Cinematic Era: 1907 Vintage

Joseph Vallot and his team of guides and porters climb Mont Blanc in 1906. Their ascent will take three days. They spent their nights at the Grands Mulets refuge and the Grand Plateau refuge. This is the very first successfully filmed ascent. Joseph Vallot (1854-1925), rich heir of Lodève in Occitania. He devotes part of his fortune to the observation of the Alps, sometimes opposing the scientific community. He built an observatory, still standing today.

An artist settles down on a folding stool right in the middle of the street and starts playing. Soon enough, objects of all sorts are thrown from the windows, without interrupting the musician’s inspiration… until a little girl shows up.

Some people row a boat up to a town, set fire to it, then row back to their own place, amidst a gun battle.

A crew row their way from the S.S. Kinau through troublesome water to the shore.

A series of comic mishaps in house boxes at a music hall.

Australian bushranger movie. The first filmed version of Rolf Boldrewood's 'Robbery Under Arms' novel.

King Frederik VIII travels to Iceland in 1907.

The devil hijacks a train trip in France. Made by magician turned filmmaker Walter Booth, who established the Charles Urban Trading Company to make films in his own London garden.

A Woman sings and everything breaks.

When the husband has not arrived home at the time he should have, the wife hurries out looking for him at the bistro he frequents. As sorunson as the wife is spotted, the husband slips away via the back door, runs home and gets in bed. Despite the common belief, the actor in this film is not Max Linder.

A statue of Hope revives and finds a home for a waif.

Young women frolicking in the countryside encounter a satyr.

Vitagraph short from 1907

Short comedy from the Théophile Pathé company.

The Bogie Man's cave is one of the many triumphs of set design for Georges Méliès. More unusual for the pioneering French director is the grisly turn when the monster chops up his servant for a steaming pot of stew. But the Bogie Man’s guilty conscience weighs on him, plaguing his sleep with even more fantastic visions of just deserts. (Max Goldberg, Fandor)

Danilo invites Hanna Glawari and the two dance a pair of rollers from the operetta's second act. The photographer has waved quite quickly, so the movements are remarkably slow. At one point, both outside picture ends.

Two houses being demolished with dynamite in Ordrup Krat.

Desperadoes cause trouble and attempt to push settlers from their property. A cowboy, motivated by justice, decides to get involved in the situation. The cowboy confronts the villains, leading to a showdown where the terror is "shot or disposed of in some equally satisfactory way," thus delivering justice and helping the homesteaders.

A magician's son plays tricks with his father's magic wand.

A very young girl goes to deliver lunch to the cowboys who have stayed behind on the plains. She climbs into a wagon. Along the way, the wagon is spotted by a man on horseback. The girl arrives and kisses her father, to whom she gives the lunch. Eventually, the child is kidnapped, and a ransom of 25,000 pounds is demanded. A ten-year-old boy offers to go and try to save the girl.

On July 30, 1907, King Frederick VIII of Denmark came to Iceland. The picture shows the king's visits to Akureyri and Hrafnagil in northern Iceland on 17 August.

In the impoverished Balkan principality of Pontevedrino, a love drama unfolds. The class divide prevents Count Danilo from marrying the peasant girl Hanna. With an aching heart, he moves to Paris, while she becomes engaged to a rich banker who dies soon afterwards, leaving her his large fortune. Baron Zeta of Pontevedrino now seeks to have Hanna marry a compatriot, hoping that her millions will save the principality from bankruptcy. Although the plan seems to succeed at first, fate has something else in store for Hanna. (stumfilm.dk)

Short trick film

Leonard Corrick’s camera moves up and down the streets of Perth recording the action on the street. At one point a man bumps into another man in the street and fisticuffs ensue as the camera moves past.

Children from a wealthy family are playing in a garden. They encounter poor children, looking sad and sickly, who watch them play with envy. Moved to the depths of their little souls, our little rich people will work together to lavish all the kindness possible on the unfortunate youngsters, adorning them with a nobly charitable gesture, showering them with toys and candy.

There's a killer on the loose in Muswell Hill. Escaped from an asylum, he can be identified by the missing forefinger on his left hand.

A comic cops-and-robbers chase.

The opening shows a colored nursemaid in the park with baby carriage, and seated on a bench receives the attention of several smart colored men who admire her greatly and endeavor to make her acquaintance. But the dusky belle is coy and declines to make the acquaintance of any of them, until one more fortunate than the rest is invited to a seat on the bench with her, and a most pronounced flirtation takes place between the lady and her beau. (Selig catalog)

Various street scenes from Copenhagen in 1907.

Kids jump in the water.

Magic tricks in a medieval setting.

