Film+in+Europe

Back to IB Film > World Cinema/Early Cinema > Early Cinema

** Film in Europe ** Film was born in Europe. Until the emergence of the Studio System in 1920's America, Europe was the hub for film making and cinematic technological advances. Today we are seeing a resurgence of cinema in Europe, with filmmaking hubs in the UK, Italy and France becoming world renowned centers for excellence in cinema.

**//__Origins of European Film__//** Moving images were produced on revolving drums and disks in the 1830s with independent invention by Simon von Stampfer (Stroboscope) in Austria,Joseph Plateau (Phenakistoscope) in Belgium and William Horner (zoetrope) in Britain. Étienne-Jules Marey invented a chronophotographic gun in 1882, which was capable of taking 12 consecutive frames a second, recording all the frames on the same picture. He used the chronophotographic gun for studying animals and human locomotion.

//Roundhay Garden Scene//, filmed by Louis Le Prince on October 14, 1888 in Roundhay, Leeds, West Yorkshire, England, UK is now known as the earliest surviving motion picture. On June 21, 1889, William Friese-Greene was issued patent no. 10131 for his 'chronophotographic' camera. It was apparently capable of taking up to ten photographs per second using perforated celluloid film. A report on the camera was published in the British //Photographic News// on February 28, 1890. **//__French Innovation In Early European Cinema__//**

The French film industry in the late 19th Century and early 20th Century was among the world's most important. Auguste and Louis Lumière invented the cinématographe and their //L'Arrivée d'un train en gare de La Ciotat// in Paris in 1895 is considered by many historians as the official birth of cinematography. The early days of the industry, from 1896 to 1902, saw the dominance of four firms: Pathé Frères, the Gaumont Film Company, the Georges Méliès company, and the Lumières. Méliès invented many of the techniques of cinematic grammar, and among his fantastic, surreal short subjects is the first science fiction film //A Trip to the Moon// (//Le Voyage dans la Lune//) in 1902). In 1902 the Lumières abandoned everything but the production of film stock, leaving Méliès as the weakest player of the remaining three. (He would retire in 1914.) From 1904 to 1911 the Pathé Frères company led the world in film production and distribution. At Gaumont, pioneer Alice Guy Blaché (M. Gaumont's former secretary) was made head of production and oversaw about 400 films, from her first, //La Fée aux Choux//, in 1896, through 1906. She then continued her career in the United States, as did Maurice Tourneur and Léonce Perret after World War I. In 1907 Gaumont owned and operated the biggest movie studio in the world, and along with the boom in construction of "luxury cinemas" like the Gaumont-Palace and the Pathé-Palace (both 1911), cinema became an economic challenger to legitimate theater by 1914. __**//German Expressionism//**__
 * German Expressionism** refers to a number of related creative movements beginning in Germany before the First World War that reached a peak in Berlin, during the 1920s. These developments in Germany were part of a larger Expressionist movement in north and central European culture.

//**The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari**// (German: //Das Cabinet des Dr Caligari//) is a silent horror film made in the 1920's and directed by Robert Wiene from a screenplay by Hans Janowitz and Carl Mayer. It is one of the most influential of German Expressionist films and is often considered one of the greatest horror movies of the silent era. This movie is cited as having introduced the twist ending in cinema.

