All Films

The Damnation of Cain

1911 • 10 min • Italy

"What hast thou done? Listen, the voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto Me from the ground." Two farmers love the same woman, who can choose only one of them. The rejected suitor takes revenge, and causes the fatal accident of his rival.

Le secret du corsaire rouge

1911 • 10 min

1910 Louis Feuillade short film

The Runaway Engine

1911 • 15 min

Allan Peters, just out of college, the son of a railroad president, calls at his father's office. The indignant parent suggests that as he has studied hard for several years, a trip to Europe would be in order. Allan, however, tells his father he is ready to go to work and wants to begin at once. Further, that he wants to learn the railroad business from the bottom up and asks for an opportunity to start as a fireman. While following his vocation he meets the daughter of Steve Martin, his engineer and falls in love at first sight. Industriously prosecuting his suit they become formally engaged and Allan advises his father by wire. The receipt of the message angers President Peters. He orders his private car got ready and hurries to the division where Allan is employed in an effort to rescue him from what he terms a misalliance.

Better at Night

1911 • 11 min

French silent film.

The New Air Fan

1911 • 4 min • France

Titine and her family go for a fast-motion bicycle ride while enveloping the whole public sphere in their raging tornado of bodily ventilation. They knock over pedestrians, café diners, and horse-drawn carriages. Finally, they are steamrolled by the superior fan of a gas-guzzling automobile. Translated from Le Bulletin Pathé, they “are swept in turn like simple fetuses”

Léontine’s Apprenticeship

1911 • 10 min • France

It’s high time for tomboy Titine to settle down and learn a useful trade. Instead, she terrorizes any shop owner foolish enough to audition her labor. In a throwback to the third episode, where she apprentices for a milliner, Titine drops a carton of fancy hats that are crushed by a steamroller. Then she throws a cake at the baker’s best customer and insults a woman with large feet at the shoe store.

Coronation Drill at Reedham Orphanage

1911 • 6 min • United Kingdom

Kinemacolor

A Run with the Exmoor Staghounds

1911 • 8 min • United Kingdom

Kinemacolor

Patouillard fait du Sandow

1911 • 6 min • France

Paul Berthos' doctor tells him he needs to get some exercise, and hands him some of those rubbery strings with handles. We had them around the house when I was a kid, sold by Jack Lalane and other exercise gurus. You could pull them apart, or attach them to a wall and get your whole body involved. As you might expect, Bertho attaches them to things that he should not.

Le parapluie magnétique

1911 • 4 min

A boy gets an umbrella which speeds up the world.

Calino et ses pensionnaires

1911 • 4 min • France

Calino decides to take a boarder. The gentleman turns out to be a huntsman. All goes well until pay day when the roomer refuses to get out of bed to pay his bill. He says that his pocketbook is in one of his trunks in the garret. Up goes the anxious Calino and his officious mother and sister only to find, upon ransacking each trunk, a furious African lion emerge. The hungry beasts pursue the trio in full haste and the complications and situations encountered are unusually comical. Calino never pays the board bill.

Absorbing Reading

1911 • 5 min • France

A little man buys a paper and begins to read it as he walks down the street. It is so absorbing -- as the title indicates -- that he doesn't notice anything else. He knocks down streetlights and walks into women who stab him with enormous hatpins, yet goes on reading.

Patouillard crieur de journaux

1911 • 6 min • France

Paul Berthos can use some money, so he gets a job as a news boy; you know, those kids who would stand about street corners in old movies, brandishing a newspaper, shouting "Wuxtry! Wuxtry!" and waiting for a car to run them over.

Pik Nick Wears a Jupe-Culotte

1911 • 6 min • Italy

Teddy (Pik Nik) is visiting his married lover. Her husband comes home and Teddy quickly disguises himself as a mannequin. When he sneezes, the man discovers him and chases after him. Teddy manages to lose him and he decides to write a letter to the husband, luring him to his house. He then hypnotizes the husband and shaves his head.

The Life of the Honey Bee

1911 • 8 min • United Kingdom

A documentary on honey bees.

Austin Flood

1911 • 8 min • United States of America

This film incorporates scenes taken by a Thanhouser film crew rushed to Austin, Pennsylvania, following news of a flood. On Saturday, September 30, 1911, the Bayless Dam broke, and a huge wall of water, followed by a fire, devastated the town and killed over 100 of its citizens.

Aboard the World's Northernmost Railway

1911 • 6 min • Sweden

A train ride from Narvik to the national border.

A Spiritualistic Seance

1911 • 7 min • France

M. Instead, is a spiritualist and decides to invite some friends to a seance. His daughter, Lucy, however, is much more interested in a certain young man, and when papa goes out to send telegrams to his guests she proceeds to entertain her admirer. Unfortunately papa returns with some of his friends, and the young man balances a table on his back while the tablecloth hides him from the view of all. The guests come in, and tea is put on the table. The poor young man under it is in a very uncomfortable position, and sends all the tea-things flying. The ladies shriek, and the men climb on chairs, for they think it is spirits, and Lucy seizes the opportunity to join him under the table. Papa Insteade lifts up the corner of the tablecloth, and reveals the two enjoying themselves. The pair are so obviously in love that he relents, and gives the necessary consent.

Picturesque Colorado

1911 • 4 min

Early travelogue film.

Shooting the Rapids on the River Ozu in Japan

1911 • 7 min

A wild boat ride through the Hozu River’s white-water rapids, set against a beautifully coloured natural background.

Belgian Cavalry

1911 • 3 min • Belgium, France

Demonstration of the Belgian cavalry, the military department on horseback in Ypres, including shots of riding through water, "leapfrogging" over a horse, jumping and dressage.

Jobard, Porter for Love

1911 • 6 min • France

Lucien Cazalis sees a young woman and falls instantly in love. He volunteers to carry her trunk to her apartment, where he kneels, grinning in front of her, until her father locks him in the trunk and throws it out the window.

Their Only Son

1911 • 14 min

The parents of a young man who is wrongly accused of theft eventually find their son on a ship, where he is working as a sailor.

Flying at Pwllheli

1911 • 1 min • United Kingdom

Intrepid aviator H.J.D. Astley laughs off another crash.