After the tremendous popular success of the
　　Fantô(📼)mas novels, both of the major French
　　film studios — Pathé(😞) and Gaumont —(🙂)
　　vied for the rights to produce films based
　　on the series. Gaumont won, and from
　　April 1913 to May 1914 Louis Feuillade
　　directed five Fantômas films which critic
　　(🍾)David Thomson has described as "the first
　　great movie experience."