Consisting of a single shot, Spiders on a Web is one of the earliest British examples of close-up natural history photography. Made by one of the pioneers of the British film industry, G.A. Smith, this short film details spiders trapped in an enclosure, and despite the title, does not actually feature a web.
The plot outlines the story of the early Christian martyrs with a compendium of horrors such as maulings at the Colosseum, crucifixions, beheadings, savage hackings and burnings at the stake, burnings in the limepit, the spectacle of human torches in Nero's garden.
Two silent films capture a panoramic view of the 'Rue de l'Avenir', an electric powered moving walkway displayed at the Exposition Universelle in Paris (1900).
A turn-of-the-last-century hand-tinted short, which features two women, Miss Lally and Miss Julyett, dancing at a ball. By the legendary French filmmaker Alice Guy (attributed only, but not confirmed in any primary sources).
A series of fantastical wrestling matches.
The 1900 Paris World's Fair as seen from Trocadéro.
In this subject a "comique eccentric" enters the drawing room inhabited by spirits. He tries to take off his coat and hat, but these garments return to his head and shoulders as soon as he takes them off. The chairs, his umbrella, his hat, etc., fly away in different directions and by various methods. (Star Film Catalog)
Taken from an automobile. This picture was taken during the fashionable driving hour, making a complete circle of the Place de la Concorde, passing hundreds of carriages and busses. The beginning of the picture shows the historical church of the Madeleine in the background, the picture ending by approaching and running under the main entrance to the Paris Exposition.
Taken from a music hall sketch of Lewin Fitzhamon and advertised as 'Two minutes of white hot excitement taking place on the open veldt.
Here we have a mixed company of Gordon Highlanders, Irish Fusilliers and English Lancers, as a group of prisoners taken to the rear by a troop of Boer Cavalry. The expression on their faces show who is the victor, and who is the vanquished. You can read in the dust and smoke-begrimed countenance of the prisoners, the story of their stubborn resistance to superior numbers before the surrender: while the Boers give expression to their feelings, by cheering and waving their hats in triumph as they pass.
James White, the Edison Company's main filmmaker at the time, realized a burst of creativity during his visit to the 1900 Paris Exposition. It's uncertain who his cameraman was for this journey, but historian Charles Musser suggests that it might've been Alfred C. Abadie. In their Paris Exposition films, they introduced tilting (see 'Panorama of Eiffel Tower') and, although panning and panoramas had already been around for a while, they introduced some novel functions for them.
Using photographs and films shot by a French Consul, Auguste François, in turn-of-the-century China, documents the historic events and everyday life he saw around him. Narration uses his letters, diaries, and notes.
A magician performs tricks involving three women, who are sometimes merged together into one corpulent female.
"The Bath" is a flip book remake of After the Ball (Après le Bal) made in the late 1800s.
Sherlock Holmes enters his drawing room to find it being burgled, but on confronting the villain is surprised when the latter disappears.
Drama by Walter R. Booth. Survival status unknown.
Kathryn Osterman, the well-known vaudeville comedienne, in a complete exposition of the methods of "making-up" the face for the stage. She shows the penciling of the eye-brows, blackening the eye lashes, rouging the lips, applying the grease paint and so forth. The work is done in a very dainty and interesting way. Only the head and shoulders of the subject are shown; the figure thus being very large. (AMB Picture Catalogue, 1902)
A band-leader has arranged seven chairs for the members of his band. When he sits down in the first chair, a cymbal player appears in the same chair, then rises and sits in the next chair. As the cymbal player sits down, a drummer appears in the second chair, and then likewise moves on to the third chair. In this way, an entire band is soon formed, and is then ready to perform.