The film is several vignettes of slap stick presentation of racial stereotypes. We are treated to murderous Mexicans, conniving Jews, brawling Irish, bloodthirsty Scots, an Indian, and even Uncle Sam. This little black and white silent feature is an interesting look, especially in that we really don't know what we are seeing. Is this what it first appears - a racist comedy that shows a disdain for all non-WASPs? Is the final scene depicting most of the cast (except the dancing Negros) working together to show that America is a melting pot?

King Oscar II visits Marstrand.

The Tommy Burns vs James 'Gunner' Moir boxing match.

A lady uses a series of newspaper spreads to create various objects including a man, a clock and a dog.

A motley quartet of musicians inflicting the torture of their music on a law abiding citizen.

When the coachman comes home drunk, his wife beat him up and she takes the passenger car creating chaos in the city.

Various scenes of daily working life at a sugar plantation in Hawaii.

A young girl reads an ad in the newspaper and enthusiastically shows it to a young man, who cares for her. She leaves on the train; the young man gives her a carrier pigeon. At the end of the journey, she meets with a lady, who takes her to her house. The girl is given an evening dress and taken to a salon filled with revellers. She fights off their advances and is locked in her room. Realizing that she has ended up in a brothel, she sends off the pigeon with a message. The young man gets the message and arrives at the brothel with the police. He takes the girl away with him, but after the police have left, the remaining revellers cheerfully continue their debaucheries.

A policeman spots a dog stealing a piece of meat from a butcher's shop, and gives chase. Soon several more policemen have joined the pursuit. But the chase does not turn out as the policemen expect.

The Devil visits Earth on a magic elevator. He surprises two sewer workers, disguises himself, and spreads chaos: a quarrel with a coachman, an altercation with a police sergeant, the confusion for a barman and others. He is trapped in a cage with a young woman and returns to Hell. It is revealed that the young woman is, in fact, the jealous Madame Devil in disguise. It is often confused with Le spectre rouge, notably in the IMDB database and subsequently in YouTube attributions.

Native troops in what look like US Army uniforms do formation practicing with rifles in bayonet maneuver.

Showing the progress of the natives from barbarism to industrial development. This unique and beautiful series contains the best photographic results of two expeditions through British North Borneo. The expeditions penetrated 127 miles into the interior, some parts of which had never previously been trodden by white men, and the journey bristled with difficulties. The series illustrates not only the commercial enterprise of the British North Borneo Company, but also the quaint manners and strange customs of the natives.

The film is of a man who, judging from his face and the part of his costume that is visible, is made up as a clown. The shortness of the film permits little other than just identification. The photographic composition is a tight one-shot (close-up), and just the head and shoulders of the subject are visible.

A modern days Diana comes to the border of a wood, near a water creek with canes, undresses, and places each clothing item on a tree branch. The camera shows her every movement, but also her reflection and those of the woods on the clear, moving waters. When she is going to lift up her white undershirt - the film teasingly ends.

Leonhard Haskel & Anna Müller-Lincke sing a song.

After burglars break into a home, lay out a man, and steal valuable merchandise, the police are after them. No part of the force is more relentless than the dogs who pursue the thieves.

An early documentary by Tunisian film pioneer Albert Samama Chikly who lovingly documented Tunisian culture, and filmed over Tunis from a balloon in 1907.

Actuality footage of Kaiser Wilhelm II and Tsar Nicholas II during their August 1907 meeting at Swinemünde (today Świnoujście), showing the monarchs coming aboard the German battleship SMS Deutschland and observing naval manoeuvres. A brief record of imperial pageantry in the Baltic, typical of pre-newsreel royal “actualities.”

Actuality film from 1907, documenting the public celebrations in Stockholm for King Oscar II and Queen Sofia’s 50th wedding anniversary. The footage captures scenes of the royal couple and the festivities, including parades and public gatherings. Preserved by the Swedish Film Institute and the Royal Library, it stands as one of the earliest surviving Swedish newsreel-style recordings of a royal occasion.

Lost comedy film starred by Max Linder.

A Cinematophone singing film which was originally intended to play with a sound on a disc. A simple mechanism would approximately synchronise the sound and picture. The disc for this film does not survive, but this popular song of 1906 by A.J. Mills (lyrics) and Bennett Scott (music) does survive in printed form. The scene is a beach representing the Zuyder Zee (the inlet on Holland's North Sea coast that was dammed some 20 years after this film was made), and the singer appears in Dutch costume, singing to camera. In the backgorund there are some children playing giving an impression of depth and the picturesque to the scene.

The first Egyptian documentary.

An early sound film of Vesta Victoria singing the titular song, which was very popular in its day.

Silent film.

Dancers, including a fellow dressed as a bullfighter, demonstrate some involved dances, including the flamenco, while a guitar player and lutist perform in this silent movie.