1895-1897 - LA
SORTIE DES OUVRIERS DE L’USINE LUMIERE (Workers
Leaving the Lumiere Factory). Lumiere Brothers.
First film projected? Probably. Still evocative. To
watch it is to be intrigued. This first piece of the
mundane, preserved and thus preserved becomes entertainment.
(Louis Black)
1895 - L’ARRIVE
D’UN TRAIN EN GARE (Arrival of a Train at a Station).
Lumiere Brothers. Did people really run from the screen?
If film is real life as a celluloid dream, is this the
beginning? Or was it the Edison version that stampeded
audiences? (Louis Black)
1895 - L’ARROSEUR
ARROSEE (The Sprinkler sprinkled). Lumiere
Brothers. A man is watering with a hose. A boy steps
on the hose. The man looks into the hose. The boy steps
off the hose squirting the man. The birth of cinematic
narrative and screen comedy? (Louis Black)
1896 - THE KISS.
Edison, 1896. Two people kiss. A single action as
narrative. Sex comes to the cinema. Demands for censorship.
A marker on the road to the social controversy about
films – how they make meaning and what meaning
they make. (Louis Black)
1902 - A TRIP
TO THE MOON. George Melies, 1902. Special
effects, visual manipulation and narrative are explored
as Melies expands the language of film beyond simply
what is in front of the camera. (Louis Black)
1903
- THE GREAT TRAIN ROBBERY. Edison, 1903. Directed
by Edwin S. Porter. If not the first narrative film
than the first film where the narrative was understood
as such and appreciated. One of the first where the
director is credited. (Louis Black)
1906
– CLASSIC CARTOONS – Humourous
Phases of Funny Faces – considered by some to
be the first animated cartoon.
