The last great trick film? - 1909 - Princess Nicotine - J. Stuart Blackton

Just as rapid technological innovation lead to film having the ability to tackle more ‘serious’ genres such as tragedy, the medium’s increasing length also meant that film’s earliest topics were now of less importance. The Lumiere Brothers’ actuality film no longer had the effect of wowing audiences simply because they were witnessing the moving image for the first time. The trick film too, was becoming a less important genre and would eventually desist altogether.

(Although there is a convincing argument to be made that many of the action films made since the eighties are the natural extension of these early trick films: i.e. the primary emphasis of these films are visual trickery, although most of these later films lack the wit and charm of these early trick films.)

As influential as Méliès has been on many of the filmmakers of the last thirty years, his influence on his immediate peers is less apparent. Princess Nicotine, along with Blactkon’s earlier trick film, The Thieving Hand, are clear examples of trick films that have been heavily influenced by Méliès, However, as we navigate the next decade of film making, his influence and popularity both temporarily wane.

The extraordinary settings of Méliès’ Le Voyage dans la Lune (1902) and Le Voyage à travers l'Impossible (1904) (if you want to read more about Méliès’, check out this review of both films as well as other films made by Méliès ) allowed both films to entertain and delight audiences at fourteen minutes and twenty four minutes respectively.  

However, as Méliès and other like minded film makers would discover over the next few years, audiences' interests would change dramatically; film was no longer seen as a gimmick; instead, it was now considered by some to have the potential to function as an art form.

Princess Nicotine identifies the primary problem that makes it abundantly clear why the trick film’s popularity was waning in 1908: film’s increasing length. Outside of Méliès’ two aforementioned masterpieces, it is hard to find a surviving trick film that was an unqualified success which lasted for more than ten minutes. The problem was that there was a limited selection of camera tricks that one could use. Princess Nicotine used every stage and camera trick that was available at the time, and still only managed to thread together a film that lasts for five minutes. Within five years many films would run for over an hour, making it impossible for a trick film to possess the sustained quality of a film like Princess Nicotine.

As with Blackton’s earlier trick film, The Thieving Hand, Princess Nicotine incorporates surreal and fantastical elements to an ordinary situation to entertain his viewers. Princess Nicotine involves an Edwardian man discovering two ‘tobacco fairies’ (see image below) among his smokes and the fallout that ensues.

I was surprised by the devilish amount of sassiness and wit that Princess Nicotine offers its audience; the fairies in the film are more Christopher Marlowe than Walt Disney, and all the better for it. The Smoker, who is played by Paul Panzer, is charming, but lacks the subtleties in body movement that Max Linder displayed in his film on the topic of smoking, Le Premier Cigare D’un Collegien.

What makes Princess Nicotine stand out from most other trick films is its narrative pacing. The tricks on display do not feel gratuitous; each one raises the comic stakes of the faux battle between the two parties, with the film ending on a dark but humorous note. 

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The first cinematic Roman Tragedy - 1909 - Nerone - Luigi Maggi

...The silent historical or costume film ultimately marked the high-water mark of Italian production and its success abroad in foreign markets. Interest in literary or historical topics helped to create the need for the artistic director, in addition to the cameraman and the producer, whose task was to coordinate the necessary research, the construction of sets and costumes, and the increasingly central role of the often temperamental actor and actresses whose popularity would soon surpass that of the man or woman in the street of the early documentary short film. Increasingly complex plots, taken either from history or from the Italian literary classics, also required the services of another technician, the scriptwriter even though films were yet to speak.

As Film: Ab Initio continues to progress through film's rich history, one of the most interesting conclusions that we can draw about the growth of the film industry is the strange paradox of separate countries producing wholly distinctive films that nevertheless produced certain roles and developments that influenced film makers across the globe. 

Within seconds, Nerone can be identified as an Italian film, yet the crucial developments that such Italian films made in regards to creating the positions of artistic director, producer and script writer, as mentioned in the above quote (from Peter Bondanella’s indispensable book A History Of Italian Cinema) will become a permanent feature for all filmmakers.

