The Invention of Dreams

A blog celebrating the films of the incredible Georges Méliès.

[art-and-things-of-beauty]

Georges Méliès (1861-1931) - Self portrait, oil on canvas, 63,5 x 52 cm.

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“My friends, I address you all tonight as you truly are; wizards, mermaids, travelers, adventurers, magicians… Come and dream with me.” Hugo (2011)

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From Georges Méliès’s “The Witch” or “La fée carabosse ou le poignard fatal” (1906).

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From Georges Méliès’s Rêve de Noël (1900).

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[prismably]

did you want an illustrated poster for a 112 year old film? no? okay

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The 400 Tricks of the Devil (1906)

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"we owe him everything"

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Georges Méliès portrait-graphite and chalk 24”X18”

[nitratediva]

From Georges Méliès’s Le Manoir du Diable (1896), the first ever horror film. And that’s Méliès himself standing in the doorway, dressed as the devil.

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L’éclipse du soleil en pleine lune, 1907. Dir.: Georges Méliès

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The Kingdom of the Fairies (1903) French title: Le Royaume des fées  dir. Georges Méliès

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George Melies

[vanishments]

film meme |  a trip to the moon ∙ directed by Georges Méliès (1902)

Voyage dans la Lune, Le/A Trip to the Moon (France, 1902), the screen’s first science fiction story, was a 14 minute masterpiece, created by imaginative French director and master magician Georges Melies (1861-1938) in his version of the Jules Verne story. The silent film’s plot, a light-hearted satire criticizing the conservative scientific community of its time, was inspired by Jules Verne’s From the Earth to the Moon (1865) and H. G. Wells’ First Men in the Moon (1901).

As a film pioneer and producer of over 500 short films, Melies made up and invented the film medium as he directed. He developed the art of special effects in earlier films, including double exposure, actors performing with themselves over split screens, and use of the dissolve and fade. He also pioneered the art of film editing. The sets or scenery backdrops in the film are simple, painted flats. It has all the elements that characterize the science-fiction genre: adventurous scientists, a futuristic space voyage, special effects such as superimpositions, and strange aliens in a far-off place. [x]