Old Hollywood
Cinema
1900-1979
Nostalgia is a seductive liar - George Wildman Ball
Girls Gone Wild, Turn of the Century Edition: Still from Seminary Girls (1897, Edison Manufacturing Co.) In addition to the invention of the “Kinetograph”, a motion picture camera, and the “Kinetoscope”, a peep-hole viewer where people could watch short films, Thomas Edison’s lab produced numerous films, including Seminary Girls in 1897. Only 30 seconds long, it features six girls pillowfighting until they are caught by their teacher. Film can be seen on youtube here.

Girls Gone Wild, Turn of the Century Edition: Still from Seminary Girls (1897, Edison Manufacturing Co.)

In addition to the invention of the “Kinetograph”, a motion picture camera, and the “Kinetoscope”, a peep-hole viewer where people could watch short films, Thomas Edison’s lab produced numerous films, including Seminary Girls in 1897.

Only 30 seconds long, it features six girls pillowfighting until they are caught by their teacher. Film can be seen on youtube here.

The Hearts of Age (1934, dir. Orson Welles & William Vance) (via giurassic), the first film directed by Orson Welles. The surrealistic 8-minute short, which was made when Welles was a 19-yr-old student, can be seen online here. “The legend of Orson Welles holds that he knew little or nothing about the cinema before making Citizen Kane in 1941. And Welles nurtured this legend, attributing its innovations ‘to my ignorance. If this word seems inadequate to you, replace it with innocence.’ But his little-known first film, The Hearts of Age, made seven years earlier, gives the lie to the legend. While indisputably technically crude and a bit sophomoric, The Hearts of Age reveals both a keen eye for composition and montage, and substantial familiarity with film art.” -excerpted from Brian L. Frye’s Senses of Cinema review

The Hearts of Age (1934, dir. Orson Welles & William Vance) (via giurassic), the first film directed by Orson Welles. The surrealistic 8-minute short, which was made when Welles was a 19-yr-old student, can be seen online here.

“The legend of Orson Welles holds that he knew little or nothing about the cinema before making Citizen Kane in 1941. And Welles nurtured this legend, attributing its innovations ‘to my ignorance. If this word seems inadequate to you, replace it with innocence.’ But his little-known first film, The Hearts of Age, made seven years earlier, gives the lie to the legend. While indisputably technically crude and a bit sophomoric, The Hearts of Age reveals both a keen eye for composition and montage, and substantial familiarity with film art.”

-excerpted from Brian L. Frye’s Senses of Cinema review

La Jetée (1962, dir. Chris Marker) “La Jetee’s fans insist that it’s the finest science fiction film ever made, and why not? It’s truly unique, implementing a series of hundreds of unmoving pictures, beautifully edited together to tell a mind-bending story of time travel that doubles as a melancholy fable about memory, loss, childhood, and destiny. Only for a moment is there any action on screen (besides the implied action in the cuts from shot to shot), and that motion is one of the cinema’s most profound. It’s no exaggeration, finally, to say that La Jetée may represent film’s closest approach to poetry.” -Bryant Frazer, Deep Focus The 26-minute film, which inspired Terry Gilliam’s 12 Monkeys (1995), tells the story of post-apocalyptic, nuclear war-ravaged Paris, where underground commanders run time travel experiments on prisoners. The film can be seen here.

La Jetée (1962, dir. Chris Marker)

“La Jetee’s fans insist that it’s the finest science fiction film ever made, and why not? It’s truly unique, implementing a series of hundreds of unmoving pictures, beautifully edited together to tell a mind-bending story of time travel that doubles as a melancholy fable about memory, loss, childhood, and destiny. Only for a moment is there any action on screen (besides the implied action in the cuts from shot to shot), and that motion is one of the cinema’s most profound. It’s no exaggeration, finally, to say that La Jetée may represent film’s closest approach to poetry.”

-Bryant Frazer, Deep Focus

The 26-minute film, which inspired Terry Gilliam’s 12 Monkeys (1995), tells the story of post-apocalyptic, nuclear war-ravaged Paris, where underground commanders run time travel experiments on prisoners. The film can be seen here.

