Some Film History ~ Firsts in Film
The first film ever made in the United States, by WKL Dickson at Edison studios was Monkeyshines, No. 1 (1890), it was an experimental film and was never released to the public.
The first film made in the United States and released to the public was Dickson Greeting (1891). Dickson Greeting is generally considered to be the first US film because the ones before it were only experimental and were never shown to the public.
The first copyrighted film was Edison Kinetoscopic Record of a Sneeze (1894) a.k.a Fred Ott's Sneeze. The first film to feature a close up was also Edison Kinetoscopic Record of a Sneeze (1894).
The first motion picture to be shown on a screen before a paying audience was a four-minute boxing subject, Young Griffo v. Battling Charles Barnett, presented by Major Woodville Latham of the Lambda Co. at 153 Broadway, New York on 20 May 1895.
Film historians agree that the first public exhibition of motion pictures occurred on 28th December 1895 when August Lumière and Louis Lumière (the Lumière Brothers) exhibited a selection of ten of their single-reel films to a paying audience at a Parisian cafe. Popular legend has it that, when this film was shown, the first-night audience fled the cafe in terror, fearing being run over by the "approaching" train in L' Arrivée d'un train à la Ciotat (1895).
The first machine patented in the United States that showed animated pictures or movies was a device called the "wheel of life" or "zoopraxiscope". Patented in 1867 by William Lincoln, moving drawings or photographs were watched through a slit in the zoopraxiscope. However, this was a far cry from motion pictures as we know them today. Modern motion picture making began with the invention of the motion picture camera.
The Jazz Singer (1927) was the first movie with audible dialogue. Synchronized sound is used only for a few scenes containing songs. Spoken dialogue, such as the famous line "You ain't heard nothing yet," occurs only immediately after songs. All other dialogue, even including offstage dialogue during one song, is displayed on intertitles as usual for silent movies. Many documentaries and historians state that immediately after the release and success of the Jazz Singer that all of Hollywood switched to sound. This is not true for several reasons. First, the Vitaphone process was very selective and only was available to select productions. Secondly, the sound process nearly doubled the budget of a film. Thirdly, the first feature film with all synchronous dialogue was Lights of New York (1928). Silent pictures would remain mostly until 1929 and some even were in 1930 and 1931. The monophone process came to films in 1928 and finally made the silent process extinct.
The first film where a persons thoughts were presented by voice-over was Murder! (1930) directed by Alfred Hitchcock. The scene where Sir John thinks out loud in front of a mirror had to be filmed with a recording of the lines and an orchestra hidden behind the set as it was not possible to dub the soundtrack later.
The first feature-length comedy ever made was Tillie's Punctured Romance (1914), it was also Charlie Chaplin's first feature film.
The first ever remake of another film was The Great Train Robbery (1904), It was a remake of The Great Train Robbery (1903).
The first ever parody of a film was The Little Train Robbery (1905), it was a parody of The Great Train Robbery (1903).
The first film to be shown in the White House (to President Woodrow Wilson) was The Birth of a Nation (1915).
The first feature to be shown on White House grounds was Cabiria (1914)
The first film to run over 100 minutes was The Birth of a Nation (1915).
D.W. Griffith produced and directed the first movie ever made in Hollywood. "In Old California" 1910. He is also the first to negotiate and start film producing in Hollywood. Director D.W. Griffith discovered the little village on his trips to California and decided to shoot there because of the beautiful scenery and friendly people. On 6 May 2004 a monument will be erected at 1713 Vine Street, just north of Hollywood Boulevard. The monument is being made by Hollywood Forever Cemetery, and the actual rare film which was once thought lost will be screened at the Beverly Hills Film Festival. This is the first time the movie has been seen by the public in 94 years. The film will then be scheduled for restoration, and the restored version will be premiered at a later date. The American Mutoscope and Biograph Company who made the film is in existence today and the oldest movie company in America, established in 1895.
Oliver Twist (1912/I) is the earliest known, if not the first feature length American film. Of the film's original five reels however, only four of them survive.
Oliver Twist (1912/II) was the first British feature-length photoplay; the feature-length documentary The Durbar at Delhi (1912) preceded it by six months.
Lorna Doone (1912) was the first British five-reel feature.
David Copperfield (1913) first full-length feature to be filmed in England.
The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906) was the first film to run for more than 60 minutes and is considered to be the first full-length feature film ever made..
Raja Harishchandra (1913) was the first feature length India film.
