Who Was the First Actor to be Paid $1 Million for a Single Film?
Many early actors earned more than $1 million. Until the mid–1940s most Hollywood actors were paid an annual salary, rather than per film.
Picture Show Man
When Was Color First Used in Motion Pictures and How Were They Made?
Color motion pictures appeared almost from the very beginning. Thomas Edison experimented with a hand-tinting process in his films.
Greatest Movies of the Silent Film Era
The Silent Film Era ran from 1895 to 1929. The period is marked by stories without synchronized dialogue or sound.
When Did “Movie” Replace “Motion Picture”?
In America the slang expression “movie” began to get circulation in newspaper comic strips in 1909, and within a year it was well on its way to nationwide usage.
First Actor to be Filmed Doing a Death Scene
The very first death scene we can find on record was filmed by Thomas Edison’s production company between May 10–19, 1895. Unfortunately, the catalogue entry does not list the cast. It is possible that David Henderson played Svengali. The scene was from David Henderson’s Burlesque that recreated an episode from “Trilby”, the 1894 novel by … Read more
Alice Calhoun: Lovely Lady of the Silent Screen
Alice Calhoun was a pretty, petite, brunette leading lady of Hollywood silents. She appeared in (at least) 49 films and was awarded a star on Hollywood’s Walk of Fame,
The History Of “Aspect Ratio” In Movies
Why the original 4:3 aspect ratio was chosen from the very earliest stage of motion picture development remains something of a puzzle. Although the 4:3 ratio had been used often for 19th Century lantern slides and photographs, there was no “standardized” format at that time.
James Dean – Hollywood’s Rebel
James Dean is one of only five people to have been nominated for a “Best Actor” Academy Award for their first feature role, and the only one nominated posthumously for an Academy Award twice.
Understanding Film Restoration
During the silent era, a film company would usually produce two camera negatives, placing two cameras next to each other to shoot a scene. One negative was usually used for domestic prints, and the second, often inferior negative (since the camera position was not perfect), used for foreign prints. When this was done, an internegative, a “printing negative”, was not used.
When and Why did 35mm Film Become the Standard?
Most commercial movies were, and some still are, shot using film that is 35 millimeters wide. When Thomas Edison and his team of inventors, headed by William Kennedy Laurie Dickson, finally introduced the Kinetoscope in April 1894, it used a film that was almost identical with the 35mm film used today – the same width … Read more