The Birth of Film

     1878 marked the year that the first ever "movie" or moving picture was introduced in the world. The title was The Horse in Motion and it was created by Eadweard Muybridge. Following this short sequence of moving pictures that Muybridge brought into the world, many other creators latched onto this idea of moving photography and thus film was born.
     I was surprised to find that many movies of this time period already began to explore the realms of horror and science fiction. There was a film by the name of Le Voyage dans la Lune, (A Trip to the Moon) that depicted a man landing on the moon in what is recognized by all as the first sci-fi film. Many other genres emerged from this genesis of an art form, such as the western, animated cartoons, and horror films.

     It is interesting to note that many of these filmmakers hung on to many of the ideas and themes of the romantic period such as horror and the exploration of the illogical. Film, like many other mediums, would become a vessel for the ideas and aspirations of society, helping turn the wheels and grease the axle of progress in its own, new way.
     While certainly not as timeless as written literature or many other forms of visual art, film today is certainly one of the most lucrative as well as one of the most talked about art forms. Movies such as documentary have the power to raise awareness, social issues could be represented on a accessible scale in adventure films to help spread ideas and highlight certain injustices, and inspiration for the future of technology could be found in many great science fiction films in a way that words written on a paper or motionless drawings simply could not.
     There were many different political and economical calamities of the Gilded Age, and those should not be overlooked, but the emergence of such a universal and beautiful form of art is often overlooked in the wake the great depression and the two world wars. I often wonder why film is not studied as seriously as a part of general education among public schools and universities, as the richness and depth of this particular form of art is still being uncovered to this day.

Photo Credit:
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