Kiki of Montparnasse, queen of 1920s Parisian bohemia, in Emak Bakia (aka Leave Me Alone, 1926, dir. Man Ray) Though best known for his avant-garde photography, Man Ray directed several influential short films in 1920s (several of which can be seen here), which reflected his involvement in the Dada & Surrealist movements. Of Emak Bakia, Man Ray wrote: “A series of fragments, a cinepoem with certain optical sequences making a whole that remains a fragment. Just as one can much better appreciate the abstract beauty in a fragment of a classic work than its entirety, so this film tries to indicate the essentials in contemporary cinematography.” (via)

Kiki of Montparnasse, queen of 1920s Parisian bohemia, in Emak Bakia (aka Leave Me Alone, 1926, dir. Man Ray)

Though best known for his avant-garde photography, Man Ray directed several influential short films in 1920s (several of which can be seen here), which reflected his involvement in the Dada & Surrealist movements.

Of Emak Bakia, Man Ray wrote: “A series of fragments, a cinepoem with certain optical sequences making a whole that remains a fragment. Just as one can much better appreciate the abstract beauty in a fragment of a classic work than its entirety, so this film tries to indicate the essentials in contemporary cinematography.”

(via)

In Youth, Beside the Lonely Sea (1925, dir. unknown). This early short film features Thomas Aldrich’s poem dramatized in triptych (i.e. three films are shown on three screens simultaneously, which would have made it necessary to run three different projectors to exhibit it in a theater). In the film, we follow an imaginative boy who has mystical visions of mermaids & fairies from his youth to old age. The lonely, drunken old man he’s become has lost his visions and capacity for poetry & illusion and he laments that only “full dark” lays ahead. (This film is available on the excellent collection Unseen Cinema)

In Youth, Beside the Lonely Sea (1925, dir. unknown).

This early short film features Thomas Aldrich’s poem dramatized in triptych (i.e. three films are shown on three screens simultaneously, which would have made it necessary to run three different projectors to exhibit it in a theater).

In the film, we follow an imaginative boy who has mystical visions of mermaids & fairies from his youth to old age. The lonely, drunken old man he’s become has lost his visions and capacity for poetry & illusion and he laments that only “full dark” lays ahead.

(This film is available on the excellent collection Unseen Cinema)

Pascal Lamorisse in fantasy short film The Red Balloon (1956, dir. Albert Lamorisse)

Pascal Lamorisse in fantasy short film The Red Balloon (1956, dir. Albert Lamorisse)

via Un Chien Andalou (1929, dir. Luis Buñuel) (online here) “Amusingly enough, a great many psychiatrists and analysts (i.e., film critics) have had a great deal to say about my movies. I’m grateful for their interest, but I never read their articles, because when all is said and done, psychoanalysis (i.e., film criticism), as a therapy, is strictly an upper-class privilege. Some analysts - in despair, I suppose - have declared me ‘unanalyzable,’ as if I belonged to some other species or had come from another planet (which is always possible, of course). At my age, I let them say whatever they want. I still have my imagination, and in its impregnable innocence it will keep me going until the end of my days. All this compulsion to ‘understand’ everything fills me with horror.” -Luis Buñuel, in his autobiography My Last Sigh

via Un Chien Andalou (1929, dir. Luis Buñuel) (online here)

“Amusingly enough, a great many psychiatrists and analysts (i.e., film critics) have had a great deal to say about my movies. I’m grateful for their interest, but I never read their articles, because when all is said and done, psychoanalysis (i.e., film criticism), as a therapy, is strictly an upper-class privilege.

Some analysts - in despair, I suppose - have declared me ‘unanalyzable,’ as if I belonged to some other species or had come from another planet (which is always possible, of course). At my age, I let them say whatever they want. I still have my imagination, and in its impregnable innocence it will keep me going until the end of my days.

All this compulsion to ‘understand’ everything fills me with horror.”

