Very Cool!!!

This is How Movies Should Be Made

Good movie, but best of all time? Hardly . . .

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

This very short short film from 1900 put a smile on my lips. It is directed by J. Stuart Blackton and also stars him. He is one of the most famous prolific directors of the early 20th century. Here he give us a man who draws a painting of another man. He also draws some wine and cigars. When the artist magically takes the wine and cigars from the picture, the painted man looks mad as he seems to want his pleasure back. So finally, he gives it back to him as well as his cylinder and he is happy again. J. Stuart Blackton also seems to have a great time drawing as he seems so enthusiastic. This is a very short work, but not a bad one at all. Much better than most silent one-minute shorts from around 1900. It's like a good joke. Short, but memorable. Recommended.

Enchanted Drawing, The (1900) *** (out of 4) Early attempt at animation is also another take on the work of Georges Melies. A cartoonist walks onto a stage with a large sheet of paper. He then begins to draw various items, which seems to come to life (this trick down with the editing). It's hard to be too hard on a film this early and running just over a minutes so I won't even try. This is a pretty fun little movie even with the various flaws. I found the cartoonist to be pretty entertaining and the drawings are quite nice. The "magic" tricks aren't that believable and are miles below the work of Melies but they're still mildly charming.

While Winsor McCay is often treated as the father of animated film, others like Emile Cohl (working for a studio, unlike McCay) and Stuart Blackton definitely were on the scene before. Their styles are all very different (especially Cohl's), but Blackton does wonderful things with the medium of animation, which are, in spirit, much the same as the animation films and episodes we come to know and love. My rating is not only for its inventiveness, but historical significance, as it belongs to a style, genre, and era that is often undertreated in film history (often getting a page or two mention in film history books). But thanks to the likes of John Canemaker and Donald Crafton, animation is increasingly well-canonized and game for consideration.

This "trick movie" (as they are known) lasts for a minute & a half & transpires much as the summary above describes: a man draws a face on a large sheet of paper, then several objects (a bottle, a glass, a cigar, a hat) which, thanks to stop motion, come to life as he reaches for them. The face itself changes when things are taken away or when they are returned. The face itself is not animated, though this film is considered an early example of the animated film.The lightning-quick sketch artist in the film is James Stuart Blackton, who toured in vaudeville with his easel & amazed audiences with his quick drawings. He worked for Edison quite a while, for obvious reasons - a century later, the film is really, really cool, & the same stop motion that worked in TV shows like "Bewitched" always seems amazing.But this one, even as early as it was made, has a charm that some shorts can't replicate. First of all, it's extremely well done; when Blackton grabs the bottle & glass, it's surprising. Second, Blackton himself is a showman, so his drawing & his interaction with it are done in an animated, entertaining way. & lastly, it's just fun: a drawing that gets mad when its bottle of wine is stolen, but becomes happy when it is fed the wine is just too cute & funny to find trite or dull.