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6 Episodes 1995 - 1995
Episode 1
58 mins
This first program traces the birth of the industry in Europe from the first moving pictures screened in 1895 through to the First World War. It contains glimpses of the hand-colored fantasies of George Melies, the sly comedy of Max Linder, the epic vision of Abel Gance, war films from Italy, early action films from Denmark and propaganda films from Britain and Germany. Going to the cinema in the last years of the 19th century wasn't much fun. You would probably be treated to such gripping titles as Leaving the Factory at Lyon or The Baby's Meal in a damp overcrowded tent that was likely to burn down (film being highly flammable). Things soon picked up, though, as this meticulous history of European cinema shows: by 1910, audiences were enjoying comedy, epics, romances and fantasies, some of them hand colored, some of them even with sound.
Episode 2
58 mins
A look at the the period of Swedish cinema known as the Golden Age which began in 1910 and lasted until the mid-1920s. Victor Sjostrom and Mauritz Stiller were the greatest talents in Swedish film, with pictures such as Ingeborg Holm, a scathing examination of poverty, and Gosta Berling's Saga (which brought Greta Garbo to fame). Today historians acknowledge the debt that the critically acclaimed French cinema industry owed to the Scandinavians.
Episode 3
58 mins
Featuring The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, Battleship Potemkin by Sergei Eisenstein, Metropolis, Die Nibelungen by Fritz Lang, Joyless Street starring Greta Garbo, F. W. Murnau's Nosferatu, Emil Jannings, The White Hell of Pitz Palu featuring Leni Riefenstahl and Louise Brooks becomes a star in G. W. Pabst's Pandora's Box and Diary of a Lost Girl.
Episode 4
58 mins
"The Music of Light" episode of Cinema Europe focuses on French silent cinema. It covers many films and directors, some of whom may be unfamiliar to American audiences. A few of the films covered in this episode include: Au Bonheur Les Dames, L'Argent, La Roué, Nana, Napoleon, Travail, the lost, early widescreen adaptation of To Build a Fire, and a thirty-two reel adaptation of Les Misérables.
Episode 5
58 mins
British silent film was small and old fashioned ; many actors snubbed working in movies and few establishment society figures respected directing. Documentary, however, was a field where there was a distinctive contribution.
Episode 6
58 mins
Looks at the impact of the arrival of sound on the European film industry. Despite European technical innovation, the industry lacked investors to promote its discoveries. However, it was not sound that doomed the golden age of European film-making. With the rise to power of the Nazi party at the beginning of the 1930s, a new era dawned in film-making history; international co-productions began to fade and nationalistic propaganda films started asserting their authority.