TSPDT Starting List (Silent Era)

In the garden, a man asks his friends to do something silly for him to record on film.

A shot of people walking on The Leeds Bridge.

One of W.K.L. Dickson's laboratory workers horses around for the camera.

An athlete swings Indian clubs.

Three men hammer on an anvil and pass a bottle of beer around.

The earliest extant sound film, but the phonograph soundtrack has been lost. It depicts William K.L. Dickson standing in the background next to a huge sound pickup horn connected to a Thomas Edison phonograph recorder.

Annabelle (Whitford) Moore performs one of her popular dances. For this performance, her costume has a pair of wings attached to her back, to suggest a butterfly. As she dances, she uses her long, flowing skirts to create visual patterns.

"Firemen in working uniform, rubber coats, helmets, and boots. Thrilling rescue from burning building. Smoke effects are fine." - from the Edison Catalog

A man (Thomas Edison's assistant) takes a pinch of snuff and sneezes. This is one of the earliest Thomas Edison films and was the second motion picture to be copyrighted in the United States.

Workers leaving the Lumière factory for lunch in Lyon, France in 1895; a place of great photographic innovation and one of the birth places of cinema.

Three men in a rowboat are leaving the harbor.

As part of a maiden public film screening at the Salon Indien, on December 28, in Paris, Auguste Lumière pivots the centre of attention around his baby daughter, as he tries to feed her from a spoon.

An impudent child plays a prank on a gardener innocently watering his plants.

Remarkable Lumière short that shows a beautiful aquarium with fish inside and can be considered as the first aquarium video ever who become quite popular about a 100 years later.

The photographers who need to participate in the congress of Lyon get off a boat in Neuville-sur-Saône, dividing to the right and left.

This short film, one of the first to use camera tricks, depicts the execution of Mary, Queen of Scots.

The first cinema screening, consisting of the shorts "Italienischer Bauerntanz (1895)", "Komisches Reck (1895)", "Das boxende Känguruh (1895)", "Der Jongleur (1895)", "Akrobatisches Potpourri (1895)", "Kamarinskaja (1895)", "Die Serpentintänzerin (1895)", "Ringkämpfer (1895)" and "Apotheose (1895)".

A train arrives at La Ciotat station.

Fantasy tale involving a fairy who can produce and deliver babies coming out of cabbages. Gently moving through the cabbages and using of lovely gestures, she takes one baby out of there, then makes more magic and delivers two more.

The first moving shot, created by a stationary camera on a gondola in Panorama du Grand Canal vu d'un Bateau, was filmed by Alexandre Promio for Louis Lumiere. Filming Locations: Venice, Veneto, Italy. Release Date: 1896 (France).

Strong-man Eugene (Eugen) Sandow poses in a long shot on a bare stage against a black background, wearing only tight trunks and laced sandals. He begins with his arms folded against his chest, looking off screen left, then strikes a variety of poses that accentuate his muscular development. These positions include flexing his right arm with the fist to his head and face to shoulder; turning his back to the camera and flexing his upper arms and shoulder muscles; and, with his back still to the camera, stretching out and up with one arm at a time. Sandow then turns back to face the camera and performs a standing back flip. He closes in the same pose with which he opened From Biograph photo catalog: 24 feet. Still another picture of the great athlete displaying his muscles, and turning a somersault without touching hands to the floor.

A woman sitting on a bench is approached by a soldier. Momentarily, she refuses his advances, but in no time at all, they are kissing each other passionately.

In a medium closeup shot of the first kiss ever recorded on screen, two fervent lovers cuddle and talk passionately at a hair's breadth, just before the love-smitten gentleman decides to give his chosen one an innocent peck.

Four workers demolish an old factory wall. One worker is pressing the wall inwards with a jackscrew, while another is pushing it with a pick. When the wall hits the ground, a cloud of dust whirls up. Three workers continue with picks.

A woman gets undressed in her private sitting room. After losing her dress, she sits down and gets rid of her socks.