a “special” movie, I came to care
about the characters. The reviews left me with the
impression that the critics did not understand the
film. For those of us who come to this kind of thing
with some special understanding of the material, which
apparently the makers of the film had, and the critics
could not be expected to have, Shadow Magic is a little
gem. You can find it in a good tape rental place in
the foreign films section.[The above review was written by friend Paul Pottash, film enthusiast,
restorer of vintage projectors, builder of his own home 35mm theatre,
and former editor of Sixteen Frames, the quarterly journal of the
recent Movie Machine Society. He sent it to me as part of an email letter, and I'm posting it with his permission.--Gerard]