Several more shorts...(and the reason I stopped posting pics is because, as I said, these are not memorable or really all that noteworthy so I can't find pics of them online and I can't get my DVD software to take screen caps)
The Rivals (1907)
Director: Edward S. Porter
Length: 12 minutes
A simple story of men competing over a woman. Each scene was one man pulling a prank or a scheme to sabotage the guy the woman was with and take her from him. Each scheme got progressingly more and more complexe, not to mention, absurd. Kind of funny, put I never actually laughed. The funniest thing was the womna going off with the sabotaur each and every time. In the end, she marries on of them, and the other 2 congradulate them.
Historical Rating: 2/10
Entertainment Rating: 3/10
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The Little Girl Who Did Not Believe In Santa Claus (1908)
Director: Edward S. Porter
Length: 14 minutes
This first Santa film (that I know of) starts off simple enough. One boy, living in a nice home, beleives in Santa, and a girl, who lives with her mom in what can best be described as a shack, does not. So the boy has a plan (And after this, I don't want to hear ANYONE bitching about violence in movies again!). The boy takes a GUN, and ambushes Santa when he comes to his house. Ha takes Santa hostage, ties him up and forces him to go to the little girl's house. He then makes Santa leave the girl lots of toys and creates a Christmas Tree for the girl as well. They leave, and right after they do, the little girl wakes up and finds the toys and tree. The last scene is of Santa carrying the boy back to bed. I guess that's a sign that Santa let the boy ambush him with a handgun and take him hostage. *shrug* It made it entertaining, though!
Historical Rating: 3/10
Entertaining Rating: 4/10
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Rescued From An Eagles Nest (1908)
Director: Edward S. Porter
Length: 8 minutes
A short tale of a child that gets kidnapped by an eagle and taken to its nest. The mother finds the child missing and gets the father. The father and his tree-chopping down buddies find the nest on the side of a small cliff and lower the father down. An epic, 10 second battle between father and eagle ensues, in which the father kills the eagle. He then takes his son to safety.
Historical Rating: 2/10
Entertainment Rating: 4/10
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New York Today (1910)
Length: 7 minutes
Another documentary. It was pretty neat to see places like Times Square and Central Park 100 years ago.
Historical Rating: 2/10
Entertainment Rating: 4/10
Porter basically created a system of expressions and motions to help tell his stories. But as stories became more complex, his way of director was seen as old-fashioned. Porter mainly told well known stories and simple stories. But when you have to pump out several movies at a time, you run out of ideas and well known stories. Porter is pretty much phased out around this time, as best as I can tell. He simply didn't adapt well to new on-screen techniques that helped to advance a story. There was more than one time when I was watching one of these shorts where a few minutes in I just thought "What the hell is going on!?"
I'll pick this up later when my next batch of Netflix gets here. Probably won't get it updated until late this weekend since I'll be gone all day Friday.