Fantômas! Les Vampires! Judex!: The roman noir film-serials of Louis Feuillade with John Hartley

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French filmmaker Louis Feuillade’s crime serials, made between 1913 and 1916, may be seen as the twentieth-century offspring of the roman noir of Eugène Sue and Paul Féval père, whose works, like those of their English near-contemporaries Edward Bulwer Lytton, G.P.R. James, William Harrison Ainsworth and G.W.M. Reynolds, marked a nineteenth-century transition from the original gothic.

Fantômas, based on the pulp novels by Marcel Allain and Pierre Souvestre, follows the criminal activities of the titular character, whose very existence is debated by Parisian society, even as he is pursued by Inspector Juve and his ally the journalist Fandor. Loved by the avant-garde, and paid homage to by the painters Juan Gris, Yves Tanguy, and René Magritte, the books and film serial were a popular and critical success.

Les Vampires featured another crusading journalist, Philippe Guérande, determined to expose the activities of the exotically-named criminal society. The film made a star of the actress Musidora (Jeanne Roques) who, as Irma Vep, a member of the gang, took part in their robberies dressed in a figure-hugging black bodysuit.

Judex, featuring a masked avenger, was Feuillade’s response to the charge that he was glorifying criminals and anarchists. Judex is fighting exploitation and corruption, but his appearance, motivation, and methods, make him a sinisterly ambiguous figure, presaging the pulp superheroes that would follow, such as the American crime-fighter The Shadow. Judex again features Musidora as the leader of a criminal gang.