Editing Sarah Bernhardt (section)

==Motion pictures==
<gallery mode="packed" heights="250">
File:Scene from film Camille with Sarah Bernhardt in the title role.jpg|Bernhardt in the film ''Camille'' (''[[La Dame aux camélias]]'') with [[André Calmettes]] (1911)
File:Les Amours de la reine Élisabeth.jpg|As Queen Elizabeth in the film ''[[Les Amours de la reine Élisabeth]]'' (''The Loves of Queen Elizabeth'') with [[Lou Tellegen]] (1912)
</gallery>
Bernhardt was one of the early actresses to star in moving pictures. The first projected film was shown by the [[Lumière brothers]] at the Grand Café in Paris on 28 December 1895. In 1900, the cameraman who had shot the first films for the Lumière brothers, [[Clément Maurice]], approached Bernhardt and asked her to make a film out of a scene from her stage production of ''Hamlet''. The scene was Prince Hamlet's duel with [[Laertes (Hamlet)|Laertes]], with Bernhardt in the role of Hamlet. Maurice made a phonograph recording at the same time, so the film could be accompanied by sound. The sound of the clashing wooden prop swords was not loud and realistic enough, so Maurice had a stage hand bang pieces of metal together in sync with the sword fight. Maurice's finished two-minute film, ''[[Hamlet (1900 film)|Le Duel d'Hamlet]]'', was presented to the public at the [[Exposition Universelle (1900)|1900 Paris Universal Exposition]] from 14 April to 12 November 1900 in Paul Decauville's program, Phono-Cinéma-Théâtre. This program contained short films of many other famous French theatre stars of the day.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Seeing Sarah Bernhardt: Performance and Silent Film|last=Duckett|first=Victoria|publisher=University of Illinois Press|year=2015|isbn=978-0-252-08116-3|pages=Chapter 2: Hamlet, A Short Film}}</ref> The sound quality on the wax cylinders and the synchronization were very poor, so the system never became a commercial success. Nonetheless, her film is cited as one of the early examples of a sound film.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.isntlifeterrible.com/labels/film%20preservation.html|title=Filming Shakespeare With And Without Words In Settings Familiar And Unfamiliar|access-date=18 October 2007|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071030131421/http://www.isntlifeterrible.com/labels/film%20preservation.html |archive-date=30 October 2007}}</ref>

Eight years later, in 1908, Bernhardt made a second motion picture, ''La Tosca''. This was produced by Le Film d'Art and directed by André Calmettes from the play by Victorien Sardou. The film has been lost. Her next film, with her co-star and lover Lou Tellegen, was ''La Dame aux Camelias'', called "Camille". When she performed on this film, Bernhardt changed both the fashion in which she performed, significantly accelerating the speed of her gestural action.<ref name="Duckett-2015">{{Cite book|title=Seeing Sarah Bernhardt: Performance and Silent Film|last=Duckett|first=Victoria|publisher=University of Illinois Press|year=2015|isbn=978-0-252-08116-3|pages=Chapter 7. 'Mothers of France: World War 1, Film, and Propaganda.'}}</ref> The film was a success in the United States, and in France, the young French artist and later screenwriter [[Jean Cocteau]] wrote "What actress can play a lover better than she does in this film? No one!"{{Sfn|Tierchant|2009|page=318}} Bernhardt received $30,000 for her performance.

Shortly afterwards, she made another film of a scene from her play ''Adrienne Lecouvreur'' with Tellegen, in the role of Maurice de Saxe. Then, in 1912, the pioneer American producer [[Adolph Zukor]] came to London and filmed her performing scenes from her stage play ''Queen Elizabeth'' with her lover Tellegen, with Bernhardt in the role of Lord Essex.{{Sfn|Skinner|1967|pages=308–310}} To make the film more appealing, Zukor had the film print hand-tinted, making it one of the early color films. ''[[Les Amours de la reine Élisabeth|The Loves of Queen Elizabeth]]'' premiered at the Lyceum Theater in New York City on 12 July 1912, and was a financial success; Zukor invested $18,000 in the film and earned $80,000, enabling him to found the [[Famous Players Film Company]], which later became [[Paramount Pictures]].{{Sfn|Tierchant|2009|pages=318–19}} The use of the visual arts–specifically famous c.19{{clarify|What does c.19 mean?|date=October 2023}} painting–to frame scenes and elaborate narrative action is significant in the work.<ref name="Duckett-2015" />

Bernhardt was also the subject and star of two documentaries, including ''Sarah Bernhardt à Belle-Isle'' (1915), a film about her daily life at home. This was one of the early films by a celebrity inviting us into the home, and it is again significant for the use it makes of contemporary art references in the mis-en-scene of the film.<ref name="Duckett-2015" /> She also made ''Jeanne Doré'' in 1916. This was produced by Eclipse and directed by Louis Mercanton and René Hervil from the play by Tristan Bernard. In 1917 she made a film called ''Mothers of France'' (''Mères Françaises''). Produced by Eclipse it was directed by Louis Mercanton and René Hervil with a screenplay by Jean Richepin. As Victoria Duckett explains in her book ''Seeing Sarah Bernhardt: Performance and Silent Film'', this film was a propaganda film shot on the front line with the intent to urge America to join the War.<ref name="Duckett-2015" />

In the weeks before her death in 1923, she was preparing to make ''La Voyante'', another motion picture from her own home, directed by Sacha Guitry. She told journalists "They're paying me ten thousand francs a day, and plan to film for seven days. Make the calculation. These are American rates, and I don't have to cross the Atlantic! At those rates, I'm ready to appear in any films they make."{{Sfn|Tierchant|2009|page=350}} However, she died just before the filming began.{{Sfn|Skinner|1967|page=332}}