Workers Leaving the Lumiere Factory, The Gardener, Arrival of a Train at La Ciot Station and many more are on display in Lumiere's First Picture Show; a collection of firsts from the filmakers that started a business of film production, exhibition and distribution. The acknowledged birth of film history was December 28, 1895 when the first paying audience gathered at the Grand Cafe on Boulevard des Capucines, Paris, for a performance of films on the Cinematographe of brothers Louis and Auguste Lumiere. This program is mostly reproduced from a collection of original Lumiere films unearthed in 1972 from a basement storage area in the Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History. They were copied using an original Cinematographe as a printer. The program includes twenty films from 1895-97 taken in France, four special films that were hand-colored one frame at a time, and thirteen films taken in Washington, Chicago and New York City during 1896-97 in the United States.

When a pair of film noir icons like Lizabeth Scott and Dan Duryea collide, sparks are sure to fly. Jane Palmer (Scott) and her husband Alan (Arthur Kennedy) mysteriously have

In late 1914, Charlie Chaplin was paid the then-unprecedented salary of

In late 1914, Charlie Chaplin was paid the then-unprecedented salary of

In late 1914, Charlie Chaplin was paid the then-unprecedented salary of

Discover a time when the truest adventure had the wind at your back and an infinite horizon all around. Under Full Sail: Silent Cinema on the High Seas proudly collects five breathtaking films that preserve the romance, grandeur and allure of windjammers sailing open waters, exquisitely photographed in the style of the time.

According to legend,Traffic in Soulswas produced surreptitiously at Universal Pictures Corp. with the producer (Jack Cohn) and director (George Loane Tucker) prepared to buy the picture in case the company wouldn't release it. Exploiting a recent expose of prostitution rings, this "white slavery"story proved a huge financial success.Traffic In Soulsis a very accomplished work for its time, and makes excellent use of its New York City locations.

It is the story of Beppo, a gondolier who comes to America and settles in lower Manhattan, where he operates a shoeshine business and eventually saves enough money to import his fiancee. Crime and poverty soon impact their lives - and there is no artificial, happy ending. Conflated from three sources, this tinted edition is mostly copied from an original nitrate print, and has an optional scene-specific audio essay by Prof. Giorgio Bertellini. A compiled score of authentic photoplay music is performed by the Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra led by Rodney Sauer, who also provides the music for the three Edison shorts.

The film faithfully retains the play's famous set pieces-Holmes's encounter with Professor Moriarty, his daring escape from the Stepney Gas Chamber, and the tour-de-force deductions. It also illustrates how Gillette, who wrote the adaptation himself, wove bits from Conan Doyle's stories ranging from "A Scandal in Bohemia" to "The Final Problem," into an original, innovative mystery play.. Film restorer Robert Byrne says, "It's an amazing privilege to work with these reels that have been lost for generations. William Gillette's Sherlock Holmes has ranked among the holy grails of lost film and my first glimpse of the footage confirms Gillette's magnetism. Audiences are going to be blown away when they see the original Sherlock Holmes on screen for the first time.".

Like the musical Chicago that won the Best Picture Academy Award and five other Oscars in 2002, this original 1927 version descends from a 1926 hit Broadway play by Maurine Watkins. It's a terrifically entertaining mix of humor and melodrama as well as a pungent critique of trash journalism. Frank Urson signed onto Chicago as director, although it is substantially the work of Cecil B. DeMille and his A-list technical staff. Chicago is silent filmmaking at its peak, with an outstanding score for this edition by the Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra. The 1927 Chicago was long believed a lost film, but a perfect print survived in Cecil B. DeMille's private collection. Restored by the UCLA Film and Television Archive in 2006, it has since been widely performed to rapturous audiences...Sexy, jazz-loving and dressed to kill, Roxie Hart has a doting, handsome husband in Victor Varconi; not to mention a gold-digging affair on the side with Eugene Pallette, who pays and pays, eventually with his life. Put on trial for murder, Roxie secures lawyer Billy Flynn, equal part mob "mouthpiece"and publicity agent. When Roxie hits the headlines, the courtroom theatrics begin.

A lost gem rediscovered! Thanks to the efforts of the Film Noir Foundation, this terrific 1950 film noir, the only American print of which was burned in a 2008 fire, has been rescued and restored to its original luster. Join the wild chase around San Francisco as a man goes into hiding after witnessing a gangland execution. Police bird-dog his wife Eleanor (Ann Sheridan), certain she'll lead them to her husband, whose testimony against the killer could bring down a crime kingpin. But Eleanor and her hubbie are Splitsville-she never wants to see him again.. When roguish newspaperman Danny Leggett (Dennis O'Keefe) charms Eleanor into helping him track down the hidden husband-there are unexpected, stunning, and poignant results. This nervy, shot-on-location thriller is a witty and wise look at the travails of romance and marriage, and perhaps the best cinematic depiction ever of mid-20th century San Francisco..

A charming pastoral about two unwanted children finding acceptance and love, Timothy's Quest (1922) is a rare, cinematic gem based on a novel by Kate Douglas Wiggin (Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm), who was then known as "America's best loved author of stories about children."*. The only production of the Dirigo Film Company, established in order to make films in the state of Maine adapted from works by Maine authors, Wiggin loaned her own home as one of the principal filming locations. Director Sidney Olcott - a true pioneer who was General Manager of Biograph and directed one of the earliest American feature films, From the Manger to the Cross (1912) - makes generous use of beautiful, local landscapes that look lovely and timeless in this tinted print.. The story centers around two orphans from the slums, Timothy (Joseph Depew) and "Lady Gay" (Baby Helen Rowland), who decide to strike out for the country rather than be sent to an asylum. They end up at White Farms, home of the bitter, old Miss Avilda Cummins (Marie Day). She takes a harsh attitude toward the children but agrees to house them for the night, warning her housekeeper, Samantha Ann Ripley (Margaret Seddon), that the kids are to be kicked out the next day. Eventually, though, the old spinster softens and, influenced in part by the tragic memories of her own 'wayward' sister, adopts and provides a home for both Lady Gay and Timothy.. Featuring a digital stereo score compiled by Eric W. Cook and performed by the Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra, this little-known treasure of regional filmmaking in the silent era is "...a story for any and everybody who happens to have a heart.".