The Movies Begin - A Treasury of Early Cinema, 1894-1913 (1902) Review

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(More customer reviews)To the casual movie viewer, the history of cinema begins in the 1930s, when silents were totally replaced with the new talkie medium. Beyond an occasional showing of The Phantom of the Opera or a few Keaton or Chaplin movies, silents- and especially early silents- are a part of the murky past. This collection is a real eye opener to either a movie fan who wants to broaden their knowledge or someone who, like me, is a silent movie fan who wants to see how it all began.
This collection offers a broad variety. From early melodramas and comedies to newsreel footage and special effects vehicles. The two most famous early silents- The Great Train Robbery and A Trip to the Moon- are shown here but other, more unusual films such as the Golden Beetle and the Grass Widower are also allowed to shine. The picture quality is excellant especially considering the age of these films.
The music by Robert Israel is wonderful, always appropriate and quite a bit less sober than most silent movie music. Even my mother, who likes silents but dislikes silent movie music enjoyed it. It should please both purists and casual fans.
One fault I found with this collection is that some movies have narration whether you want it or not. It surely would not have been difficult to include an on/off function for the commentary track. Also, at points the sound is badly mixed so that the music drowns out the narrator. However, this fairly minor flaw did not ruin my enjoyment of the collection.
I particularly enjoyed the pre-WWI French films, it is easy to see why the French imports could outshine much of the American output. They are beautifully produced, make no bones about their staginess and have an element of playful fantasy. The last disc has a film of the wonderful French comedian Max Linder, it's a shame that he never regained his pre-war popularity because his comedy is spurisingly modern and he has obvious charisma.
The newsreels are also a highlight, Russia in the winter, various "working dogs", an english biscuit factory... all are valuable historically as well as very amusing.
This set is cheap at the price and while not all of the films can be called masterpieces, they are all important in reconstructing a period of cinema history that is too often ignored. If you have any interest in the story of earlky cinema, I recommend this set without reservation.

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Unseen Cinema - Early American Avant Garde Film 1894-1941 (1910) Review