-Luis Buñuel, in his autobiography My Last Sigh

Sieg heiling duck via Der Fuehrer’s Face (1943, dir. Jack Kinney) Der Fuehrer’s Face, an animated Walt Disney cartoon, was released during WWII as an anti-Nazi propaganda film. The short film, which employs numerous sight gags & songs to mock the German, Italian, & Japanese enemy, stars Donald Duck as a factory worker living under the Nazi Regime, where all are forced to salute the Führer at every turn.

Sieg heiling duck via Der Fuehrer’s Face (1943, dir. Jack Kinney)

Der Fuehrer’s Face, an animated Walt Disney cartoon, was released during WWII as an anti-Nazi propaganda film. The short film, which employs numerous sight gags & songs to mock the German, Italian, & Japanese enemy, stars Donald Duck as a factory worker living under the Nazi Regime, where all are forced to salute the Führer at every turn.

The Tell-Tale Heart (1953, dir. Ted Parmelee), a surrealistic animated short film based on Poe’s short story & narrated by James Mason (full film online here & here) “The old man sprang up in the bed, crying out, ‘Who’s there?’ I kept quite still and said nothing. Presently, I heard a slight groan, and I knew it was the groan of mortal terror. It was the low stifled sound that arises from the bottom of the soul when overcharged with awe. I knew the sound well. I knew what the old man felt, and pitied him although I chuckled at heart. I knew that he had been lying awake ever since the first slight noise when he had turned in the bed. His fears had been ever since growing upon him. He had been trying to fancy them causeless, but could not. He had been saying to himself, ‘It is nothing but the wind in the chimney, it is only a mouse crossing the floor’. Yes he has been trying to comfort himself with these suppositions; but he had found all in vain. Now, I say, there came to my ears a low, dull, quick sound, such as a watch makes when enveloped in cotton. I knew that sound well too. It was the beating of the old man’s heart. It increased my fury as the beating of a drum stimulates the soldier into courage. But even yet I refrained and kept still. I scarcely breathed. Meantime the hellish tattoo of the heart increased. It grew quicker and quicker, and louder and louder, every instant. The old man’s terror must have been extreme! It grew louder, I say, louder every moment! And now at the dead hour of the night, amid the dreadful silence of that old house, so strange a noise as this excited me to uncontrollable terror. Yet, for some minutes longer I refrained and stood still. But the beating grew louder, louder! I thought the heart must burst. And now a new anxiety seized me — the sound would be heard by a neighbour! The old man’s hour had come! With a loud yell, I threw open the lantern and leaped into the room. He shrieked once - once only. In an instant I dragged him to the floor, and pulled the heavy bed over him. I then smiled gaily, to find the deed so far done. But for many minutes the heart beat on with a muffled sound. This, however, did not vex me; it would not be heard through the wall. At length it ceased.  I removed the bed and examined the corpse. I placed my hand upon the heart and held it there many minutes. There was no pulsation. He was stone dead. His eye would trouble me no more.” -Edgar Allan Poe, The Tell-Tale Heart

The Tell-Tale Heart (1953, dir. Ted Parmelee), a surrealistic animated short film based on Poe’s short story & narrated by James Mason (full film online here & here)

“The old man sprang up in the bed, crying out, ‘Who’s there?’

I kept quite still and said nothing. Presently, I heard a slight groan, and I knew it was the groan of mortal terror. It was the low stifled sound that arises from the bottom of the soul when overcharged with awe. I knew the sound well. I knew what the old man felt, and pitied him although I chuckled at heart. I knew that he had been lying awake ever since the first slight noise when he had turned in the bed. His fears had been ever since growing upon him. He had been trying to fancy them causeless, but could not. He had been saying to himself, ‘It is nothing but the wind in the chimney, it is only a mouse crossing the floor’. Yes he has been trying to comfort himself with these suppositions; but he had found all in vain.

Now, I say, there came to my ears a low, dull, quick sound, such as a watch makes when enveloped in cotton. I knew that sound well too. It was the beating of the old man’s heart. It increased my fury as the beating of a drum stimulates the soldier into courage.