The role of artistic director is particularly interesting, as although you may have equivalents to script directors and producers in regards to plays, the role of the artistic director is somewhat unique to cinema (theatre has stage managers, but a play will only have a limited amount of sets and is limited to the stage). The physical setting of Nerone is most impressive and marks a significant step up from those found in the first Italian film, La Presa Di Roma . Whereas the film involved events that took place only decades ago, Nerone’s events take place towards the end of the Emperor Nero’s reign. The sets are therefore more elaborate, with more attention paid to detail.

Perhaps the mediocre quality of the print aids Nerone’s feeling of authenticity, as the sets and costumes are far more ‘believable’ than in any film we have seen so far on the Film: Ab Initio list. For example, the scene where Nero parades Poppea to the Roman public is a spectacular set piece. Here we have some film’s first extras dressed up as Roman citizens welcoming their new Empress. The synchronicity with which they part and then greet the royal couple hints at similar set-pieces that we will see in later films.

The tone of Nerone is different to any film that we have observed so far, it is the first tragedy that we have encountered. I would suggest that this is because it is the hardest genre to convey in the limited period of time that film makers had in the first decade of the 20^th century. 

Whereas comedy lends itself rather well to the time-scale that the early silent period offered, it is far more difficult to develop sufficient pathos in a story in the twelve minutes of a film like Nerone to enable your audience to be taken by the tragic nature of that particular film.

Hence choosing a well-known historical event is a shrewd move; most audiences would be aware of the story and would have known any missing details the films could not cover as well as already have an emotional investment in the characters.  

Therefore it is a great shame that the actor who plays Nero himself (see picture above) completely overacts the part; the most impressive thing about his performance is his facial hair. The calm, regal atmosphere the film exudes in its opening scene is dampened by Nero’s overtly eager physical gestures and posturing. The actress who plays Octavia on the other hand, is rather impressive. She manages to convey a diverse range of emotions in a short period of time before she is murdered; moving from shock to authority to philosophical resignation within a span of five seconds.

The most imaginative moment of the film comes towards the denouement of the film, as we see Nero lying on a chair, with his imaginative thoughts unfolding in the background; a pastoral scene gives way to what appears to be Rome on fire, causing Nero to collapse in fear of his own thoughts.

It is as powerful a scene as we have witnessed in any film so far, and makes great use of the medium of film to explore the apocalyptic visions the film’s protagonist. 

News Review - Film's true superheroes

More than a reflection of society and culture, moving images are primary documents that can serve a wide range of research purposes. The director Sydney Pollack has said that cinema is “the most vivid and valuable record of who we were and what we were, and what we thought and what we believed. And it continues to be that.” As our culture is increasingly shaped by visual images in the digital age, historians may soon rely on moving images as much as on the printed word to understand 21st century culture. In a sense, by relying more and more on moving images to understand the times in which we live, society is increasingly reverting back to its roots grounded in oral tradition.

Whether it’s classic Hollywood feature films, 20th century newsreels, documentaries, classic television or home movies of Billy’s fifth birthday, it is important to preserve our visual heritage." 

This quote, from the AMIA’s (The Association of Moving Image Archivists) homepage, asserts the still underappreciated importance of film preservation. Without the work and knowledge base that film archivists and film preservationists possess, we would lose invaluable visual documents that are indispensable for current and future generations.

This article hopes to draw readers’ attentions to the incredible work that film’s true superheroes do, often without a hint of recognition.

We will start by looking at an exciting online wiki project; that among other things, is attempting to identify a plethora of films that remain nameless. Slate recently drew attention to their project.

But if you find one of those rusting, unlabeled canisters ... then what?

It's a question that drives the extraordinary German site Lost Films. Begun in December 2008 by the Berlin museum Deutsche Kinemathek, it's a collaborative effort with other archives that now encompasses an astonishing range of films: The more than 4,000 movies listed as M.I.A. range from an actual jazz-era version of The Great Gatsby(1926) to a re-enactment of The Battle of Gettysburg (1913) staged while the veterans were still alive. But even more curious is the site's "Identify" section—an open call to other museums and the public to I.D. films that sometimes survive without title cards, without canister labels, without so much as a cast or director or country of origin.

