Georges Méliès

From American filmmaking, we now move back to the French; in this case, the specific Frenchman we are referring to, though an amazing innovator, was also robbed by Thomas Edison and company: The man is Georges Méliès.

Originally trained as a stage magician, Méliès became entranced by filmmaking after seeing a cinema demonstration in 1895. For the rest of the decade, Méliès and his assembled theatre company pushed the boundaries of how one could use film, creating such techniques as the multiple exposure and the stop trick; here are some of his best short films:











Of course, Méliès's most famous film was A Trip to the Moon, released in 1902:


Unfortunately for Méliès, who had intended to release the film in the United States to profit from it, certain film technicians hired by one Thomas Edison secretly made copies of it and distributed it throughout the country; though the film was still hugely successful, Méliès did not make a dime off of it, and thanks to Edison's unscrupulous techniques, the poor filmmaker eventually went bankrupt.

After his brilliant career, Méliès became a toy salesman in a train station in France; it would be two decades before his innovations were to be appreciated for what they were.

Despite his poor lot in life, Méliès was a true pioneer of cinema, being one of the first filmmakers to deal largely in special effects wizardry and, well, just plain fun.