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The Magical Attractions of Early Cinema &

The International Expansion of Cinema

Jaakko Seppl

Homepage:

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Brighton and After

For decades early cinema was a neglected field ofstudy

Early cinema was seen as an elementary stage ofcinematic evolution

International Federation of Film Archives (FIAF) held asymposium in Brighton in 1978

The event brought together film archivists and filmhistorians around a common purpose

Early cinema began to be understood as a period thatpossessed a different conception of space, time andnarrative form from the way in which these issues wereapproached in the later classical cinema

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The Cinema of Attractions

For a long time the history of early cinema was

theorised under the hegemony of narrative films

Early cinema (films made before 1906/1907) is now

understood as the cinema of attractions This cinema celebrates its ability to show something

In the first few years the film projector was the

attraction

Then the demonstration of the possibilities of cinema

continued in films

What ever the attraction is, it is of interest in itself

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Actualities and Trick Films

Many early films are non-fiction filmsactualities

These films use footage of real events

Topics of actualities: parades, sports, shipwrecks etc.

News events were covered on location where they

happened but also recreated in studios

Line between fact and fiction was not sharply drawn

Trick films are cinematic magic tricks

These films are essentially devoid of plot

Special effects were used to show what was possible

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Early Story Films

First story films were comic skits

Before 1903 mainly single-shot films

In many of these films there is no sense of depth

Longer multi-shot films became common from 1903 Reasons: artistic innovation,product differentiation,

enabled to sell more feet of film, more efficient to shoot

films in studios than to make actualities on location

Simple narratives that follow action in linear fashion

New multi-shot film genre: the chase film

Common and popular genre internationally in 1903-1905

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The Gay Shoe Clerk(1903)

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Contextualising Early Films

Early films need to be studied in the context of the screen

The exhibitor, rather than the image-maker, generally held

editorial control and was responsible for what is now called

postproduction

The exhibitor bought single-shot films and created film

programs

Lecturing, vocal acting, music, sound effects etc.

Early story films were often based on well known myths,fairy tales and nursery rhymes

Audiences were familiar with these (prior knowledge)

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Tinted film

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Toned film

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Blue Tone and Rose Tint

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Stencil Colour

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Nickelodeons

Itinerant movie-show people played an important role

in the creation of audiences for films outside the

largest cities

In the United States storefront nickelodeons in largecities began operating in 1904 and 1905

Soon nickelodeons opened in every larger town

Preconditions: film production on a large scale and film

exchanges

In 1910 26 million Americans visited nickelodeons

every week (mass entertainment)

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A Nickelodeon

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The International Expansion

Before the turn of the decade cinema was truly an

international phenomenon

Films travelled freely across boarders

A typical film show consisted of films made in

various countries

There were no national cinemas and it did not

much matter where a film was made Filmmakers influenced each other

This was an era of experimental filmmaking

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Georges Mlis (France)

Stage Magician (Theatre Robert Houdin)

In 1896 Mlis bought a projector from R. W Paul

and built his own film camera

Made films for his own company Star Film

The master of the trick film

Stop motion

Superimpositions In many ways these films are excessively theatrical

Mlis was internationally successful until 1905

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Georges Mlis (1861-1938)

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Path Frres (France)

Path Frres was formed in 1896

The company produced film equipments and films

Path camera was the most popular film camera in the

world before the 1920s The company produced all kinds of films but in the early

1900s it was best known for its story films (freries)

Path became the first vertically integrated film company

in the world when it opened its own film theatre in 1906

The largest and most important film company in the

world before the Great War

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Film dArt

Film dArt was a small company founded in 1908 by Paul

Latiffe

The company had good connections to the theatre world

Film dArt produced prestigious art films films for upperclass audiences

Lassassinat du duc de Guise (1908)

Legitimate actors, scripts written by famous dramatists and

original scores by well known composers Film as art

In 1911 the company was in debt and had to be sold

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British Cinema

British cinema had an influential and innovative

beginning

Silent British films made after 1905 have been

neglected (and/or considered bad) A large number of phantom ride films in early 1900s

Dolly shot films inspired by Lumire films

The Brighton School (Williamson & Smith) Ingenuity in editing and shooting practices

Rescued by Rover(1905)

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Pendlebury Colliery 1900

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Italy

Fiction film production began in 1905

In the early 1910s Italy was one of the major powers in

world cinema

Early film production: actualities, historical films andslapstick comedies

Soon Italy was known for historical epics

The zenith of achievement: Cabiria (1914)

First feature films were made in the early 1910s

Diva films (Lyda Borelli & Francesca Bertini)

Strongman films (Maciste)

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Lyda Borelli

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Bartolomeo Pagano