"For a working film archive, unidentified films pose a much more urgent question," explains Kinemathek staffer Oliver Hanley in an e-mail. Not knowing what scripts or other contextual materials to consult makes these orphans nearly impossible to preserve properly. As Hanley notes, "To the public, it renders them lost already."

One cannot speak highly enough of this project as it attempting to bring together the vast knowledge base of film lovers and historians the world over, to help identify films that have been forgotten for vast periods of time as well as hunting down the thousands of films that we have records of but are now missing. Take a look at this page, which has pictures from a variety of films; you never know, you might help preserve a film by identifying a film that no-one before you has been able to name. Furthermore, here is more information about how you can contribute towards this important project.

The next piece concerns perhaps the most important part of the film preservation process: the pain-staking restoration of classic film. This in-depth piece from DemocratandChronicle.com, which I implore you to read in its entirety, takes an in depth look at George Eastman House:

George Eastman House helps preserve and repair these tattered objects, often more than a century old. Its six film technicians restore up to 200 films annually. Their quiet rescue mission reaches Hollywood studios and film archives around the world.

"Last year, we could have circled the Earth with that footage," says Edward Stratmann, associate curator of motion pictures.

The museum revives many films at their last gasp. An estimated 90 percent of silent-era movies already have vanished. Others are dying "the death of 1,000 cuts" with tears, stains and fading.

"It we don't act, sometimes it might be too late," says Caroline Frick Page, curator for the motion picture department.

When they do act — on rare screen tests for Gone With the Wind (1939), for example, or the first full-length movie of Huckleberry Finn (1920) — a part of film or art history is saved both for posterity and practical use. The Eastman House gets constant inquiries from studios looking to make DVDs from restored prints.

The museum also is training the next generation of preservation experts through two pioneering programs.

The L. Jeffrey Selznick School of Film Preservation, launched in 1996, has trained more than 130 motion picture archivists in 19 countries. Its dozen incoming students each year will learn how to preserve and restore movies, engaging in lab work and archiving courses. It offers both master's and certificate programs.”

George Eastman House not only restores up to 200 films a year, but they have also trained more than 130 motion picture archivists in 19 countries. Having complained in an earlier article about what I perceived as a lack of initiative and awareness when it came to film preservation and film restoration, it is delightful to learn of the indispensable work that one institution is partaking in to ensure that these important visual documents are not consigned to history. The fact that they are training archivists in countries which may have a far inferior knowledge base when it comes to film preservation can only bode well for the survival of early film in unheralded parts of the world.  

As with almost every conceivable topic one can imagine, there is a wealth of information available in regards to film preservation available online, that we can use to deepen our knowledge and understanding of the field. For example, over at the Film Archive Forum , there is some extremely useful information on the topic, for example:

Preservation copies

Additionally, due to the fragility of film and video, it is often necessary to make copies for preservation purposes. This may be e.g. to transfer from nitrate to ‘safety’ film, to transfer from acetate ‘safety’ film which is suffering acetic deterioration (commonly called) Vinegar Syndrome) or to retrieve content from obsolete formats. In this case, the new copy should also be treated as a master, replacing or supplementing the original. Wherever possible, any new master replacing an original should be on an appropriate format eg a new master from a title originating on film should usually also be on film of an equivalent format, even though the viewing copy may be video or digital. A new master taken from an obsolete format should be on to a current format of equivalent or greater quality

I was unaware that preservation copies of fragile films and videos are made for preservation purposes. If we increase our basic knowledge of the basics of film preservation, not only can we increase our understanding of the methodology behind the field, but hopefully such knowledge will encourage more people to go into the field as well argue its cause when it comes to ensuring that film preservationists receive more funds.

If you share my interest in this field, please retweet, facebook, digg or whatever method you use to increase awareness in regards to this article and more importantly, this often overlooked aspect of the film business. Also, if you have any links or information which you would care to share in regards to this field, please post a comment below.

