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$25,000 Bet
IN 1878 Muybridge makes a bet with his rich chums. He bets that a horse has all hoofs off the ground at some point while its running. So they get a bunch of cameras and tae the pictures while the hrose is running. Muybridge wins 25000 dollars and they realize if you look at them fast, frame by frame, that it seems as if the horse is moving. This is the beginning of film. -
Vaudeville grows in popularity
A typical performance is made up of a series of separate , unrelated acts groped together in a set of performances. Acts can range from theatrical to circus performances like juggling. These performances are ofter referred to as vaudevillians -
The creation of the Cinematographe
According to popular history the Lumiere brothers were the first to do what Edison avoided doing. They created a device,the cinematographe, that could show motion pictures to an audience rather than one person. They then started making money off of 30-60 second films that they made and showed in cafe's -
The First Narrative Film
In 1903 an employee of Edison and Porter created the first narrative film. It was called The Great Train Robbery and had 14 scenes and lasted 1 minutes. IT was a real epic by the standards of the day. -
Expansion of Nickelodeon
Nickelodeon Theaters, previously known a Vaudeville, started attracting 26 mil viewers a week. 5 years later that number had more than doubled. Nickelodeons were a small store front theaters that featured films accompanied by music/sound effects. -
Expansion of Feature films
A feature film that is between 40-80 minutes long rather than the shot 30-60 seconds films 2 decades before. The expansion of these films originated with the epics D.W Griffith made in the mid 1910's. During this time many small studios were taken over by larger studios, forming the studio system that would run America film making until the 1960 -
Hollywoods biggest year
In the 1930 america was feeling the effects of the great depression and because of this paying for an escape from your situation for just a little while became increasingly popular. Films came in and gave people a chance to escape from their situation and be engrossed in characters. This reached its peak in 1939 with MGM's release of The Wizard of OZ, which set a standard for movies for generations to come. -
Film to Media
Between 1947 and 1957 there was a huge plunge in ticket sales due to the rise of television. Because to this many companies produced programming for prime time TV schedules. Due to this many film companies converted to media companies such as Warner Bros and others. -
Shift in Hollywood
During the 1960's movies were starting to die out due to television. To fix this movie needed to reinvent themselves to keep things new,fresh, and most importantly entertaining. This brought rise to a multitude of things such as the rise of independent films and new genres of movies. -
Explosion of Indie and independent films
In 197's many independent were unable to make a name for themselves due to lack of funding. That was all about to change as more and more people started wanting to watch these films. THis was due to popular independent and indie films such as “Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song.” and Jaws.
