The Adventures of Prince Achmed (1926)

A handsome prince rides a flying horse to faraway lands and embarks on magical adventures, which include making new friends, battling old foes, wielding magical artifacts and falling in love...

While much ado was made over Walt Disney's Snow White(1937) being the first full-length feature film, three precede it by many years, two Argentinian ones (currently lost) by Quirino Cristiani-and this 106-minute film from early German Auteur Lotte Reiniger, who wrote the script using the " 1001 Arabian Nights" series for inspiration. Her silhouette animation technique-using movable sheets of cardboard, leaded glass and stop-motion by frame photography-was practiced and perfected in several earlier short features, and is definitely up to the task of entertaining audiences in this longer format. I can in fact say with complete confidence that this film is the one that placed Ms.Reiniger 'on the map' when it came to the International stage, and gave her the recognition and financial foundation for a long and successful career in her field...

Time was not kind to the original German nitrate prints-fortunately several fragment from secondary sources were duplicated and re-mastered into this re-creation of the original masterwork, complete with music from composer Wolfgang Zeller added to the final print. And so I may thrill to the adventures, escapades and romances of theses lovely animated characters over Jasmine tea...and share them with others, of course! Tinted, Soundtrack.