To conclude, here is another excerpt from the DemorcratandChronicle piece:

... Restoration work tends to be anonymous, intensely technical and glacially slow. It demands Sitzfleisch: German slang for gluing your backside to a seat for hours at a time.

"Today, a polyester film base can last up to 500 years — longer than any CD," Haidet says. "We don't get our names attached to this work: it's a group effort. But I feel that we're doing something for posterity."

  

1908 - A Very Fine Lady - Louis Feuillade

Today, Louis Feuillade is primarily remembered for his pioneering work on the serial thrillers Fantomas (1913) and Les Vampires (1915). However, the scope of Feuillade’s influence was broader and deeper than is currently remembered.

In 1905, Feuillade started to sell screenplays to Gaumont, who at the time were the second largest film company in France after Pathé. He was recruited by Alice Guy, the pioneering film maker who was responsible for Gaumont’s growth during its formative years.  

Given that by 1910, two-thirds of worldwide film production was produced by French companies, this was a remarkably influential position to hold, the likes of which there is no modern equivalent of today. The likes of Abel Gance, Romeo Bosetti and Marcel L’Herbier worked at Gaumont while he was creative director at Gaumont. Feuillade was also a prolific director; before his death in 1925, he made close to 700 films.

A Very Fine Lady demonstrates Feuillade’s versatility and will surprise those who only know Feuillade through Fantomas and Les Vampires. The film is a simple comedy that owes a significant debt to the early work of Max Linder. Linder’s growing popularity meant that there was demand for more comedy films, but they needed to combine slapstick with a sense of adventure. A Very Fine Lady is as humorous as any of Linder's early films, successfully structuring its comedy around a single conceit. If the film has a weakness, it is that it tails off slightly as it reaches is its climax. But overall, it is a highly amusing film that should have the ability to win over any silent film sceptics that you know.  

A Very Fine Lady follows a beautiful young woman and traces the trouble and fuss she creates among the male population. What makes the film enjoyable is the manner in which the scenarios on display become both increasingly absurd and funny; starting with a shop keeper pouring a bucket water the wrong way (see image above) and reaching its comic peak with a man taking out another gentleman with a large plank of wood, as his sight is distracted by the pretty lady as she walks by (see image below).

We also have one of cinema’s first allusions to an earlier film. As the young lady walks past a gardener watering a public park, you are reminded of one of the Lumiere Brothers’ first films, Le Jardinier (l'Arroseur Arrosé) (1895), where a similar gag is played with a hose pipe (see image below).  

The film is also the first example that we have of the ‘male voyeur's gaze’. In her landmark 1975 essay, Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema ,  Laura Mulvey stated that:

The image of woman as (passive) raw material for the (active) gaze of man takes the argument a step further into the structure of representation, adding a further layer demanded by the ideology of the patriarchal order as it is worked out in its favorite cinematic form - illusionistic narrative film. The argument returns again to the psychoanalytic background in that woman as representation signifies castration, inducing voyeuristic or fetishistic mechanisms to circumvent her threat. None of these interacting layers is intrinsic to film, but it is only in the film form that they can reach a perfect and beautiful contradiction, thanks to the possibility in the cinema of shifting the emphasis of the look. It is the place of the look that defines cinema, the possibility of varying it and exposing it. This is what makes cinema quite different in its voyeuristic potential from, say, strip-tease, theatre, shows, etc. Going far beyond highlighting a woman's to-be-looked-at-ness, cinema builds the way she is to be looked at into the spectacle itself.

I have always felt that Mulvey’s argument is over-exaggerated and slightly dated, but she certainly raises an interesting debate which I think is well worthwhile pursuing. And although A Very Fine Lady is a straightforward comedy, there is no denying that if we were to apply Mulvey’s reading to film, the genealogy of the ‘male voyeur's gaze’ can be traced back to this film.

For example, returning to the hosepipe scene, the sexual innuendo of the gardener’s hosepipe ushering a fountain of water as the lady walks by (see image below) could be interpreted as adding weight to Mulvey’s assertion.