Richard III (1912) was thought to be lost for decades, but a pristine print (believed to be the oldest known complete surviving feature film made in the US) was discovered by a private collector in 1996 and donated to the American Film Institute.
Hiawatha (1913) was the first film to feature an all-Native American cast.
Cohen Collects a Debt (1912) was the first Keystone feature.
The Squaw Man (1914) was the first feature-film made in Hollywood, California, which at the time was a rural area. Its inhabitants at the time were not happy during the film's production and violently attempted to stop the film from being made. One of these acts included gunshots fired at director Cecil B. DeMille on his way to his office in the morning.
The first horror movie, only about three minutes long, was made by imaginative French filmmaker Georges Melies, titled Le Manoir Du Diable (1896) (aka The Devil's Castle) containing some elements of later vampire films.
The earliest vampire film was director Arthur Robison's German silent film Nachte des Grauens (1916), aka Night of Terror, with strange, vampire-like people. The first genuine vampire picture was also produced by a European filmmaker - director F. W. Murnau's feature-length Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens (1922), aka Nosferatu, A Symphony of Terror. Shot on location, it was an unauthorized film adaptation of Bram Stoker's Dracula with Max Schreck in the title role as the screen's first vampire - a mysterious aristocrat living in distant Bremen named Count Graf Orlok (Max Schreck). Because of copyright problems, the vampire was named Nosferatu rather than Dracula, and the action was changed from Transylvania to Bremen.
The earliest horror pictures, now-forgotten "vamp" pictures (films featuring devilish captivating ladies) in one-reel or full length features, were produced in the US from 1909 to the early 1920s, making the horror genre one of the oldest and most basic. The first Frankenstein monster film in the US was Edison's Frankenstein (1910), a 16-minute (one-reel) version made by the Edison Studios and starring Charles Ogle as the monster. In this early version, the Monster was created in a cauldron of chemicals. Two other silent precursors to later Frankenstein films were Life Without a Soul (1915) and the expressionistic German film Homunculus (1916), a serial about an artificially-created man. Before the 1930s, Hollywood was reluctant to experiment with the themes of true horror films. Instead, the studios took popular stage plays and emphasized their mystery genre features, providing rational explanations for all the supernatural and occult elements.
The first American horror-film star was Lon Chaney, Sr known as "the man of a thousand faces" because of his transformative, grotesque makeup and acting genuis.
The first 'true' zombie film was director Victor Halperin's and UA's low-budget, atmospheric White Zombie (1932), Bela Lugosi as 'Murder' Legendre - an evil voodoo master, necromancer and hypnotist. He runs a Haitian sugar mill with empty-faced, mindless zombie slaves and enters into a perverse pact to control and win the soul of a bride-to-be (Madge Bellamy).
The first Westerns: The earliest cowboy films were Thomas Edison's Cripple Creek Bar Room Scene (1898) and Poker at Dawson City (1898), followed by Edison's publicity film Romance of the Rails (1903) (made by Edison's cameraman Edwin S. Porter). Other early westerns copyrighted by the American Mutoscope and Biograph Co. were the 21-minute long Kit Carson (1903) and the 15-minute The Pioneers (1903). But the 'first real movie' or commercially narrative film that gave birth to the genre was Edwin S. Porter's pioneering western The Great Train Robbery (1903). Porter (named 'the father of the story film') was responsible for the one-reel, 10-minute long film, shot - curiously - on the East Coast (New Jersey and Delaware) rather than the Western setting of Wyoming. [The first westerns were shot, until 1906, on the East Coast. The first western produced in the West was Biograph's A California Hold Up (1906).] The first feature-length western was Lawrence B. McGill's six-reel Arizona (1913).
Thomas Ince (1882-1924), known for inventing the studio system, was the first studio executive who embraced the western in the teen years. He arrived in California in 1911, where he produced detailed scripts with new situations and characters for a vast number of classic westerns. In 1912, his Bison Company production studios (known as Inceville) purchased the Miller Brothers 101 Ranch and the Wild West Show to use their props and performers for his assembly-line, mass-produced films.
The first westerns super-star of the silent era was William S. Hart.
the first big-scale epic film of the silent era was also a western, James Cruze's landmark and highly successful The Covered Wagon (1923) , an expensive effort which cost $800,000 yet brought $4 million at the box-office. This feature-length western from Paramount was the historical drama of a wagon train in the mid-1800s moving westward, encountering harsh environmental and weather conditions (a river crossing and prairie fire), and of course, hostile Indians. Hollywood was encouraged to produce many more westerns in subsequent years.