__**//Centers Of European Filmmaking//**__ Whilst the French city of Cannes has become famous for it's annual film festival, the production of European Cinema has been focused on specific locations for the past 100 years. These include: **[|Pinewood Studios (]****[|UK)]** [|Barrandov Studios (Czech Republic)] Film Ambrosio (Italy) In addition to these studios, certain cities have strong links with European Filmmaking. Prague has long existed as //the// centre for film production in Eastern Europe, and Paris has been home to cinema pioneers since the early 1800s. __**//Significant European Films of the early 20th Century//**__ Gance: //Ecce homo// Gance: //J’accuse// L’Herbier://Phantasmes// || ( [|Weimar Cinema until the coming of Sound: An Overview] ) ||  ||   ||   || [|Dulac: //La fete espagnole//] || [|Lang: //The Spiders//] [|Lang: //The Plague in Florence//] [|Lubitsch: //Madame Dubarry//] [|Wiene: //The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari//] ||  ||   ||   || Dulac: //Malencontre// Gance (-1922) //La Roue// || [|Wegener: //The Golem//] ||  ||   ||   || [|Murnau: //Nosferatu//] ||  ||   ||   || L’Herbier; //Don Juan et Faust// || [|Lang: //Dr. Mabuse: The Gambler//] ||  ||   ||   || Dulac: //Gossette// Dulac: //La Souriante Mme Beudet// Gance: //Au secours// || [|Lang: //The Nibelungen//] ||  ||   ||   || Renoir: //La fille de l’eau// || [|Leni: //Waxworks//] [|Murnau: //The Last Laugh//] ||  || [|Eisenstein: //Strike//] Protazanov: //Aelita// ||  || Dulac: //Ame d’artiste// Dulac: //La Folie des vaillants// Gance (-1927)://Napoleon vu par Abel Gance// Gance(-1927) //Autor de Napoleon// Gance (-1928)//Marine// || [|Lang: //Metropolis//] [|Wiene: //The Hands of Orlac//] ||  || [|Eisenstein://Battleship Potemkin//] [|Kuleshov: //The Death Ray//] ||  || Dulac: //Antoinette Sabrier// Gance (-1928)//Danses// || [|Fank: //The Holy Mountain//] [|Murnau: //Faust//] [|Murnau: //Tartuffe//] ||  || [|Kuleshov: //By the Law//] [|Pudovkin: //The Mother//] [|Vertov: //A Sixth of the World//] || [|Hitchcock: //The Lodger//] || Arrival of sound In USA || Dulac: //Le Cinema au service de l’histoire//(Compilation) [|Dulac: //Invitation au voyage//] (Online screening available) Renoir: //Charleston// || [|May: //Asphalt//] Ruttman: [|//Berlin Symphony of a City//] ||  || [|Eisenstein://October//] [|Pudovkin: //The end of St. Petersburg//] [|Shub: //The End of the Romanov Dynasty//] [|Shub: //The Great Road//] ||  || [|Dulac: //Le Coquille et le Clergyman//] (See under Invitation etc for online screening) Dulac: //La Princesses Mandane// Gance://Cristallisation// [|L’Herbier: //L’Argent//] L’Herbier: //Un Chapeau de paille d’Italie// Renpoir: //Marquetta// Renoir: //La petite marchande d’allumettes// || [|Lang: //Der Spione//] [|Pabst: //Pandora’s Box//] ||  || [|Pudovkin: //Storm Over Asia//] [|Shub: //The Russia of Nicholas II and Lev Tolstoy//] ||  || Dulac: //Etude cinegraphique sur une Aaabesgue// Dulac: //Disque 927// Dulac: //Themes et variations// Renoir: //Tire-au-flanc// Renoir: //Le bled// || [|Pabst: //Diary of a Lost Girl//] [|Siodmak et al: //People on Sunday//] ||  || [|Dovzhenko://Arsenal//] [|Eisenstein: //Old and New or The General Line//] Kovinstev and Trauberg: //The New Babylon// Protazanov://Ranks and People// Turin: //Turksib// [|Vertov: //Man With a Movie Camera//] || [|Asquith] : [|//A Cottage on Dartmoor//] [|Hitchcock: //The Manxman//] (His last silent film) [|Hitchcock: //Blackmail//] || Gance: //La Fin du Monde// Gance: //Autour de La Fin du Monde// [|Vigo: //A Propos de Nice//] || [|Von Sternberg: //Blue Angel//] ||  || [|Dovzhenko: //Earth//] ||   || Clair: //Le Million// L’Herbier: //Le Parfum de la dame en noir// Pagnol: //Marius//(Technically directed by Korda) Renoir : //On purge bebe// Renoir: //La chienne// Vigo: //Taris// || [|Lang:] [|Pabst: //The Threepenny Opera//] [|Sagan: //Girls in Uniform//] ||  || [|Vertov://Enthusiasm//] ||   || Gance: //Mater dolorosa// Pagnol: //Fanny//(Technically directed by Allegret) Renoir : //La nuit du carrefour// [|Renoir:] // [|Boudu sauve des eaux] // || [|Dudow: //Kuhle Wampe//] [|Lang: //Das Testament das Dr. Mabuse//] [|Riefensthal: //The Blue Light//] ||  || [|Eisenstein: //Que Viva Mexico!//] ||   || Pagnol: //Jofroi// Renoir: //Chotard et cie// [|Vigo: //Zero de Conduite//] || ( [|Nazi Film Genres] )
 * **Year ** || **France ** || **Germany ** || **Italy ** || **Soviet Union / Russia ** || **United Kigndom ** ||
 * 1918 || [|Dulac: //Le Bonheur des autres//]
 * 1919 || Dulac: //La Cigarette//
 * 1920 || Dulac: //La Belle dame sans merci//
 * 1921 || Dulac: //La Morte du soleil// || [|Lang: //Destiny//]
 * 1922 || Dulac: //Werther//(Unfinished)
 * 1923 || Clair: //Paris qui dort//
 * 1924 || Dulac: //La Diable dans la ville//
 * 1925 || Clair: //Le Fantome de Moulin Rouge//
 * 1926 || Clair: //Le Voyage imaginaire//
 * 1927
 * 1928 || Dulac: //Germination d’un haricot//
 * 1929 || [|Bunuel: //Un Chien d'Andalou & L'Age d'or//]
 * 1930 || Cocteau: //Le sang d’unpoete//
 * 1931 || Clair: //Sous les toits de Paris//
 * 1932 || Clair: //Le Quatorze juillet//
 * 1933 || Pagnol: //Le Gendre de Monsieur Poirier//