Film: Ab Initio will return to her argument and the above quote in more detail, when the idea of the ‘male voyeur's gaze’ is found in later films, and it will be interesting to see how well Mulvey’s hypothesis holds (particularly in relation to the Hitchcock films, Vertigo and Rear Window, that Mulvey's argument is predominantly aimed at).

A Very Fine Lady is a fine foray into the world of film making by Feuillade, and it will be interesting to observe the genesis of his directorial skills over the next ten years or so.

The first successful Shakespeare adaptation - 1908 - The Tempest - Percy Stow

Is the concept of a silent Shakespeare film an oxymoron? Absolutely not, I would argue. Shakespeare’s language is a crucial ingredient of his dramatic works, but far too often in recent cinematic adaptations it has been over-emphasised. There is a visceral visual element to many of the key works of Shakespeare that film can capture in a way that the theatre cannot. For example, my favourite cinematic Shakespeare moment involves no language at all: it is when Macbeth has been slain by a sheaf of arrows that pin him against a door in Kurosawa’s 1957 film Throne of Blood (I will have a lot more to say about this scene when we eventually get round to looking at the film).

Percy Stowe’s The Tempest is an extremely brave adaptation of its source material. With the film running at around twelve minutes, Stowe had very little scope to convey the plot of the play. However, limitation often breeds innovation, and the limited running time of the film allowed Stowe to concentrate on the key visual moments of the play.

Yet unlike with his earlier 1903 collaborative effort Alice in Wonderland, which Film: Ab Initio described as ‘enjoyable, charming but lightweight’, The Tempest is a more significant and substantial film. Whereas Alice in Wonderland picked a selection of moments from Carol’s work that felt episodic, with The Tempest, Stowe skilfully constructs a narrative thread that allows the film to have a more cohesive feel to it.

This is partially to do with Stowe’s development as a film maker, but Stowe also owes a significant debt to the rapid speed with which film was developing as a medium. Since 1903, film had witnessed its first superstar (Max Linder), ventured into the world of animation and tackled key historical events in films such as La Presa Di Roma and Stenka Razin.

Although the film leaves out some of the play’s major plotlines, the film is complete enough in itself to convey the narrative threads it does follow to someone who had not read the play (although there is no denying that a viewing of the film, as with any Shakespeare film, is enriched if one has read the play beforehand).

The film’s major success is its portrayal of Ariel. When Ferdinand chases Ariel in the film and she disappears using a simple Mélièsian trick, film has another one of its pivotal moments. This moment crystallises the difference between theatre and film; to put it simply, film can do things that theatre cannot. Although this is not the first time such a moment occurs in film history, given that it happens during the adaptation of a Shakespeare play, it explicitly confirms that film is developing in a separate direction to theatre. And this point extends beyond technical differences; it allows film to accentuate different emotional currents through such visual trickery. Ariel’s ‘disappearances’ in this scene (see image below) highlights the playful nature of Ariel, and more importantly, Ferdinand.

I have seen an awful production of The Tempest where Ferdinand was played in a dry, one-dimensional manner; this film gives the character more colour and depth in twelve minutes than that production managed to do so in two and a half hours!

From the perspective of film history, Ariel is also interesting because she is a Méliès visual trick that is removed from the confines of his studio and transposed onto a naturalistic setting. The most impressive Mélièsian trickery, however, is saved for when Prospero shipwrecks the King of Naples’ ship. I am surprised that the image is not more iconic (see image below).

The bfi’s screenonline is in agreement as to the quality of the film, though it also notes that the film’s attempts to uncover the cinematic qualities of Shakespeare’s text were not followed:

Comfortably the most visually imaginative and cinematically adventurous silent British Shakespeare film, Percy Stow's The Tempest (1908) takes a different approach from that of Dickson's 1899 film of King John, in that it attempts a complete précis of the entire play staged specifically for the cameras...

Curiously, though, no-one seems to have built on its lead, as all surviving silent Shakespeare films have tended to be as stagebound as those made by Stow's predecessors - Frank Benson's Richard III (1911) being typical.

