Louis J. Gasnier

From Wikipedia the free encyclopedia Louis J Gasnier 15 September 1875 15 February 1963 was a French film director Born in Paris Gasnier was working in theatre when Pathé hired him to direct films in the earliest days of cinema He directed comedian Max Linder in many of his early short comedies In 1912 he emigrated to the United States where he made his name working on several fairly prestigious productions most notably the serial The Perils of Pauline starring Pearl White with whom he made several other star vehicles Gasniers career declined with the advent of sound and he was later confined to making lowbudget B movies Arguably his most famous film although not for artistic reasons is the antimarijuana opus Reefer Madness made in 1936 The films overpreachy overthetop propaganda message has earned it a dedicated cult following which remains strong to the present day It is widely available in the public domain and on DVD and has been frequently shown on many terrestrial and cable TV channels quite remarkable for an ultra cheap exploitation movie of the 1930s that apparently had very scant distribution when it was originally released After Reefer Madness Gasnier made an additional eight films before retiring in 1941 He died in Hollywood at the age of 87 Description above from the Wikipedia article Louis J Gasnier licensed under CCBYSA full list of contributors on Wikipedia