History of Film
Beginnings to 1941
First Photographs of Motion
*1877 and 1878 by Eadweard Muybridge, a
British photographer working in California
who photographed a running horse by setting
up a row of cameras with strings attached to
their shutters. When the horse ran by, it broke
each string, tripping the shutters.
Thomas Edison
• Company displayed the first commercial
motion picture machine, the kinetoscope, at
the World’s Columbian Exposition in 1893
• An individual would look through a peephole
in a cabinet and watch the film
Lumiere Brothers
• Held first public screening of projected motion
pictures on Dec., 28, 1895, in a Paris cafe
Early Motion Pictures
• Re-created news events and dramatized folk
tales
• No soundtrack but sometimes accompanied
by live music, lectures, off-screen actors
speaking dialogue, and later printed titles
• Dominated by Edison’s company
Edwin S. Porter
• Leader in shifting film production from current
events toward storytelling
• Porter’s The Great Train Robbery portrayed a
train robbery and the pursuit and capture of
the robbers
• Only 11 minutes long but a huge hit
The Nickelodeon Theater
• Thousands opened in American cities
beginning 1905
• Small stores became Nickelodeons by adding a
screen and folding chairs
• Admission $.05
• Attracted new audience for movies & laid the
foundation for the movie industry
The Birth of Hollywood
• Filmmakers drawn to Southern California
because the climate is suitable for year-round
shooting (average low 57; high 75; 15” rain
annually) and the availability of varied scenery
After World War I ended in 1918,
American movies became
dominant worldwide
DW Griffith – most influential film
director of Hollywood’s early years
• Set the “Hollywood Standard” for film making
• Brought wider appreciation to movies as art
and attracted more educated and wealthier
audiences
• 1st to shoot scenes from different angles and
distances and edit the shots together into 1
scene
• 1st to include action from multiple locations
within 1 film
• Invented the close-up shot
• The Birth of a Nation = his most famous film
Movies Become Big Business
• “Star System” – publicizing performers
became the most effective means of
promoting movies and attracting audiences
Vertical Integration
• Movie studios owned production facilities,
distribution channels, and movie theaters,
giving them control of all elements of movie
making
• Allowed them to make LOTS of movies but in
familiar, repeatable genres (specific types)
ex: Western, Screwball Comedy, Musical,
Gangster Picture, Horror
The Movies Talk
• The Jazz Singer (1927) = first popular movie
with sound (sound recorded on a record
mechanically synched with the film; by 1929,
sound recorded directly on the film strip using
electronic signals)
• Disney’s Steamboat Willie (1928) = first
animated short film to use synchronized
sound
• Some stars were able to transition to sound,
but others weren’t
Movies in the 1930’s
• Hits in all major genres
• Hollywood’s prewar period ended with 2
celebrated films:
Gone With the Wind (1939)
• American Civil War drama and rocky love story
of Scarlett O’Hara and Rhett Butler
• Starring Vivian Leigh as Scarlett
and Clark Gable as Rhett Butler
• Famous line spoken by Clark Gable as Rhett
Butler (to Vivian Leigh’s Scarlett): “Frankly my
dear, I don’t give a damn.”
Citizen Kane (1941)
• Story of a powerful American newspaper
publisher
• Produced, directed, and starring
Orson Welles, who experimented
with startling camera angles
and dramatic lighting, resulting
in brilliant photography that
helped make Citizen Kane one
of the most honored films in
American film history