Biographical account of the work of
Thomas Edison and
Edison Studios.
Opens with montage of still images including portrait of
Eadweard Muybridge's and his photographs of horses, and
Edison with a cylinder phonograph. Footage of Edison's and
William Dickson's prototype kinetoscope. The horizontal feed camera, and footage of 'exercising boy from
Newark' film from 1891.
Clip of Edison's
Boxing Cats film from 1894. Edison and his wife demonstrate the fascinating and complex Kinetoscope film travels horizontally across dozens of spools. Clip of The Pie
Eating Contest from 1897 shows to men with their hands behind their back eating huckleberry pie. Clip of Dickson doffing his hat.
Footage of man unfurling a spool of film, and a paper copy of the print. Footage of
Fred Ott's Sneeze from 1894. Footage of
Fatima of '
Little Egypt' who performed belly dancing at the 1893
Chicago World Fair.
The May Irwin -
John C. Rice Kiss of 1896 shows the male protagonist twirling his moustache before kissing the leading lady. Footage of a muscular man flexing in Sandow the
Strongman of 1894.
Series of footage of trains, including train in
Tokyo,
Philadelphia Express, the
Black Diamond Express.
Market scene in
Mexico.
Street scene in
Hawaii.
Clips of
Eagle Dance of
Pueblo Indians and
The Circle Dance both of 1898, in the latter dozens of male dances can be scene dancing in a slow revolving circle, with two tepees in the background.
Baseball game in 1898, and also a home movie by Edison showing a baseball game turning into a scuffle. A cigarette commercial from 1897 for
Admiral Cigarettes shows a person jumping out of an oversized cigarette box and then proceeding to hand out cigarettes, while three seated men dressed in theatrical dress, including a 'red
Indian' style headdress with feathers and another man dressed in what appears to be an '
Uncle Sam' outfit, unfurl a banner which reads 'WE ALL SMOKE'.
Edison's 'revolving photographic building', also known as the
Black Maria. The building is unusual with its steep sloping hinged roof which opens to allow in sunlight. A short excerpt of the sharpshooter
Annie Oakley shooting targets thrown up into the air by a man knelt in front of her throwing up targets into the air. William Dickson's
Experimental Sound Film where Mr Dickson records the sound to accompany the kinetoscope film of him playing violin, while two of his male colleagues dance together. A revolving merry-go-round (carousel) is ridden by women wearing long dresses. A re-enactment of an ambulance attending a street car accident. An instructional film of rescue and resuscitation for the
United States Coastguard shows men wearing white uniforms pulling a tethered man onto shore before laying him over a barrel shaped object to resuscitate him. Footage of the
Spanish - American War, including both real footage of the wreck of battleship
USS Maine. Also recreation footage of men firing rifles from a trench before two are shot and receive attention from field medics bringing over a stretcher. The
Galveston Hurricane footage shows rescuers searching for bodies in
1900 and chopping through mounds of planks of wood and other debris. An excerpt from the newsreel footage 'Rocking the
Gold in the
Klondike' of
1901 shows gold miners shaking sluice boxes.
A moment of comedy ensues in a film called 'What happened down
23rd street' as we see a couple walking down a
New York street busy with pedestrians and horses and carriages, a woman accompanied by a male walks over a street air vent blowing air upwards and also blowing the skirt of the unfortunate woman up almost to her knees. In '
Fun in a
Butcher's Shop' a 'butcher' and his accomplices operate 'Swatzenfugle's Patent
Sausage Machine' which involves dogs being dropped into the machine while the butcher turns a handle crank to produce a string of sausages, until finally one of the sidekicks throws another person into the sausage meat machine. 'What happened in the barber shop' shows barbers being somewhat distracted from their duties by two pairs of legs in stockings at the top of a flight of stairs.
Optical illusions are employed in the Bibulous Clothier to show a clothier having to cope with a shape shifting client whose gets, taller, fatter, or thinner every time the clothier returns with a new garment.
Happy Hooligan in an
Airship utilizes a split screen effect. A charming piece of footage from the film
The Enchanted Drawing by the artist
J. Stuart Blackton shows a man drawing a face, a wine bottle and a glass on an easel before removing the bottle and glass from the artwork which become real objects. The drawing becomes independently animated with expressions, such as disgruntlement as the artist removes a cigar from its mouth.
- published: 18 Nov 2014
- views: 243