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(More customer reviews)The contents below are from unseen-cinema; they include the contents of a 160-page softcover Series Catalog, which is sold separately, but I think you would want. This is clearly a labor of love; though I can't imagine trying to watch all this in a month of Sundays, I could see dipping into it from time to time.
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Disk 1: THE MECHANIZED EYE
Experiments in Technique and Form
The dynamic qualities of motion pictures are explored by cameramen and filmmakers through novel experiments in technique and form. Early cinematographers James White, "Billy" Bitzer, and Frederick Armitage display experimental shooting styles that wowed audiences. Other independent companies further image manipulation through creative staging, editing, and printing, such as a stunning three-screen film that predates Gance's Napoleon. Experiments by photographer Walker Evans, painter Emlen Etting, musician Jerome Hill, and the film collectives Nykino and Artkino record the world in a continual process of flux. A most extreme approach is realized by Henwar Rodakiewicz with Portrait of a Young Man (1925-31), a monumental study of natural and abstract motions.
18 FILMS:
5 Paris Exposition Films (1900)-James White
Eiffel Tower from Trocadero Palace (1900)
Palace of Electricity (1900)
Champs de Mars (1900)
Panorama of Eiffel Tower (1900)
Scene from Elevator Ascending Eiffel Tower (1900)
Captain Nissen Going through Whirpool Rapids, Niagra Falls (1901)-creators unknown
Down the Hudson (1903)-Frederick Armitage & A.E. Weed
The Ghost Train (1903)-creators unknown
Westinghouse Works, Panorama View Street Car Motor Room (1904)-G.W. "Billy" Bitzer
In Youth, Beside the Lonely Sea (c. 1924-25)-creators unknown
Melody on Parade (c. 1936)-creators unknown
La Cartomancienne (The Fortune Teller) (1932)-Jerome Hill
Pie in the Sky (1934-35)-Nykino: Elia Kazan, Ralph Steiner & Irving Lerner
Travel Notes (1932)-Walker Evans
Oil: A Symphony in Motion (1930-33)-Artkino: M.G. MacPherson & Jean Michelson
Poem 8 (1932-33)-Emlen Etting
Storm (1941-43)-Paul Burnford
Portrait of a Young Man (1925-31)-Henwar RodakiewiczDisk 2: THE DEVIL'S PLAYTHING
American Surrealism
Edwin S. Porter and other early filmmakers used bizarre sets, fantastic costumes, and magic lantern tricks to illuminate their fantasy films. American parody supplied Douglas Fairbanks with enough unusual material to produce the truly surreal When the Clouds Roll By (1919). The expressionistic Cabinet of Dr. Calagari (1919) influenced American sensibilities throughout the 1920s as seen in Beggar of Horseback (1925), The Life and Death of 9413-A Hollywood Extra (1927) and The Telltale Heart (1928). The emphasis shifted when amateurs J.S. Watson, Jr., Joseph Cornell, and Orson Welles crafted a unique variety of American surrealism on film unfettered by European concerns.
17 FILMS:
Jack and the Beanstalk (1902)-Edwin S. Porter
Dream of a Rarebit Fiend (1906)-Edwin S. Porter
The Thieving Hand (1907)-creator unknown, Vitagraph
Impossible Convicts (1905)-G.W. "Billy" Bitzer
When the Clouds Roll By (1919)-Douglas Fairbanks & Victor Fleming (excerpt)
Beggar on Horseback (1925)-James Cruze (excerpt)
The Fall of the House of Usher (1926-27)-J.S. Watson, Jr. & Melville Webber
The Life and Death of 9413: A Hollywood Extra (1927)- Robert Florey & Slavko Vorkapich
The Love of Zero (1928)-Robert Florey & William Cameron Menzies
The Telltale Heart (1928)-Charles Klein
Tomatos Another Day (1930/1933)-J.S. Watson, Jr. & Alec Wilder
The Hearts of Age (1934)- William Vance & Orson Welles
Unreal News Reels (c. 1926)-Weiss Artclass Comedies (excerpt)
The Children's Jury (c. 1938)-attributed Joseph Cornell
Thimble Theater (c. 1938)-Joseph Cornell
Carousel: Animal Opera (c. 1938)-Joseph Cornell
Jack's Dream (c. 1938)-Joseph CornellDisk 3: LIGHT RHYTHMS
Music and Abstraction
The rhythmic elements of cinema are explored by artists and filmmakers fascinated by the abstract qualities of light. The American authors of avant-garde classics Le Retour á la raison (1923), Ballet mécanique (1923-24), Anémic cinéma (1926), and Une Nuit sur le Mont Chauve (1934), are finally acknowledged for their seminal artistic achievements made in Europe. Pioneer abstract films by Ralph Steiner, Mary Ellen Bute, Douglass Crockwell, Dwinnell Grant, and George Morris are compared and contrasted with Hollywood montages created by Ernst Lubitsch, Slavko Vorkapich, and Busby Berkeley. For the first time on video, composer George Antheil's original 1924 score accompanies Fernand Léger and Dudley Murphy's film Ballet mécanique, a truly avant-garde cacophony of image and sound.
29 FILMS:
Le Retour à la raison (1923)-Man Ray
Ballet mécanique (1923-24)-Fernand Léger & Dudley Murphy
Anémic cinéma (1924-26)-Rrose Sélavy (Marcel Duchamp)
Looney Lens: Anamorphic People (1927)-Al Brick
Out of the Melting Pot (1927)-W.J. Ganz Studio
H20 (1929)-Ralph Steiner
Surf and Seaweed (1929-30)-Ralph Steiner
