Ben Hur 1907
The first adaptation of Lew Wallace's novel, Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ.
The first adaptation of Lew Wallace's novel, Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ.
A group of travellers go into a house for protection. Little do they know, it is filled with ghosts who make unusual things happen to them.
An extremely clumsy man tries to clean a woman's house with disastrous results.
A pig dressed in fancy clothes flirts with a pretty girl, but she humiliates him and tears off his suit; she then makes him dance for her affections.
A family troupe of acrobats, made up to appear Japanese, perform various unbelievable stunts in front of the camera, achieved through a trick of the camera.
A traveler stays the night at a rural inn, but gets no rest as he is tormented by various spectres and mysterious happenings.
A policeman spots a dog stealing a piece of meat from a butcher's shop, and gives chase. Soon several more policemen have joined the pursuit. But the chase does not turn out as the policemen expect.
A boy spreads glue all over town.
A piano entices anyone who comes near.
As a result of a stagecoach hold-up and other crimes, Buck Brady has become known locally as the "King of Bandits". The sheriff posts a $1000 reward for Brady, dead or alive. Soon a full-scale effort is underway to capture the bandit king.
The opening title card explains that a painter has just finished his work when his assistant comes in and accidentally drinks varnish. The film then picks up as the painter goes haywire and sends the assistant into the painting.
In this film, Méliès concocts a combination fairy- and morality tale about the foolishness of trying to look too deeply into the workings of an unstable and inscrutable universe. At a medieval school, an old astronomer begins to teach a class of young men, all armed with telescopes, about the art of scrutinising an imminent eclipse. When a mechanical clock strikes twelve, all the young men rush to the windows and fix their telescopes on the heavens.
A four-year-old saves the day.
A demonic magician attempts to perform his act in a strange grotto, but is confronted by a Good Spirit who opposes him.
The film, a parody of the novel Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne, follows a fisherman, Yves, who dreams of traveling by submarine to the bottom of the ocean, where he encounters both realistic and fanciful sea creatures, including a chorus of naiads played by dancers from the Théâtre du Châtelet. Méliès's design for the film includes cut-out sea animals patterned after Alphonse de Neuville's illustrations for Verne's novel.
During the Paris Commune, a boy runs across trouble at the barricade.
A combination of the story of Goldlocks and the Three Bears with the true story of how Teddy Roosevelt spared a bear cub after killing its mother while hunting, an event which led to the popularization of the teddy bear. Goldilocks goes to sleep in the bears' home after watching six teddy bears dance and do acrobatics, viewing them through a knothole in the wall. When she is awoken by the returning bear family, they give chase through the woods, but she runs to the aid of the Old Rough Rider, who saves her.
A short film about a dirigible.
A magician is surprised when he attempts to transform a beetle.