duVoyage - Fondation Groupama Gan pour le Cinéma

help Auguste and Louis Lumière (who were making a contribution to the costs) mount a gigantic operation
to the glory of cinema: free showings by the Lumière brothers were organised on a giant screen.
These were greeted extremely favourably by the public. The scale was impressive: a space 6,300 m 2 – the
immense hall or Gallery of Machines, a vestige of the 1889 Universal Exhibition - was reorganised into a
circular space with four tiered rows of seats able to accommodate 15,000 people; a circular stage measured
90m in diameter. It was one of the largest entertainment halls in the world.
« Cinematography on this giant scale needed a great deal of resource and organisation. A 17m long cement
vat, filled with water, was installed under the floor. Winches were attached to the metallic building structure
to lift and take down the screen. A 3m wide, 6m long cabin was built in wood and lined with sheet
metal. The screen was extremely large, almost 400m 2 , and had to be removed completely in order not to
interfere with other activities taking place in the hall. The general technical and administrative report of
the Exhibition pointed out the following: The screen situated along the longitudinal line of the Champs
de Mars was 21m wide and 18m high. To shelter it from dust, operators placed it after each evening showing
in a cement vat that had been installed under the hall’s floor and contained water. Half an hour before
each session, the screen was lifted up using a winch that had been placed over the glass roof; when it
was being put up, streams of water washed the screen again. The material it was made of had been chosen
to let pass as much light as was reflected back; so that the image could be seen on both sides of the screen.
The programme, which lasted 25 minutes, included 15 cinematographic views and 15 colour photographs.
It was changed regularly – 150 films were projected, their titles unknown since these were not written
in the programme. The scale and the fact that the show was free, demonstrated the Lumières’ desire to
ensure their invention became as widely known as possible and to be officially and internationally recognised
as the inventors of cinema.
There were 326 projection sessions between 15 May and 12 November. In total almost 1 million people –
from Paris, the provinces and abroad – would have seen the show».
Source Emmanuelle Toulet, Cinema at the Universal Exhibition of 1900, Revue d’Histoire moderne et contemporaine, 1986
1900-1905:
The cinema show
The Lumière’s event at the Universal Exhibition showed the public that cinema was not just about new invention,
but could be spectacular. The cinema was no longer just technique, it was about entertainment.
The years that followed would be cinema’s golden age. Films were made for the sake of making them, and
people would go to the cinema halls, which developed quickly, in the same way that they would go to the
theatre.
Méliès would follow these developments closely – since he had what was needed to appeal to the public
in this period: an artist who could create cinematographic shows. The public were seduced. Méliès’ success
grew with popular films such as The Coronation of Edward VII or A Trip to the Moon, which gave Star
Film worldwide notoriety. There followed dazzling growth, with impressive volumes (Pathé would sometimes
release 200 copies of a film).
1905-1907:
Plagiarism and over-production
of mediocre films leading to the crisis of 1907
In 1905, production increased as a result of the success of these shows. Growth was spectacular both in
and outside France, particularly in the United States, which had just put in place the Nickelodeon network
(small projection rooms with low entrance charges increased from June 1905 to number 3000 by 1906 and
10,000 by 1910), boosting American and European growth.
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Cinema appeared to be a godsend, despite its recent creation and a certain climate of uncertainty (notably
because of the patent war in the United States).
Economic concerns dominated artistry in film and adversely affected quality. Plagiarism became commonplace,
and films became increasingly mediocre. Above all, there was not yet a sufficient number of authors
able to provide fresh content. Gradually, the public was tiring of the cinema show, and the newly emerging
industry suffered its first major set-back. In the circumstances, Méliès resisted well and continued
to enjoy some success. He was able to demonstrate the undeniable qualities of authorship which had always
characterised him. In 1906, “The Quatre Cents Farces du diable” was a major hit. He withstood the crisis
of 1907 better than his peers, but remained attached, no matter what, to his fairytale world (féerie): and so
the public finally tired of him too. Unfortunately, Georges was very much in debt because his films, imagined
as real shows, required colossal budgets. In the end, he did not weather the crisis, which hit smaller
structures like his hardest with limited equity.
Pathé, which had benefited from American growth, but was affected nonetheless by the recession, reacted
first by declaring it would no longer sell but rent films. And it would refresh its subject matter by using
new authors. Cinema theatres existed since 1904, but were always in strong competition with fairgrounds.
But by renting its films, Pathé sounded the death-knell for this old cinema distribution channel, and built
its own cinema theatre network throughout France; Pathé had invented a new economic model which
would allow the industry to overcome the crisis and to transform itself.
MPPC 1908 : facteur de relance de l’industrie
In Paris, Méliès worked night and day in his two Montreuil studios to produce the 1,000 feet (300m) of film
each week required by the MPCC. In 1908, Star Film had more than tripled its production compared with
the previous year. To strengthen his precarious finances, Méliès returned to the stage, giving performances
at the Robert-Houdin theatre.
1909-1913:
Industry changes
In February 1909, the 2 nd International Congress of Film Editors, chaired by Georges Méliès, adopted Edison’s
perforated film as an international standard, making large-scale film rental possible. Small producers,
without large structures, disappeared or were absorbed by larger groups such as Pathé or Gaumont. This
was the case of Méliès, who would fall under the sway of Gaumont, his exclusive distributor from 1909,
and then Pathé in 1911 and 1912. He lost all editorial control over the length and structure of his films.
The cinema industry had changed completely, following developments driven by the crisis of 1907 and the
Congress of 1909. New authors were entering the scene, such as Max Linder, Cecil B. De Mille, and D.W.
Griffith. Large production companies like Gaumont and Pathé organised and controlled the market. In the
United States, the MPCC imposed enormous constraints which only large studios could manage.
In 1913, Méliès was ruined because he had not known how to adapt to this new reality and leave his artisanal
system behind, but had continued to produce high-budget films. He was not able either to renew
his content and subject matter, in an artistic context which was resolutely different to the one he was
familiar with.
Méliès’ last film, Le Voyage de la Famille Bourrichon, was in fact produced, like all his other films in 1911
and 1912 under Pathé’s total control. None of his later films sold well, the public having grown tired of
his fairies. His last big production (À la conquête du Pôle, 1912) was a commercial flop. Méliès ended up
owing a considerable amount of money to Pathé as a result. He was removed from the production of his
last film, a comedy in the Max Linder style, based on a play by Labiche - to make matters worse, the film
was never distributed by Pathé.
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