The first full length film in color was The World, the Flesh and the Devil (1914) in UK using (Kinemacolor)
Also check out http://members.cox.net/stegokitty/dsotr_pages/technicolor.htm
The first full length American movie in color was probably Cupid Angling (1918)
Leon Forrest Douglass is believed to have produced the first full length American color film but there could have been more before him that are not known.
You can read more about it here scroll down to the part about Leon Forrest Douglass.
The first Technicolor film was The Gulf Between (1918) using Technicolor Process Number One but only a few frames of this film exists today.
The first full length 2 strip Technicolor film was The Toll of the Sea (1922) using Technicolor Process Number Two.
The first full length 3 strip Technicolor film was Becky Sharp (1935)
The first live action 3 strip Technicolor film was the short musical La Cucaracha (1934).
You can read more about those films here.
The first Technicolor film shot in England was Wings of the Morning (1937).
The first film to be shot in Three-Strip Technicolor outside of a studio environment (on location) was The Trail of the Lonesome Pine (1936).
The first commercially produced color film was was G. A. Smith's A Visit To The Seaside (1908) (Kinemacolor), an eight-minute short featuring the White Coons pierrot troupe and the Band of the Cameron Highlanders which was trade shown in September 1908.
The first dramatic film in color was the Kinemacolor production Checkmated (1911), directed by Theo Bouwmeester, who also played the lead role of Napoleon.
The first all-color talking feature was Warner Bros.' two-color Technicolor musical On With The Show (1929), directed by Alan Crosland with Betty Compson and Joe E. Brown, which was premiered at the Winter Garden Theatre in New York on May 28, 1929.
Flowers and Trees (1932) was the first animated short in full color and the first one to win an Academy Award--Walt Disney's first of thirty-two. Also the first film (animated or otherwise) to use the three-strip Technicolor process.
The first three-color Technicolor sequence in a feature was in MGM's The Cat And The Fiddle (1934).
The technology to make color films has been around at least since 1889, when Edward R. Turner received a patent for a three color motion picture system. So, there may be some full length color films before the ones I mentioned above, using some of the different color technologies that were developed at different times. The process was too expensive at the time and so most films were made in Black and White.
Some more websites:
Additive Color Systems
Kinemacolor Descendants
Hand Colored Films
Cinecolor
Technicolor
Movie Timeline
1953 - The Robe had 4-track stereo sound; was the first CinemaScope film and led the release of 33 stereo films in 1953, but stereo failed to transform motion picture soundtracks and would not reappear until 1975 with Dolby optical stereo sound. The Robe used directional sound, footsteps of Roman Legions marching from right to left, thunder and wind and rain of the crucifixion scene. The first time off-screen voices are actually heard off-screen, when voices warn Marcellus of his ship departure to Judea. Only Fox and Todd-AO would record dialogue with directional sound. All other studios provided some music in stereo for magnetic soundtracks, but recorded voices and sound effects in mono.
The Robe was the second movie made in CinemaScope, but the first to be released.
The first film to be encoded with a Dolby stereo optical soundtrack was Lisztomania (1975)
The first 35mm Dolby stereo optical film with encoded surround effects was A Star Is Born (1976).
The first film to use the 70mm Dolby Stereo surround sound system was Apocalypse Now (1979)
Motion Picture Sound 1930-1989
His Girl Friday (1940) was one of the first, if not the first, films to have characters talk over the lines of other characters (overlapping dialogue), for a more realistic sound. Prior to this, movie characters completed their lines before the next lines were started.
The first film adaptation of a Shakespeare play was King John (1899) This short film recreates King John's death scene at the end of the play.
The first British feature-length animated film was Animal Farm (1954).
The first movie to show a woman (Janet Leigh) in just a bra and slip was Psycho.
The first movie to show a flushing toilet on camera was Psycho.
Admiral Cigarette (1897) was the first advertising film lodged for copyright at the Library of Congress, 5 August 1897.
Detour (1945) Was the first "poverty row" movie chosen by the Library of Congress for preservation, in 1993.
Many sources have claimed that director Boris Ingster's Stranger on the Third Floor (1940) was the first full-featured film noir.
The first detective film to use the shadowy, nihilistic noir style in a definitive way was the pivotal work of novice director John Huston in the mystery classic The Maltese Falcon (1941)
The first American film that defied the 'Hayes Code' of morals in the big screen was The Outlaw(1943).
