Faust: apparition de Méphistophélès (1897) The Faust story was a very popular one to be told throughout the silent era. I'm going to guess that the story itself was well-known to people so it would easily translate to the screen. In this fifty-five second movie, Faust appears to be praying for some sort of help when all of the sudden the Devil appears. This here is when the film cuts off so obviously there's nothing here that is ground-breaking or cinema changing but at the same time it's pretty fascinating getting to see this early take on the subject. Georges Melies was experimenting with magic tricks and he too did a couple versions of the story and it appears this here is trying to be a dramatic take on the subject.