Changing Methods of Production and Representation

Despite many stable elements, the cinema underwent a staggering array of fundamental changes between 1895 and 1907. During the first months of widespread projection, short (one-shot) films were enjoyed primarily for their ability to reproduce lifelike motion and exploit isolated presentational elements. While such comparatively non-narrative uses of film continued and developed in what Tom Gunning has called “the cinema of attractions,” many exhibitors began to organize these short films into multishot narratives. Although arranging these scenes was the chief responsibility of exhibitors during the 1890s, production companies had largely assumed control over this process (i.e., editing) by 1903–1904. The era of storefront motion-picture theaters or “nickelodeons,” which began in 1905–1906, involved a new organization of exhibition that had profound effects on all other aspects of film practice.

Change creates new necessities, new opportunities, and new practices even as it eliminates old ones. In many respects, the introduction of a single fundamental change—the adaptation of Edison’s moving pictures to projection—precipitated a series of shifts and transformations within the field of screen entertainment that could be likened to a row of falling dominos. While nothing inherent in the medium necessitated this rapid succession of innovations, the economic and cultural dynamics of American society in general and screen practice in particular pressured the film industry to change along the general lines that it did. Perhaps a somewhat different kind of development would have taken place if William Kennedy Laurie Dickson had remained with Thomas Edison or if a patents company had been established in the 1890s. Yet even here the differences would have been limited. Motion-picture practices did not evolve as they did because of the extraordinary genius of a few individuals but because significant numbers of people recognized new commercial and artistic opportunities implicit in previous change and so, in turn, further altered the practice of cinema.

In seeking to explain the underlying dynamics of a rapidly changing film practice and to provide an account of the American screen before 1907, this volume does not dwell on the theoretical and methodological framework. 13 In some respects it remains rather “old-fashioned” in that it is very concerned with who did what, where, and when. The reasons why something was done and its significance or relation to the larger industry are carefully investigated. Nonetheless, this narrative treatment functions within a carefully worked-out historical model. A central aspect of this model explores the interaction between cinema’s mode of production (how the cinema is made) and the mode of representation (how a story is told or a subject represented). The gradual shift in editorial responsibility from exhibitor to producer in the early 1900s, for example, allowed for new ways of articulating a narrative. As filmmakers explored the new representational possibilities resulting from this shift, the commercial success of these innovative pictures provided further impetus for centralizing the control of editing inside the production companies.

In examining the cinema’s production methods, we must begin by looking at how films were made, shown, and appreciated: in other words, by looking at the production companies, the exhibitors, and the spectators. Although the spectators’ relationship to the screen experience remained relatively constant through 1907, the interactions between image production and exhibition underwent multiple transformations. Each shift involved complex adjustments between the two areas. It is not coincidental that most of the leading filmmakers from the early 1900s had previous experience in exhibition: Edwin S. Porter, James White, J. Stuart Blackton, Wallace McCutcheon, and William Paley—to name only a few. Since distribution is at the interface of film production and exhibition, it is hardly surprising that it too underwent substantial changes. Although the industry had autonomous sales agents and a few exchanges from the outset, many distribution functions were performed by either producers (who commonly sold their films directly to “the trade”) or exhibitors (who rented films to theaters as one part of their service package). Only after key postproduction responsibilities were assumed by the film producers did the development of the rental system become possible and specialized distribution companies or “exchanges” emerge as important factors in the field.