The shots from above of Gilbert falling from a balcony, or swinging by a swag of drapery high above a crowd? His face was showing all the time, and they couldn't do blue screen shots then. If anybody knows, I wish they'd tell me.
First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win. Gandhi.
i can't tell you, but the stunts were spectacular!
i absolutely loved him climbing up the wall.
the only thing that looked remotely phony and/or impossible was the parachute down. lol!
You're right that chroma wouldn't come along for another fifteen years or so, although they did have matte, that was one of the first special effects ever invented. But that's not what they used in the scene where he fell off the balcony.
It was very clever how they did it. Gilbert was actually not that far off the ground. The camera was on a crane directly above. The camera pulls up, making it look like he's falling a lot farther than he really is.
The one where he's swinging above the crowd, though, that is a matte shot. There are several mattes throughout this scene where he escapes.
You've got me?! Who's got you?!
Those stunts were beyond fantastic, surpassing even Errol Flynn's acrobatics in THE ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD.
And I do mean "beyond fantastic" because nobody in real life could actually make a getaway from the scaffold the way Gilbert does in this!
Still and all, it's a rousing, highly charged and entertaining action sequence.