Film: Ab Initio will carefully monitor the progress of adaptations of Shakespeare’s works; with Stow’s The Tempest, film has made a promising start.

Note: Unfortunately, the film for The Tempest cannot be found online, it can only be found on the bfi’s DVD Silent Shakespeare. It is well worth the purchase, and contains several other Shakespeare films that this blog will cover.  

D.W. Griffith's Directorial Debut - 1908 The Adventures of Dollie - D.W. Griffith

It is a common mistake to over-emphasise the importance of a major artist’s first work, particularly when it is framed in the context of his oeuvre rather than the period he was working in. In a thoroughly comprehensive piece on The Adventures of Dollie, Peter Gutmann of Classical Notes overstates the importance of the film:

The Adventures of Dollie is assured of a permanent niche in the annals of art if only because it was the first movie directed by D. W. Griffith, arguably the most important director in the history of cinema. Yet, it is far more significant than a mere historical anecdote – as the starting point from which Griffith’s genius would flow it provides a baseline against which his remarkable achievements can be measured.

Among other first works, Griffith’s first movie leans more toward the technically competent but wholly imitative juvenilia of Mozart than the early works of Beethoven, in which glimmers of a mature, confident and innovative artist are already evident. (Or, to take two extreme examples from the world of film, contrast the soft-core porn that launched the careers of so many famous directors and stars with the astounding brilliance of Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane.) But even considering that film, by its nature, necessarily is a collaborative art that forecloses most private experimentation and development before embarking on a feature project, Griffith’s first film hardly sprung out of a void.  

(Before I deconstruct the above quote, it must be said that the majority of Gutmann’s piece is an essential read - particularly in regards to providing biographical information in regards to Griffith’s life when he made the film)

I am wholly unconvinced that Griffith is ‘the most important director in the history of cinema’. In fact, one of my major complaints with misconceptions of film in the second decade of the twentiethcentury is that it is viewed as being ‘Griffith’s decade’ and that he alone was moving film into the realm of the feature film and the more naturalistic style of film making that we are accustomed to today.

The framing of The Adventures of Dollie ‘as the starting point from which Griffith’s genius would flow it provides a baseline against which his remarkable achievements can be measured’ burdens this pleasant film 
with expectations it cannot live up to.


The Adventures of Dollie involves a gypsy kidnapping a young girl named Dollie in order to seek revenge against Dollie’s father, who had earlier attacked the gypsy for harassing his young family. The plot is almost identical to Hepworth’s 1905 film Rescued by Rover and quite similar Griffith’s acting debut Rescued from an Eagle’s Nest.

It is a film firmly rooted in its era’s conventions and genres. When we observe the film from this perspective rather trying to ponder whether it is more like the early works of Mozart or Beethoven, a more balanced reading of the film can be obtained. And the film does contain some impressive moments which suggest Griffith will go on to become a substantial director. The shot of the reflection of the surroundings before the horse drawn cart pounds into the water is elegant; the sequence of the film where the barrel rolls down the river adds a layer of suspense while also being an attractive framework for the sequence.

There is a logical flaw in an important part of the set up of the film. When the gypsy hides Dollie in the barrel, surely Dollie would have made some sort of noise to alert the search party she had coming looking for her?
Given the sheer inventiveness of several of the recent films we have looked at (e.g. the lightning-paced animation of Fantasmagorie, the birth of slapstick in Début d'un Patineur, etc.s), the Adventures of Dollie feels slightly underwhelming.

The Early & Silent film blog provides us with some useful information about the film as well as detailing its instant success:

The biography by Richard Schickel [D. W. Griffith An American Life, Touchstone Book 1984) we learn that Griffith directed his first one reel film for Biograph after receiving advice from the veteran cameraman Billy Bitzer. Bitzer was later to become a stalwart of the Griffith production team. The film was taken from a written synopsis at Biograph. Griffith was able to cast the film himself. The cameraman was a Biograph regular, Arthur Marvin. It was he who suggested the locations for the film. The filming took two days. And a month later it was released with apparent success. Biograph still sold its films outright at this period, before a rental system had fully developed. The best total for a film to that date was fifteen prints; The Adventures of Dollie sold twenty-five prints, a new house record.

