Georges Méliès (A genius for recreation) and Lumiere Brothers (Photography/Movies)

The film we watched in thursdays class, voyage to the moon (Le voyage dans la Lune), made in 1902, by Georges Méliès, was indeed a great film.


My favorite scenes were the scientists landing on the moon from a cannon. On the moon being a underground forest scene with the mushrooms (changing from the umbrella), the alien monsters poofing in a smoke screen, and the falling of the lunar rocket into the sea.

(Interesting note* The spaceship in voyage to the moon is very similar to the metallic ship in "You only live Twice", a James Bond movie. The evil group Spectre was capturing American/ Russian space shuttles and using blame games to lead the world in global war, with Spectre gaining the finincal gain. Bond of course stopped them.)


I was amazed by the film layers when the sparkiling nova going across the screen and the overlay of night sky and star in the background. Layers were really amazing and this was indeed a precursor to photoshop. I was also surprised on the use of using stars with human actors as faces. It was indeed a brillant idea. In later films, the sun, stars, and moon have had faces to symbolize all sorts of avertisement.


This film was really a dawn of a new age....

Auguste and Louis Lumière provided a good take on early black and white movies. I was surprised by the nudity in the small films, but I do believe it was a good marketing gimmick for that time. It is the dawn of risque (women in the past had long clothes), and the evolution of exposure (nudity and pornography).  

Now the moving train professor Santiago was describing is indeed true. For the evolution of technology simulating real events did infact cause a stir among people. We find it funny but in truth it was a new thing for them. Pictures of people moving was normal but now realistic engines and automobiles was incredible. Amazing that the Lumière brothers started the black and white movies and comedies. What if the brothers showed them a high definiton TV with color. That would probably cause a war.

Both the Lumière brothers and Georges Méliès provided a great recreation of how todays technology is accredited to them and so many others.