Charlie Chaplin was the first actor to appear on the cover of 'Time' magazine, (July 6, 1925).
Jean Harlow was the very first film actress to grace the cover of 'Life' magazine in May 1937.
Luise Rainer was the first actor/actress to win back-to-back Acadamy Awards for her performances in The Great Ziegfeld (1936) and The Good Earth (1937).
Blackmail (1929) is generally acknowledged as the first British talkie.
The first film to win the Oscar "grand slam" (Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Director and Screenplay) was It Happened One Night (1934).
The Broadway Melody (1929) is one of the very first Hollywood musicals (possibly the first after The Jazz Singer (1927). Also the first musical to spawn "sequels" (Broadway Melody films would appear every few years until 1940).
Frau im Mond (1929) (Woman in the Moon) was the film to show the first countdown to launch of a rocket. Not just the first one in a movie, but the first ever: it was invented as a dramatic device for the movie. Also depicted for the first time are the use of liquid rocket fuel, a rocket with two stages, and zero gravity in space.
In May 2002, Bowling for Columbine (2002) became the first documentary to compete in the Cannes Film Festival's main competition in 46 years.
In 2003, Bowling for Columbine (2002) became the first documentary to be nominated for and then to win a WGA Award for its screenplay.
Fahrenheit 9/11 (2004) is the first American Documentary to win the Palm d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival. It is only the second ever documentary to win, the first was Le Monde du silence (1956).
Fahrenheit 9/11 (2004) was the first ever documentary to cross the $100 million mark in the United States.
Lyle Talbot says "damn" in The Thirteenth Guest (1932), marking the first time the word is used in a major studio film. This is a full seven years before Clark Gable didn't give a damn in Gone With the Wind (1939)
The Manchurian Candidate (1962) was one of the first Hollywood films to use martial arts in a key fight sequence (between Frank Sinatra and Henry Silva), over a decade before the Kung Fu craze of the 1970s. The earliest, however, may well be in Blood on the Sun (1945), with its climactic judo bout involving James Cagney.
Blowup (1966) was reportedly the first British feature film to show full frontal female nudity.
The first movie to have a musical score written specifically for the film was King Kong (1933). After the score was completed, the sound effects were altered in pitch to conform to the music, an at-the-time unprecedented event. RKO had told Steiner not to write original music but to edit existing tracks; however, Cooper offered to pay for a new score out of his own pocket, an ultimate cost of $50,000. Portions of this score have shown up in numerous later films.
The MGM Records soundtrack album made from Till the Clouds Roll by (1946), originally released on a 78-RPM album set, was the first soundtrack album ever made from a live-action film musical. Previously the only movie musical soundtracks released on records were those of the Walt Disney animated films. (The authentic soundtrack album of MGM's The Wizard of Oz (1939), with the film cast, was not released until 1956.)
Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942) was the very first black and white movie to be colorized using a controversial computer-applied process. Despite widespread opposition to the practice by many film aficionados, stars and directors, the movie won over a sizeable section of the public on its re-release.
Life of an American Fireman (1903) was the first story film ever made.
For his performance in The Jazz Singer (1980), Neil Diamond became the first ever "winner" of the Razzie Award for Worst Actor.
Bullitt (1968) was the first mainstream Hollywood film to use the expletive "Bullshit!" in its script.
He Who Gets Slapped (1924) was the first production to start filming in the newly formed Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It was not their first release, though; it was held until the holiday season when attendance is higher for "important" films.
He Who Gets Slapped (1924) was the first film to feature the MGM lion.
What's Opera, Doc? (1957) was the first cartoon selected for the National Film Registry.
Alice Guy is generally considered to be the world's first female film director. Her first film was La Fée aux choux (1896)
Tin Toy (1988) was the first fully-CG film to win the Academy Award for Best Animated Short.
Die Abenteuer des Prinzen Achmed (1926) is the oldest existing (and possibly first) full-length animated film.
The opening shot in It (1927) is the earliest known use of a zoom lens in an American feature.
Oscar Micheaux was the first African-American to produce a feature film--- The Homesteader (1919)
The Homesteader (1919) was the first feature-length movie made for black audiences. Stills from this film appear in Midnight Ramble (1994) (TV)
Oscar Micheaux was the first African-American to produce a sound feature film. The Exile (1931). This movie was advertised as the first Black American "talkie".
Babes on Broadway (1941) was one of the first Hollywood musicals to acknowledge that World War II was taking place.