[|Ophuls: //Liebelei//] [|Steinhoff: //Hitler youth Quex//] [|Zeisler: //Viktor and Viktoria//] ||  || [|Kuleshov: //Velikii uteshitel' (The Great Consoler)//] || [|Korda: //The Private Life of Henry VIII//] || [|Gance (-1935)//Napoleon Bonaparte//] L’Herbier : //Le Scandale// Pagnol: //L’Article 330// Pagnol: //Angele// [|Renoir: //Madame Bovary//] [|Renoir: //Toni//] Vigo: //L'Atalante// || [|Trencker: //The Prodigal Son//] (1933-34)
 * 1934 || Gance: //Poliche//

[|Wegener: //A Man Must go to Germany//] ||  || [|Vasiliev Bros://Chapayev//] || [|Hitchcock: //The Man who Knew Too Much//] || Gance: //Jerome Perreaux, heroes de barricades// Gance: //Lucrece Borgia// Pagnol: //Merlusse// Pagnol: //Cigalon// [|Renoir: //Le crime de Monsieur Lange//] [|Renoir: //Toni//] || [|Riefenstahl: //Triumph of the Will//] || Blasetti: //Old Guard// || [|Dovzhenko://Aerograd//] [|Kosintsev and Trauberg: //The Youth of Max//] || [|Cavalcanti: //Coalface//] [|Hitchcock: //The Thirty-Nine Steps//] || Gance: //Un Grand amour de Beethoven// Renoir: [|//Partie de Campagne//] ||  ||   || Dzigan: //We From Kronstadt// [|Eisenstein://Alexander Nevsky//] || [|Hitchcock: //Sabotage//] || Gance: //Le Voleur de femme// Pagnol: //Regain// [|Renoir: //La Grande Illusion//] ||  || Gallone: //Scipio the African// ||   ||   || [|Carne: //quai des brumes//] Gance: //Louise// Pagnol: //La Femme du boulanger// Renoir: //La Marseillaise.// [|Renoir: //La bete humaine.//] || [|Froelich: //Heimat//] [|Reifenstahl: //Olympia//] || Alessandrini: //Luciano Serra Pilota// ||  || [|Asquith: //Pygmalion//] [|Hitchcock: //The Lady Vanishes//] Saville: //South Riding// || Gance: //Le Paradis perdu// L’Herbier: //La Brigade sauvage// L’Herbier: //Entente cordiale// [|Renoir: //La regle du jeu//] ||  ||   ||   || For contextual links and more films see: [|British Cinema and Society: Chronology 1939–1951]
 * 1935 || Gance: //Le Roman d’un jeune homme pauvre//
 * 1936 || Carne: //Jenny//
 * 1937 || Carne: //Drole de drames//
 * 1938 || [|Carne: //Hotel du Nord//]
 * 1939 || Carne: //Le Jour se leve//

[|British Cinema of the Second World War]

[|Hitchcock: //Jamaica Inn//]

[|Korda: //The Four Feathers//] [|Reed: //The Stars Look Down//] ||