At times closer to the madcap adventures of an American series than to maritime history, this serial retracing the adventures of the Saint-Malo privateer devised by Arthur Bernède, the popular author of Belphégor and Judex, attracted attention above all for the natural settings of most of its shots. Filmmaker Luitz-Morat (AKA Maurice Radiguet), who began his career as an actor with Feuillade and Fescourt, distinguished himself in the 1920s, handling challenging shoots on location in Tunisia, Morocco and Italy. This time, he gave free rein to his keen eye for landscapes by setting up his cameras in Brittany, braving the tumultuous weather. In June and July of 1924, he filmed in Saint-Malo (Ramparts of Holland, Grand Bé island), in Saint-Servan-sur-Mer at the Château de Riancourt (where the privateer died) and in the house where he was born, in Rothéneuf, Saint- Lunaire, Dinan (the Jerzual district), in the Bay of Paimpol, in Lorient, Saint-Nazaire and Brest. The descendants of Surcouf (including Baron Joseph Surcouf, a lawyer at the Paris Court of Appeal) lent authentic props and served as historical advisors. In Paimpol, a three-masted cod fishing boat was transformed into the frigate “Confiance” and used as a floating stage. The soldiers of the Saint-Malo regiment and the marine fusiliers at Lorient (where the English pontoons were rebuilt) served as extras, flanked by a few local faces to add picturesque interest. The remainder was filmed at the Levinski/Pathé-Nathan studios in Joinville-le-Pont, where Luitz-Morat had installed the “Kent” and the entire bow of the “Confiance”; the naval battles with miniature ships were not filmed in a tank, but on a smooth, glimmering surface, and the scale models were repositioned frame by frame.
The series was a resounding success in movie theatres and was even distributed abroad. Arthur Bernède (whose grandfather, the King’s Prosecutor, knew Surcouf personally) drew from it for a film novel, Surcouf, roi des corsaires, published in “Le Petit Parisien” between February and April of 1925.

Hervé Dumont, Encyclopédie du film d’Histoire, hervedumont.ch