 In this period, L'Herbier was linked with filmmakers such as Abel Gance, Germaine Dulac and Louis Delluc as part of a "first avant-garde" in French cinema, the first generation to think spontaneously in animated images.The acclaim which he earned in the 1920s contrasts markedly with the relative neglect of his later work.Even in the silent period, there were those who found his work mannered and marred by an aestheticism unlinked to the subjects of his films.