The History of Film
Episodes
44 episodes
1- Cinema's Earliest Prehistory
The foundations of cinema from cave paintings to the invention of the chronophotographic gun. Visit the show's website at historyoffilmpodcast.com. If you want to get in touch, I would love to hear from you! My email is, predictably, historyoff...
2- Cinema's Artistic Antecedents
Cinema was not born of void. Earlier inventions, including, but not limited to, the magic lantern, diorama theater, the photograph, and vaudeville contributed to what went on in front of the camera in the earliest days of film history. Visit th...
3- The Birth of Cinema
Kodak, Edison, and Dixon are introduced, as are their first roles in the story of film history. Next week we cover movies they made.I use movie clips as transitions in this show. Once we reach sound film, all the clips will be very pertinen...
4- Edison, Dixon and The Black Maria
Let's all go to the movies! Sorry, I am two days late. Today we discuss the kinetograph, and the movies made on it, including Fred Ott's Sneeze, Comic Boxing, Serpentine Dance, and more. If you want to contact me, my email is histo...
5- The Lumiere Brothers and Projected Cinema
This episode we cover an exciting, but ultimately unfruitful, film made in the Black Maria, and voyage to Europe to meet the Lumiere family, and their incredible contributions to cinema.I told you the clips would start becoming useful j...
6- Lumiere "Firsts" and Advancements in Film Before Georges Méliès
This week we look at some of the "firsts" in film history as they occurred in the Lumiere's early projections. We also describe a few advancements in film technology, including the Latham Loop, and the Geneva Drive. I have had to take t...
7- Georges Méliès and the Magic of Editing
In the most dramatic and magical episode of the show so far, we cover the life and achievements of cinemas first great magician, Georges Méliès. The only movie clip is from the 2011 film Hugo, which touches on subjects of film history ...
8- George Albert Smith and the Brighton School
It was a big episode this time, and it took me a long time to write. But here it is! As I said at the end of the episode, a huge thanks to Stephen Herbert and Luke McKernan, whose work has proved to be the single most referenced resource I have...
9- Titans of Early French Film 1: Pathé
We cover the life and accomplishments of Charles Pathé! This is actually the first in a series of at least two episodes, as I hope to upload one about Leon Gaumont and Alice Guy within two weeks. Thank you all for staying with me through my Dec...
10- The Life and Work of Max Linder
CORRECTION: Okay, it turns out Max Linder is much more remembered than I thought he was. Not only is he featured, albeit briefly, in many of the texts I didn't initially find him in, but he is even mentioned in the 2009 film Inglor...
11- Titans of French Film 2: Leon Gaumont and Alice Guy
A longer episode this week, and we aren't even done yet! In this exciting episode, we cover the early career of Leon Gaumont and his first star director Alice Guy, the first female filmmaker. It was worth the wait, and I will see you next week!...
11a- The Movies of Alice Guy
It's the second part of episode 11, in which we cover Alice Guy's movies. Movies, after all, are just as much a part of film history as the people who made them (more actually). In this episode, we discuss:Faust et Méphistophélès (...
12- Edwin S. Porter and Parallel Editing
Edwin S. Porter and some of his early films and achievements are highlighted here, as well as some achievements that he did not... well, achieve. There are a couple of references that didn't fit into the flow of the show that I wo...
13- Edwin S. Porter and the Revolution of the Shot
It’s a big one again this week! We complete our second and Gil episode focused on filmmaker Edwin S. Porter, and discuss how his movies relate to film history. This includes technical innovations, genre development, and early examples of voyeur...
14- Growing Audiences and Consolidating Power
The reason my voice sounds just a little off is because I have been pretty sick for more than a week now. This is far and away the best I have sounded in a while though, so I went into the makeshift recoding booth and gave you my best! This...
14a- Inside the Nickelodeon
This was a wonderful episode to produce, even if it was tricky. If you would like to learn all of the things that I didn't get to in this episode, like some of the wonderful names nickelodeon’s had, I really can't recommend At The Picture S...
15- Feature Presentations
This is actually the first of a two-part episode that I was originally going to call "Trustbusters." This week, we cover the early events of Carl Laemmle's life and see the feature film become the dominant form of cinematic presentation in the ...
16- The Stars are Born
16- The Stars are BornHere it is, episode 16, which in my heart, is the Kill Bill Vol. II of the podcast. This one pares a lot with episode 15, so I have a couple of brief recaps of the last episode to make the episode flow a little bet...
16a- Florence Lawrence
This episode is actually a bonus episode, rather than the other “bonus” episode I’ve released, which was 30 minutes long and took weeks to make. This episode gets a little heavy, but suicide is a heavy subject. If you, or someone yo...
17- Film D'art
Just as promised in episode 15, this week we begin our journey through the early influences of feature-length movies that will eventually take us into the studio era of the U. S. film industry and D. W. Griffith. Film D'art is more important fo...
18- Heroines and Villains Every Week! Early U.S. Serial Film
Forget movies that are a mere five reels long, how about three hundred!? In the United States during the "nickelodeon era" of film history, movies got longer in more ways than the ones we have been covering recently. Some became the first film ...
19- Murderers, Vamps and Deviants: The Work of Louis Feuillade
It is a little late, but it is also long! This is one I have been researching and working on for a long time. This week it's all about a new kind of serial film–one that takes us out of the light, and into the shadowy depths of a criminal a...
20- Rise of the Roman Film Empire
This is the first of a planned three-episode series about Italian film from before the 1920's and the rise of fascism in Italy. In this very first episode, we cover the earliest origins of Italian film, though much more briefly than we did Fren...