{"id":330,"date":"2012-01-06T19:07:55","date_gmt":"2012-01-06T19:07:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.charlesmusser.com\/?page_id=330"},"modified":"2012-01-11T02:50:27","modified_gmt":"2012-01-11T02:50:27","slug":"before-the-nickelodeon","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/www.charlesmusser.com\/?page_id=330","title":{"rendered":"Before the Nickelodeon"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.charlesmusser.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/01\/BeforetheNickelodeonUSDVD_1.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-336\" title=\"BeforetheNickelodeonUSDVD_\" src=\"http:\/\/www.charlesmusser.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/01\/BeforetheNickelodeonUSDVD_1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"351\" height=\"500\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.charlesmusser.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/01\/BeforetheNickelodeonUSDVD_1.jpg 351w, http:\/\/www.charlesmusser.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/01\/BeforetheNickelodeonUSDVD_1-210x300.jpg 210w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 351px) 100vw, 351px\" \/><\/a><em>Before the Nickelodeon: The Early Cinema of Edwin S. Porter <\/em>(1982). 60 mins. Produced, directed and edited by Charles Musser.\u00a0 Written by Warren D. Leight and Charles Musser.\u00a0 Associate Professor and Photo Colorist: Elizabeth Lennard.\u00a0 Executive Producer: Steve Brier. Camera: Rob Issen.<br \/>\nNarrated by Blanche Sweet.\u00a0 Voices: Robert Altman, Milos Forman. Rick King, Louis Malle, Michael Peyser, Jay Leyda, Robert Sklar, D.A. Pennebaker, Peter Davis, Mitchell Kriegman Grahame Weinbren, Jim Walton, Steve Brier, Robert Rosen, Anthony Potter.<\/p>\n<p>Originally shot and distributed in 16mm, DVD versions were made by the <a href=\"http:\/\/filmstore.bfi.org.uk\/acatalog\/info_76.html\">BFI<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.kino.com\/video\/item.php?film_id=15\">Kino<\/a>.\u00a0 It can be purchased from <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Before-Nickelodeon-Early-Cinema-Porter\/dp\/B0013XZ6QQ\/ref=sr_1_1?s=movies-tv&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1325958409&amp;sr=1-1\">Amazon<\/a> as well.<\/p>\n<p>The idea for\u00a0 <em>Before the Nickelodeon:<\/em> came out of Jay Leyda&#8217;s seminar on D. W. Griffith at NYU, in which we watched his Biograph films, from <em>The Adventures of Dollie<\/em> onward, in chronological order in an effort to trace his development as a filmmaker.\u00a0 I became frustrated with the assumption, evident among many of my fellow students, that everything of importance started with Griffith.<\/p>\n<p>So I went down to Washington D.C. with Ismail Xavier in October 1976 and ended up looking at the Edison films made between the late 1890s and about 1905 (at which point the Edison films stopped being submitted for copyright purposes as paperprints). These were generally, though as it turned out not always accurately, attributed to Edwin S. Porter. As someone who had worked in the industry for a few years as a film editor, I was particularly interested in the simple editing structures of these films&#8211;two shot films such as <em>Another Job for the Undertaker<\/em> (1901) and <em>Terrible Teddy, the Grizzly<\/em> <em>King<\/em> (1901).\u00a0 But as I encountered slightly later films such as <em>The Execution of Czologosz<\/em> (November 1901) and <em>Appointment by Telephone<\/em> (1902), the progression of work was fascinating.<\/p>\n<p>This was also the moment when I had put aside my cut of <em>An American Potter<\/em>.\u00a0 Since I was both directing and editing the film myself, I felt I needed some distance.\u00a0 Also the end was in sight and here was the perfect subject for my next film!\u00a0 From Potter to Porter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Before the Nickelodeon: The Early Cinema of Edwin S. Porter (1982). 60 mins. Produced, directed and edited by Charles Musser.\u00a0 Written by Warren D. Leight and Charles Musser.\u00a0 Associate Professor and Photo Colorist: Elizabeth Lennard.\u00a0 Executive Producer: Steve Brier. Camera: Rob Issen. Narrated by Blanche Sweet.\u00a0 Voices: Robert Altman, Milos Forman. Rick King, Louis Malle, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.charlesmusser.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/330"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.charlesmusser.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.charlesmusser.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.charlesmusser.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.charlesmusser.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=330"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"http:\/\/www.charlesmusser.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/330\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":335,"href":"http:\/\/www.charlesmusser.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/330\/revisions\/335"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.charlesmusser.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=330"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}