Early Cinema: Seeing Through a Frame

Auguste Lumière and Louis Lumière

The Lumiére Brothers started the innovation of Film by creating the first form of a video camera called the "Cinématographe". Some of their first Movies were "Repas de bébé" ("Baby's Breakfast") and L'Arroseur arrosé("The Sprinkler Sprinkled"). These films were the few of  many that the Lumiére brothers would create and are the basis of the Film Evolution.

Even though these films were a mere form of what we would call a "home video" today, audiences at the beginning of this new invention were in awe at the creation of these films.


Cinématographe


 



Repas de bébé

L'Arroseur arrosé



George Méliès

George Méliès was next in line to create the first visual effects with the invention of the Cinématographe. Méliès began his career as an illusionist and carried that skill into his films. He not only directed his films but also acted in them. Méliès is considered the father of Visual Effects.

With Méliès ingenious style, he has created countless films that revolutionized the film industry. Méliès’s films were cleverly made with backdrops painted to create visual space using perspective. His use of the "Master Shot" and unique transitions are the basis of what we use in films today.
Some of the films that Méliès created were "Le roi du maquillage"(Untameable Whiskers), "Le Voyage dans la lune"(Trip to the Moon) and "Le diable noir"(The Black Imp). These films show Méliès skill as an illusionist but also as a Superb director. These films have influenced the films we see today.

I consider Méliès to be influential in my own film endeavors.

 

 

Maya Deren is another influential film maker who brought about expressionistic and abstract cinema. One of her works that she directed and acted in is "Meshes of the Afternoon". It is a short experimental film that Deren and her husband both worked on.

The film has a very mysterious quality that leaves the viewer in suspense. It has a morbid and eerie dream like state that is different from a lot of films. Not only that, the composer who did the music for Deren -Tiji Ito, creates a song that gives the film a more horrid atmosphere.

I consider the film "Meshes in the Afternoon" similar to that of the T.V series "The Twilight Zone" by Rod Serling.