Georges Méliès

DIRECTING

1861-12-08

1938-01-21

Paris, France

Biography

Georges Méliès (December 8, 1861 - January 21, 1938), full name Marie-Georges-Jean Méliès, was a French illusionist and filmmaker famous for leading many technical and narrative developments in the earliest days of cinema. One of the first filmmakers to use multiple exposures, time-lapse photography, tracking shots, dissolves, and hand-painted color in his work, Méliès pioneered effects that would define cinematic special effects for decades to come. A prolific innovator in the use of special effects, Méliès accidentally discovered the substitution stop trick in 1896, a method of creating seamless disappearing and/or appearing effects used throughout both films and television for decades to come. Because of his ability to seemingly manipulate and transform reality through cinematography, Méliès is sometimes referred to as the first "Cinemagician". Two of his best-known films are A Trip to the Moon (1902) and The Impossible Voyage (1904). Both stories involve strange, surreal voyages, somewhat in the style of Jules Verne, and are considered among the most important early science fiction films, though their approach is closer to fantasy. Méliès was also an early pioneer of horror cinema, which can be traced back to his Le Manoir du diable (1896). In early 1909 Méliès stopped making films to protest Thomas Edison's Motion Pictures Parents Company monopoly, and presided over the first meeting of the International Filmmakers Congress in Paris. Further financial hardships created by his opposition to Edison and diminishing influence, Méliès disappeared from public life. By the mid-1920s he made a meager living as a candy and toy salesma in Paris, with the assistance of funds collected by other filmmakers. Although he was recognized for his contributions in cinema, Méliès spent most of his later years in poverty before being accepted into La Maison du Retraite du Cinéma, the film industry's retirement home in Orly.

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Biography

Best known for:

Filmography:

Playing Cards(1896)

3.4

apperead as

Un joueur de cartes

Georges Méliès

Georges Méliès

Biography

Biography

Best known for:

Filmography:

Playing Cards(1896)

A Terrible Night(1896)

The Vanishing Lady(1896)

A Nightmare(1896)

Post No Bills(1896)

Le manoir du diable(1896)

Arrival of a Train at Vincennes Station(1896)

Les tribulations d'un concierge(1896)

Arrival of a Train (Joinville Station)(1896)

A Serpentine Dance(1896)

Miss de Vère - English Jig(1896)

Conjurer Making Ten Hats in Sixty Seconds(1896)

A Soldier's Unlucky Salutation(1896)

Le château hanté(1897)

The Surrender of Tournavos(1897)

Between Calais and Dover(1897)

The Bewitched Inn(1897)

After the Ball(1897)

Naval Combat in Greece(1897)

The Last Cartridges(1897)

The Hallucinated Alchemist(1897)

The Devil's Laboratory(1897)

Gugusse and the Automaton(1897)

An Irritable Model(1897)

Boxing Match(1897)

Fencing at the Joinville School(1897)

A Terrible Night (Remake)(1897)

D. Devant, Conjurer(1897)

Bois de Boulogne(1897)

The Four Troublesome Heads(1898)

The Magician(1898)

Divers at Work on the Wreck of the "Maine"(1898)

Panorama from Top of a Moving Train(1898)

The Famous Box Trick(1898)

Adventures of William Tell(1898)

The Temptation of St. Anthony(1898)

The Damnation of Faust(1898)

Pygmalion and Galatea(1898)

The Bridegroom's Dilemma(1898)

A Woman Surprised(1898)

Carrefour de l'opéra(1898)

An Up-to-Date Conjurer(1899)

The Devil in a Convent(1899)

The Mysterious Portrait(1899)

Dreyfus Court Martial - Arrest Of Dreyfus(1899)

Devil's Island - Within the Palisade(1899)

Dreyfus Put in Irons(1899)

Suicide of Colonel Henry(1899)

Landing of Dreyfus at Quiberon(1899)

Dreyfus Meets His Wife at Rennes(1899)

The Attempt Against the Life of Maitre Labori(1899)

The Fight of Reporters(1899)

The Court Martial at Rennes(1899)

The Mysterious Knight(1899)

Cinderella(1899)

The Dreyfus Affair(1899)

Cleopatra's Tomb(1899)

Fantastic Dining Room(1899)

Extravagant Struggles(1899)

Christ Walking on Water(1899)

The Clown and Automobile(1899)

The Degradation of Dreyfus(1899)

Dreyfus Leaving the Lycée for Jail(1899)

A Midnight Episode(1899)

The One-Man Band(1900)

The Astronomer's Dream(1900)

Addition and Subtraction(1900)

The Cook's Revenge(1900)

Joan of Arc(1900)

The Rajah's Dream or The Bewitched Wood(1900)

The Wizard, the Prince and the Good Fairy(1900)

The Magic Book(1900)

The Triple Conjurer and the Living Head(1900)

The Christmas Dream(1900)