7 Vorkapich Montage Sequences (1928-37)-Slavko Vorkapich
The Furies (1934)
Skyline Dance (1928)
Money Machine (1929)
Prohibition (1929)
The Firefly- Vorkapich edit (1937)
The Firefly-MGM release version (1937)
Maytime (1937)
So This Is Paris (1926)-Ernst Lubitsch (excerpt)
Light Rhythms (1930)-Francis Bruguière & Oswell Blakeston
Une Nuit sur le Mont Chauve (Night on Bald Mountain) (1934)-Alexandre Alexeieff & Claire Parker
Rhythm in Light (1934)-Mary Ellen Bute, Ted Nemeth & Melville Webber
Synchromy No. 2 (1936)-Mary Ellen Bute & Ted Nemeth
Parabola (1937)-Mary Ellen Bute & Ted Nemeth
Footlight Parade - "By a Waterfall" (1933)-Busby Berkeley
Glen Falls Sequence (1937-46)-Douglass Crockwell
Simple Destiny Abstractions (1937-40)-Douglass Crockwell
Abstract Movies (1937-47)-George L.K. Morris
Scherzo (1939)-Norman McLaren
Themis (1940)-Dwinell Grant
Contrathemis (1941)-Dwinell Grant
1941 (1941)-Francis Lee
Moods of the Sea (1940-42)-Slavko Vorkapich & John HoffmanDisk 4: INVERTED NARRATIVES
New Directions in Story-Telling
Early directors D.W. Griffith and Lois Weber develop the radical language of cinema narrative through audience-friendly melodramas made for nickelodeon theaters. Experimental fantasies are depicted in such independent productions as Moonland (c. 1926), Lullaby (1929), and The Bridge (1929-30). Depression era films by socially-conscious filmmakers reshape drama as demonstrated in Josef Berne's brooding Black Dawn (1933) and Strand and Hurwitz's biting Native Land (1937-41): each pictures a raw reality. Parody and satire find their mark in Theodore Huff's Little Geezer (1932) and Barlow, Hay and Le Roy's Even as You and I (1937). David Bradley's Sredni Vashtar by Saki (1940-43) boasts an inadvertent post-modern attitude.
12 FILMS:
The House with Closed Shutters (1910)-D.W. Griffith & G.W. "Billy" Bitzer
Suspense (1913)-Lois Weber & Philips Smalley
Moonland (c. 1926)-Neil McQuire & William A. O'Connor
Lullaby (1929)-Boris Deutsch
The Bridge (1929-30)-Charles Vidor
Little Geezer (1932)-Theodore Huff
Black Dawn (1933)-Josef Berne & Seymour Stern
Native Land (1937-41)-Frontier Films: Leo Hurwitz & Paul Strand (excerpt)
Black Legion (1936-7)-Nykino: Ralph Steiner & Willard Van Dyke
Even As You and I (1937)-Roger Barlow, Harry Hay & Le Roy Robbins
Object Lesson (1941)-Christoher Young
"Sredni Vashtar" by Saki (1940-43)-David BradleyDisk 5: PICTURING A METROPOLIS
New York City Unveiled
Only Unseen Cinema DVD released as a SINGLE
The DVD depicts dynamic images of New York City and scenes of New Yorkers among the skyscrapers, streets, and night life of America's greatest city during a half century of progress, while at the same time showing changes in film style and the history of cinema experiments. Avant-garde moments pop up in the most unlikely of places including turn-of-the-twentieth-century actualities, commercial and radical newsreels, and Busby Berkeley's "Lullaby of Broadway" from Gold Diggers of 1935. Included are spectacular prints of Charles Sheeler and Paul Strand's Manhatta (1921), Robert Flaherty's Twenty-four-Dollar Island (c. 1926), Robert Florey's Skyscraper Symphony (1929), Jay Leyda's A Bronx Morning (1931), and Rudy Burckhardt's Pursuit of Happiness (1940).
26 FILMS:
The Blizzard (1899)-creators unknown
Lower Broadway (1902)-Robert K. Bonine
Beginning of a Skyscraper (1902)-Robert K. Bonine
Panorama from Times Building, New York (1905)-Wallace McCutcheon
Skyscrapers of NYC from North River (1903)-J.B. Smith
Panorama from Tower of the Brooklyn Bridge (1903)-G.W. "Billy" Bitzer
Building Up and Demolishing the Star Theatre (1902)-Frederick Armitage
Coney Island at Night (1905)-Edwin S. Porter
Interior New York Subway 14th Street to 42nd Street (1905)-G.W. "Billy" Bitzer
Seeing New York by Yacht (1902)-Frederick Armitage & A.E. Weed
2 Looney Lens: Split Skyscrapers (1924) and Tenth Avenue, NYC (1924)-Al Brick
4 Scenes from Ford Educational Weekly (1916-24)-creators unknown
Manhatta (1921)-Charles Sheeler & Paul Strand
Twentyfour-Dollar Island (c. 1926)-Robert...Read more›

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7 DVDs – 20 Hours - 155 Classics of Avant Garde Cinema! "Unseen Cinema: Early American Avant-Garde Film 1894-1941" reveals hitherto unknown accomplishments of American filmmakers working in the United States and abroad from the invention of cinema until World War II, and offers an innovative and often controversial view of experimental film as a product of avant-garde artists, of professional directors, and of amateur movie-makers working collectively and as individuals at all levels of film production. Many of the films have not been available since their creation, some have never been screened in public, and almost all have been unavailable in copies as good as these until now. Sixty of the world's leading film archive collections cooperated with Anthology Film Archives to bring this long-neglected period of film history back to life for modern audiences.

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