Merry Christmas Everyone!!

I was busy with Christmas Evening wrapping yesterday that I didn't get my last day's countdown to Christmas up...heck I didn't even have time for email!  So I'm doubling up today

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

The first film is a funny little silent film I found on You Tube.  It proves that not all silent movies need to be really old!

This next "movie" is a clip of numerous Christmas silents from all sorts of sources.  Have a Merry one, one and all!

Countdown To Christmas Day 5

Classic early stop motion animation from pre-revolutionary Russia!!  

The Insect's Christmas (1913)

Countdown To Christmas 4

Yet another Edison Christmas short, but this is one of the company's earliest, dating from 1905.  Of all of Edwin S. Porter's directed holiday shorts, I tend to favor his earliest work.  They just have a glint of silvery charm to them.

Countdown To Christmas Day 3

A CHRISTMAS ACCIDENT (1912)

Yet another Edison Christmas short.  It's a little funny, the one earliest Edison Christmas short from 1907 that I'd really like to present here has never been uploaded to You Tube, even though, arguably, it as a great deal more charm than do many of the company's later Holiday efforts.  This film, however, is quite charming and not directed by the rather "true to life" stark style original in-house director Edwin S. Porter, but rather by a later Edison hire:  Bannister Merwin, who was primarily a writer.  Hope you enjoy.  

Countdown To Christmas Day 2

A Winter Straw Ride (1906)

Another Edison holiday short, this was photographed and directed by one of motion pictures very first director's Edwin S. Porter.  It's only 7 minutes long, so give it a look.  Happy Holidays!

Countdown To Christmas Day 1

This is another Edison Christmas short produced in 1914, I wanted to juxtapose it with the earlier Little Girl Who Didn't Believe In Santa from 1907 because their plots are almost polar opposites of each other, but alas no "Little Girl" on You Tube and I am way to busy trying to catch up on Christmas stuff to upload it right now--maybe later.


In any case, this is quite funny, considering "the wrong Santa" is a bugling burglar!

A Christmas Carol (1910)

Due to family issues and a lot a fall and winter illnesses I have blown through one important holiday on this blog; and have almost blown through another.  Before it gets too late, here is the first in an installment of Christmas silents.

I'd like to write out a longer bit on this little 10 minute film from Edison's company; but I'm still having symptoms from a very bad stomach virus that I suffered over the weekend and just don't have the energy at the moment.  I will say that this is not the earliest film of the classic Dickens holiday tale, as it stated in several places in print and around the web, but it is the most important of the earliest "Christmas Carol's; and, probably, the only one to survive.  The earliest appears to date from 1908 and was produced by rival American company Essanay, who one Charles Chaplin would work for.  Some still below.  Whole film follows.  Merry Christmas!