The Hyper-Violent World of Fantômas

The Arbo Files

The pulps are often spoken of in all-American terms. There’s logic at work here, for the pulps reached their zenith in the U.S. during the 1930s, plus the genres that we must closely associate with the pulps, from action-adventure to weird menace, reached their apogee stateside. But, at the sake of dampening American triumphalism, the pulps were not an exclusively American phenomenon. Indeed, pulps and pulp-like publications enjoyed popularity throughout the world.

In Germany and Belgium, a Sherlock Holmes-like detective named Harry Dickson enjoyed a successful run of novels that began before World War I and ended right before World War II. In Great Britain, the hardboiled adventures of Bulldog Drummond and Sexton Blake captivated readers all across the empire. Italy loved pulps so much that later, in the 1960s, a entire genre of film was born. Known as giallo (“yellow”) because Italian translations of mystery and crime classics were reprinted with yellow book jackets, the genre introduced to the world to the macabre genius of men like Mario Bava, Dario Argento, and Lucio Fulci. Not to be outdone, West Germany had its own pulp-derived film genre, the krimi, which prominently featured the world of British pulp master, Edgar Wallace.

But, of all the countries to go pulp crazy, France holds the crown. The French have long had an appreciation for the dark, the weird, and outre. This is evident in their early embrace of Poe via Baudelaire, as well as their serious, almost scholarly treatment of Hammett, Cain, and Lovecraft at a time when all three were still considered “popular” writers in their native land. And long before the pulps, French readers enjoyed the serial novels of Eugène Sue, whose The Mysteries of Paris spawned the “city mysteries” genre for all Francophone readers. One cannot forget too that France is also the land of the Grand Guignol, or the hyper-violent theater that specialized in productions featuring copious amounts of blood, torture, and sadism.

Speaking of hyper-violence, France produced one of the most unique pulp characters in history with Fantômas. Fantômas, the character and the series, began in 1911. Two journalists of a Bonapartist bent, Marcel Allain and Pierre Souvestre, were hired to write something that appealed to the wicked sensibilities of Parisians — the same Parisians who reveled in tales of criminal Apaches and anarchist bombers engaging in wanton acts of destruction and debauchery. Allain and Souvestre went back to their editor with Fantômas, and the first book was published soon thereafter in 1911. The book was an immediate sensation that soon lead to a film series by pioneering filmmaker Louis Feuillade (1913-1914).

Original movie poster for Fantômas

But who, or what, is Fantômas? To quote Inspector Juve, his main antagonist, he is nothing and yet everything. He is a master criminal, a master of disguise, a terrorist, and a serial killer. According to the original novels, Fantômas was either a Frenchman or a Brit born sometime in the 1860s. He lived for a time as a duke in the German state of Hesse-Wismar. From there he journeyed to India, Mexico, and the United States. By the time of the first novel, his most recent exploit had been as a British soldier named Gurn in the Second Boer War. At every period of his life, Fantômas engaged in deceit and murder. He also sired children, including Hélène, who plays a prominent role in the novels.

Fantômas’s actions in Paris are nothing short of horrific: he traps innocents aboard a ship infected with plague-carrying rats, he destroys an entire house with dynamite to cover up a robbery, he sends other men to the guillotine instead of himself, and in one novel, the police suspect that dead men are carrying out strangulation murders in Paris because Fantômas has taken to wearing gloves covered in the fingertips of his previous victims. Morbid stuff. Most interesting of all, although Fantômas is doggedly pursued by Inspector Juve and the journalist Jérôme Fandor, he always wins in the end. His loyalty is to self-preservation. Even Hélène is sacrificed when she falls in love with Fandor.

The glorification of violence in Fantômas made the stories popular with the Surrealists, who saw the character as an absurd nightmare and as a symbol of revenge against capitalist society (Fantômas seems to commit crime simply because he loves it). Poet Robert Desnos wrote a ballad for the character, while Magritte immortalized him in paint as well. For the masses, Fantômas was the arch spectacle and one of the last great productions of the Belle Epoque. Thankfully, for Anglophone readers, most if not all of the Fantômas novels have been translated and are available for sale. The movies, including the more comedic 1960s ones, are also available for purchase. In my humble opinion, you should dip your toes into the ghastly world of Fantômas. Pulp heroes may come and go, but serial villains are eternal.