It is always interesting to learn about a major film maker’s collaborators as it provides the viewer with a more complete understanding of the creative genesis of a movie. The film was written by Stanner E.V. Taylor; it was his first writing credit – he would go on to write and direct films until 1929.


The commercial success of the film does suggest that Griffith had an intuitive sense of what the audience wanted to observe in the new medium of film. As with many commercially successful films that would follow in its steps for the next 102 years, the film plays on the fears of the middle classes as well as having a simple good-evil dichotomy.


The Adventures of Dollie is a solid yet unspectacular venture into filmmaking for Griffith. It will be interesting to observe him hone and develop his craft over the next decade. 

News Review - The Death of British Cinema? UK Film Council is scrapped by the British Govt.

Ralph Waldo Emerson once said that “a creative economy is the fuel of magnificence.” Yesterday’s announcement that the Tory government is abolishing the U.K. Film Council confirms the suspicion that many of us Brits have in regards to their complete inability to support the arts and therefore understand Emerson’s astute point. The arts are one of Britain’s strongest exports, and as one of the articles from below will point out, the UKFC has seen the films they have invested money in over the last decade make an average profit of 400%. The UKFC has financially backed films with an array of diversity: Gosford Park, Streetdance 3D, The Constant Gardener, Bend it Like Beckham, Bright Star, etc.

We were willing to throw money at banks which were haemorrhaging money, but we can no longer provide what is a paltry sum in terms of the government’s annual budget for a public body that was and is a terrific financial success? If you think that government’s decision is incorrect, then please sign this petition and get your friends to do so as well.

This decision could also be a bellwether for Britain's long term future as a major economy. Whereas India are spending $140 million to restore their classic films, the British government can no longer afford to spend £15 million a year to help produce current films. Could this be the beginning of the end for British cinema?  

The decision is short-sighted and foolish; it will have devastating effects for the long term future of an already dwindling British Industry – in 2003 there were 74 independent features made in the UK, last year there were only 40.

Best For Film set up the petition, and they go into more details in regards to the figures, thus demonstrating the buffoonery of Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt.

The UK film industry is one of our few sectors which has enjoyed consistent growth throughout the recession. Last year, its contribution to the economy was an extraordinary £4.3 billion – an increase of 50% on 2000, the year the UKFC was formed. UKFC-funded films have grossed in excess of £700 million worldwide, and its investments garner an average profit of 400%. Sorry, I’ll say that again – FOUR HUNDRED PER CENT. That’s £5 for every £1 you spend, and I defy any of Jeremy Hunt’s colleagues in the state-owned banks to offer us as good a rate.

Incredibly, the UKFC manages all this on a budget of only £15 million a year, much of which is money drawn from the countrywide tax on hope which is the National Lottery. This is compared to the £12 million being spent on the Pope’s controversial UK visit later this year, or the £7 billion which it’s costing us to host the Olympics – at its present budget, that’s enough money to run the UKFC for almost 467 years. Jeremy Hunt’s claims that destroying the UKFC was a cost-cutting measure are clearly specious, betraying his motives to be ideological rather than financial; for unclear reasons of its own, in attacking both the Film Council and the licence fee which funds the BBC the Conservative Party is holding a knife to the throat of contemporary British culture.

The article is absolutely correct to call out Jeremy Hunt’s claim that ‘destroying the UKFC was a cost-cutting measure’. The figures do not lie and it begs the question as to why they are demolishing such a profitable organisation. It may well be that they are making cuts for the sake of making cuts, because the sum invested in the UKFC will not help our economic recovery. Or perhaps David Cameron’s ‘Big Society’ involves a world where we are all volunteers and none of us are artists?

                                          Jeremy Hunt - the man who could be responsible for destroying the British      film industry.

