42 mins., b&w, silent – French intertitles
Source : CNC-Bnf
This film provides a tour d’horizon of Malagasy life by following around some French colonial officers, wearing pith helmets and carried in stretchers, as they conduct an inspection.
At 42 minutes, it is relatively long for this genre of colonial exhibition film and it covers a great variety of topics: at breakneck speed, it shows various different ethnic groups of the island, a range of forms of architecture, impressive local scenery, economic activities, a fleeting glimpse of a mosque, dances, crafts, sports (wrestling particularly), hairstyles, children’s games – all covered in a series of very brief shots that are interspersed with highly decorated intertitles featuring motifs that seem to be more Central or West African than anything to do with Madagascar.
Whatever its limitations, À travers de Madagascar appears to have circulated widely: Alison Murray Levine reproduces a 1923 poster relating to a regional screening of colonial films in France in which it figures prominently.
Text : Murray Levine 2010, p.116