Greg Pidgeon
Monday, October 25, 2004
Revolutionary Cinema and Georges Méliès
Cinema has been around since the mid 1880’s when a Frenchman called Louis Le Prince patented his process for “the successive production of objects in motion by means of a projector.
Not long after a French Magician called Georges Méliès (December 8, 1861-January 21, 1938, full name: Maries-Georges-Jean Méliès)
image from http://www.sea.fi/foto/melies_georges.jpg
progressed from his magic onto filmmaking. He originally worked as an illusionist in Robert Houdin’s Theatre later investing and becoming the owner. It was in 1895, he became interested in film after attending the first screening of the Lumiere Cinematographe on December 18,1895 in the Grand Café of Paris.
Info on Lumiere Brothers 1
Info on Lumiere Brothers 2
Then by May the following year Méliès had purchased a camera and was already making his own films.
Méliès was a pioneer in early cinema, developing many techniques particularly in the area of special effects. One of Méliès more recognised techniques is the ‘Stop trick’
Info On 'Stop Trick
and one he stumbled upon accidentally when his camera had a malfunction and dropped a few frames, whilst filming average 19th Century Parisian life outside the Paris Opera House(see below).
image from http://img.groundspeak.com/cache/log/218460_600.jpg
Quite to his surprise when he watched the film he noticed that during the few seconds where the camera was not recording, the moving object that he had been filming had disappeared. It was in fact a Hurst he was filming and although the rest of the scene must have moved, therefore not providing a smooth transition, the Hurst disappeared and Méliès took advantage of this accident. He went on to use this technique to do crude special effects and magic tricks in many of his films.
Another technique that Méliès was thought to have created is a film language based on separate scenes edited together. This was important at the time because most other filmmakers of the era were content with single shot films. In Cinderella (1899) Méliès used this technique to create a mini-epic comprised of 20 separate scenes over seven minutes to portray the popular fairytale.
Méliès most renowned film has got to be ‘A Trip To The Moon (1902)
Info On A Trip To The Moon
Taken from the Jules Verne story and Méliès version for the big screen was the first science fiction film produced and shown to the general public. Méliès wrote the script, designed the set and costumes, directed, produced and even starred in the flick. It was composed of 30 scenes and basically depicts a group of French explorers who on the orders of the President jump abroad a rocket to the moon before embarking on various adventures.
Méliès went on to create around 800 films, although other sources place the figure anything between 500 – 1500 I think 800 is a realistic figure but can never be proved as a lot of the footage has inevitably been lost over the years. Unfortunately despite the volume of work Méliès produced he never seemed to progress any further than these techniques and eventually the novelty of his work began to lose its value. Other filmmakers such as Edwin S. Porter and D.W. Griffith continued to build upon the work of Méliès. Also Méliès received very little income from his films due to an inability to effectively distribute them. Therefore he was heavily plagiarised and his cinematic marvel not really recognised until the late 1920’s.
Méliès was however a revolutionary film maker and extremely talented magician has thankfully began a time in which audiences are dazzled by the cinematic wonders of the big screen.
Sources
http://www.nwlink.com/~erick/silentera/Melies/melies-f.html
www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Academy/9657/GMelies.html
www.holonet.khm.de/visual_alchemy/voyage.html
www.labellepoque.de/cinema/cineidxe.htm
www.brainyencyclopedia.com/encyclopedia/s/st/stop_trick.html
www.nwlink.com/~erick/silentera/Melies/melies.html
Not long after a French Magician called Georges Méliès (December 8, 1861-January 21, 1938, full name: Maries-Georges-Jean Méliès)
image from http://www.sea.fi/foto/melies_georges.jpg
progressed from his magic onto filmmaking. He originally worked as an illusionist in Robert Houdin’s Theatre later investing and becoming the owner. It was in 1895, he became interested in film after attending the first screening of the Lumiere Cinematographe on December 18,1895 in the Grand Café of Paris.
Info on Lumiere Brothers 1
Info on Lumiere Brothers 2
Then by May the following year Méliès had purchased a camera and was already making his own films.
Méliès was a pioneer in early cinema, developing many techniques particularly in the area of special effects. One of Méliès more recognised techniques is the ‘Stop trick’
Info On 'Stop Trick
and one he stumbled upon accidentally when his camera had a malfunction and dropped a few frames, whilst filming average 19th Century Parisian life outside the Paris Opera House(see below).
image from http://img.groundspeak.com/cache/log/218460_600.jpg
Quite to his surprise when he watched the film he noticed that during the few seconds where the camera was not recording, the moving object that he had been filming had disappeared. It was in fact a Hurst he was filming and although the rest of the scene must have moved, therefore not providing a smooth transition, the Hurst disappeared and Méliès took advantage of this accident. He went on to use this technique to do crude special effects and magic tricks in many of his films.
Another technique that Méliès was thought to have created is a film language based on separate scenes edited together. This was important at the time because most other filmmakers of the era were content with single shot films. In Cinderella (1899) Méliès used this technique to create a mini-epic comprised of 20 separate scenes over seven minutes to portray the popular fairytale.
Méliès most renowned film has got to be ‘A Trip To The Moon (1902)
Info On A Trip To The Moon
Taken from the Jules Verne story and Méliès version for the big screen was the first science fiction film produced and shown to the general public. Méliès wrote the script, designed the set and costumes, directed, produced and even starred in the flick. It was composed of 30 scenes and basically depicts a group of French explorers who on the orders of the President jump abroad a rocket to the moon before embarking on various adventures.
Méliès went on to create around 800 films, although other sources place the figure anything between 500 – 1500 I think 800 is a realistic figure but can never be proved as a lot of the footage has inevitably been lost over the years. Unfortunately despite the volume of work Méliès produced he never seemed to progress any further than these techniques and eventually the novelty of his work began to lose its value. Other filmmakers such as Edwin S. Porter and D.W. Griffith continued to build upon the work of Méliès. Also Méliès received very little income from his films due to an inability to effectively distribute them. Therefore he was heavily plagiarised and his cinematic marvel not really recognised until the late 1920’s.
Méliès was however a revolutionary film maker and extremely talented magician has thankfully began a time in which audiences are dazzled by the cinematic wonders of the big screen.
Sources
http://www.nwlink.com/~erick/silentera/Melies/melies-f.html
www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Academy/9657/GMelies.html
www.holonet.khm.de/visual_alchemy/voyage.html
www.labellepoque.de/cinema/cineidxe.htm
www.brainyencyclopedia.com/encyclopedia/s/st/stop_trick.html
www.nwlink.com/~erick/silentera/Melies/melies.html
:: posted by Greg Pidgeon, 11:58 pm
