Cinematic Era: 1898 Vintage

Scene of pilgrimage fair in a Czechoslavic village.

Seagulls flock around a moving ferryboat in San Francisco Bay in this 2-shot short film.

Film shot by W.K.L. Dickson at Maidenhead Junction, 1898.

Don Juan Tenorio is a 1898 Mexican silent drama film directed by Salvador Toscano who was Mexico’s first filmmaker and is also the first film adaptation of Don Juan Tenorio, a play by José Zorrilla.

From one angle, a line of soldiers are shown walking up the gangplank.

The ghost of a man's twin shows him a vision of how he was killed in a duel.

The stars-and-stripes and the flag of Cuba Libre flutter in the breeze, one after the other. Very dramatic. Appeals to the popular sentiment. Excellent when colored.

From Wikipedia: Sua Santità papa Leone XIII (Italian for "His Holiness Pope Leo XIII") is an 1898 short film directed by William Kennedy Dickson for the Biograph Company and is one of the first existing films shot in the Kingdom of Italy. The short film was shot in the Vatican gardens between June and July of that year (possibly on January 4), after a long wait and negotiations with the prefect of the Apostolic Chamber Francesco Salesio Della Volpe and with the intercession of the pontiff's nephew, Count Pecci. It is a montage of three different shots with the blessing of Pope Leo XIII, eighty-eight years old at the time, and was probably filmed on Kodak film.

Two men with three lordships between them.

Fifth part of a series documenting the Basel carnival.

Short film from 1897

Bullfighting short from the Lumieres

"Shows steamer plunging head-on through the heavy seas. Huge waves break over the bow and wash the deck, almost carrying away the look-out."

Passage of a Shintoist procession, whose members carry banners and lanterns, somewhere in Kyoto.

The boulevard in front of the Kurhaus, with pedestrians and a terrace.

The film documents the launch of HMS Albion at Blackwall on the 21st of June, 1898—an event that was witnessed by 30,000 onlookers, 37 of whom lost their lives when the jetty upon which they were standing became washed away by the resultant swell.

Street scene of LA in 1898.

A man surprises a woman. While the film is lost, there is a new digital version based on re-creation from a flipbook produced by Léon Beaulieu around the same time

Geisha performance, with umbrella and fans, in Kyoto.

Reporters rush to telegraph the latest war news.

Members of the photographic convention carrying tripods and cameras file past a waiting room on the deck of the Clyde steamer “Lady Rowena”. Members of party include Craig Annan, Mr. Harold Baker, Mrs. W. Baker and Mrs. Ralph Robinson.

Short reportage

Directed by James H. White.

"This is an arranged scene worked out very effectively. At its opening two rowdies are seen engaged in a street fight. A crowd collects, and a policeman with difficulty separates the combatants. They are quickly subdued, however, and a police patrol dashes up, and into it the two prisoners are bundled and carried off."

During the Alaska gold rush, one way to reach the Klondike was over the Chilkoot Pass. A stationary camera is placed to see a ways down the curving trail. A pack train comes into view and passes in front of us, led by a man on horseback. Eight loaded mules follow, then another cowboy on horseback and a man walking, then eight more laden mules, another cowboy, then nine more mules, a cowboy, and still the pack train stretches as far as the eye can see. A solitary man watches from atop a hillock.

The pope resting.

Part 10 of Alexandre Promio's Passion Play, in which Jesus is nailed to the Cross.

Carts, pedestrians and bus traffic in the street.

A man does a practical joke on a chestnut vendor.

Taken at Washington, in front of the Navy Department, and shows Secretary of the Navy Long and Captain Sigsbee of the ill-fated 'Maine' coming down the steps...

A group of escaped reconcentrados, saved from the fate of starvation imposed by the Butcher, Weyler.

This film shows the summit portion of the Mill Valley and Mount Tamalpais Scenic Railway, the Tamalpais Tavern resort, and part of the adjacent east peak of Mount Tamalpais.

Short comedy

Parade of guards during Queen Wilhelminas coronation.

Taken on 'Lucky' Baldwin's ranch, Santa Anita, Cal. Shows an engine and five cars approaching from a distance.

Soldiers setting up camp.

A folk dance staged in the ruins of Pompeii. With the Arch of Tiberius in the near distance and Arch of Caligula in far distance. A troop of soldiers, or possibly more performers, march past. W K L Dickson who is directing the action can apparently be seen on far right of picture.

Josef Sváb-Malostranský unrolls a poster in front of a mill with the words Czech Cinematograph. All the actors in the film gather around him. An old philanderer meets up with the miller's wife in front of the mill. He is about to embrace her when her husband appears. The philanderer gets a good hiding.

Dotting the horizon on the right of the picture is the great fleet of transports, while scattered all along the beach and piled high to the left are hundreds upon hundreds of ammunition cases.

Playful ramblers carrying Sunlight placards in a cow pasture in the Jura (Canton of Vaud). The respectable gentleman is none other than William Whiteley (1831-1907), founder of London’s first department store. Is this a home movie or advertising for the launch of the Sunlight Helvetia soap factory (Olten, 12 October 1898)? Maybe both.

A staged actuality attributed to the Biograph Company, produced during the Spanish–American War. The film depicts a Jack Tar climbing a mast in Puerto Rico, tearing down the Spanish flag, and replacing it with the American Stars and Stripes. Contemporary accounts note that such scenes brought U.S. audiences to their feet in patriotic fervor, serving as powerful wartime propaganda. The film is generally considered lost, with its existence recorded in writings by Erik Barnouw and other historians of early cinema.

A little girl and her dog have an accident at the Shrewsbury River in New Jersey.

San Diego Beach, Hotel del Coronado. A pug dog, several terriers and water spaniels and a great St. Bernard are dashing into the water, retrieving sticks thrown by their master

Military subjects were consistent crowd-pleasers, and this film showing a near fatal accident was especially popular.

Arguably the first animation film in Spain, where two ships collide.