But even yet I refrained and kept still. I scarcely breathed. Meantime the hellish tattoo of the heart increased. It grew quicker and quicker, and louder and louder, every instant. The old man’s terror must have been extreme! It grew louder, I say, louder every moment! And now at the dead hour of the night, amid the dreadful silence of that old house, so strange a noise as this excited me to uncontrollable terror. Yet, for some minutes longer I refrained and stood still. But the beating grew louder, louder! I thought the heart must burst. And now a new anxiety seized me — the sound would be heard by a neighbour! The old man’s hour had come! With a loud yell, I threw open the lantern and leaped into the room. He shrieked once - once only. In an instant I dragged him to the floor, and pulled the heavy bed over him. I then smiled gaily, to find the deed so far done.

But for many minutes the heart beat on with a muffled sound. This, however, did not vex me; it would not be heard through the wall. At length it ceased.  I removed the bed and examined the corpse. I placed my hand upon the heart and held it there many minutes. There was no pulsation. He was stone dead. His eye would trouble me no more.”

-Edgar Allan Poe, The Tell-Tale Heart

The Tell-Tale Heart (1953, dir. Ted Parmelee), based on Edgar Allan Poe’s 1843 short story of the same title. The animated short film be seen online here & here.  “Why will you say that I am mad? See how calmly I tell this story to you. Listen: It starts with the old man. An old man in an old house. A good man, I suppose. He had never harmed me. I didn’t want his gold, if gold there was. Then what was it? I think…I think it was…his eye. Yes, that eye … the eye. That. His eye staring. Milky white film. The eye. Everywhere. Everywhere, in everything. Of course, I had to get rid of the eye.”

The Tell-Tale Heart (1953, dir. Ted Parmelee), based on Edgar Allan Poe’s 1843 short story of the same title. The animated short film be seen online here & here. 

“Why will you say that I am mad? See how calmly I tell this story to you.

Listen:

It starts with the old man. An old man in an old house. A good man, I suppose. He had never harmed me. I didn’t want his gold, if gold there was. Then what was it? I think…I think it was…his eye. Yes, that eye … the eye. That. His eye staring. Milky white film. The eye. Everywhere. Everywhere, in everything. Of course, I had to get rid of the eye.”

Jabberwocky (1971, dir. Jan Švankmajer), a surrealistic short film loosely based on Lewis Carroll’s poem Jabberwocky.

Jabberwocky (1971, dir. Jan Švankmajer), a surrealistic short film loosely based on Lewis Carroll’s poem Jabberwocky.

Three American Beauties (1906, dir. Edwin S. Porter) Porter shot the film in black-and-white, and then had color painted onto each frame. 

Three American Beauties (1906, dir. Edwin S. Porter)

Porter shot the film in black-and-white, and then had color painted onto each frame. 

Scenes from The Golden Beetle (1907, dir. Segundo de Chomón), a 3 minute fantasy trick film notable for its spectacular use of color, which was done by hand. Online here. (via)

Scenes from The Golden Beetle (1907, dir. Segundo de Chomón), a 3 minute fantasy trick film notable for its spectacular use of color, which was done by hand. Online here.

(via)

Simone Mareuil in Un Chien Andalou (1929, dir. Luis Buñuel) “While spending Christmas with Salvador Dali in Figueras, I suggested to him that we do a film together. He said: ‘Last night I dreamt with ants swarming in my hand.’ And I said: ‘Oh! Man! I dreamt about a cloud cutting the moon and me cutting someone’s eye with a razor.’ We wrote the script in six days. We identified with each other so much that there was no discussion.” -Buñuel, via

Simone Mareuil in Un Chien Andalou (1929, dir. Luis Buñuel)

“While spending Christmas with Salvador Dali in Figueras, I suggested to him that we do a film together. He said: ‘Last night I dreamt with ants swarming in my hand.’ And I said: ‘Oh! Man! I dreamt about a cloud cutting the moon and me cutting someone’s eye with a razor.’

We wrote the script in six days. We identified with each other so much that there was no discussion.”

-Buñuel, via