The Telegraph reports Mike Leigh’s outrage at the decision:

Jeremy Hunt, the Culture Secretary, said that the abolition of the council would wipe out a layer of bureaucracy and ensure ''greater value for money''.

But Leigh, whose credits include Happy-Go-Lucky and Vera Drake, described the decision as "extremely worrying" and "totally out of the blue".

He said: "It's very hard to know what they are actually going to sustain and what they will abandon. It really is no way to operate.

''It's like if they suddenly said: 'We're abolishing the NHS' ... It's totally out of order.''

The UK Film Council was created in 2000, and has invested more than £160 million of Lottery funding into more than 900 films which has helped generate over £700 million at the worldwide box office.

It receives £30 million a year of Lottery money and around £25.5 million from the Government. 

Leigh calls out another one of Hunt’s hollow phrases as it is unclear to all of us how the government will proceed and exactly how they intend to get a better return than they are already receiving.

Andrew Pulver describes the move  as both a ‘hammer blow’ and ‘tragically naive’. His article is well worth reading in its entirety:

It was nothing short of a hammer blow. This morning, word came through of John Woodward's email to UK Film Council staff informing them that the government was planning to shut them down. Then the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) confirmed it in a written statement at lunchtime. I was genuinely shocked. It felt like I'd nipped out for 10 minutes to get a pie and while I was out they closed the British film industry...

I can't help feeling that this is a tragically naive decision by the government. I've spent a significant amount of my time as a Guardian film journalist reporting on the various attempts to disburse lottery funding, which began in the mid-1990s. To summarise: first it was directly administered by the Arts Council, on a project-by-project basis, in the same way as theatre shows or brass bands. This setup was clearly inadequate– for keeping out both naive amateurs who wasted the money and smart operators who just ripped them off. In 1997 the franchise system was dreamed up. This meant established outfits would band together, offer a slate of projects, and be given a large amount of money. That system proved unwieldy and unworkable. It was quietly abandoned when the Film Council was set up in 2000 to operate like a mini studio, allowed to invest in big films (Gosford Park, The Constant Gardener) and also help out with small (Better Things, Red Road), as well as funding ancillary activities like the Independent Cinema Office, print and advertising assistance, and digital projection. The Film Council was essentially the most sophisticated method found so far to deal with the lottery money, and I simply don't believe any existing body will do a better job.

If the system returns to films being approved on a case by case basis it will surely once again prove to be inadequate. The lack of a concrete proposal for a replacement for the UKFC is of great concern.

The BBC makes clear that although the BFI may be asked to do the UKFC’s work, they may not have the capacity to do so:

What remains unclear, however, is who or what will distribute lottery money after its proposed closure in 2012.

The British Film Institute, the organisation charged with preserving and promoting the nation's film and television heritage, would seem the most likely candidate.

The body is directly funded by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and was mentioned by Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt as he made Monday's announcement.

Last year it was reported the BFI and UK Film Council might merge in order to create what the DCMS called "a streamlined organisation".

Some at the BFI were said to be unhappy with the proposals, concerned they might come off worse were the bodies to combine operations.

Earlier this year the BFI lost the £45m funding it had been promised by the last government for a new film centre on London's South Bank.

How equipped is the BFI to take on the complex and time-consuming business of distributing public funds to film producers?

But damage will be done, and what’s most at risk is the continued existence of film in the UK, not as an entertainment medium but as a practised artform. Specifically, the prospects for British film-makers with ambitions to create truly great cinema seem very bleak indeed...

Yet Daniel Trilling of The Guardian suggests the decision to scrap the UKFC is a good idea:

We should not, though, let the shock of this announcement stop us seeing the shortcomings as well as the successes of the movie-making culture fostered by the UKFC in its 10 years of existence. A key element of Labour's arts programme, the organisation took its structural cue from the City, with executive salaries well above the industry norm. Using a mix of lottery money and direct government subsidy, the UKFC has spent more than £300m – and the tax credit system it promoted has indeed enabled a commercial renaissance.

...According to the critic and producer Colin MacCabe, the UKFC's "aggressive commercial strategy" has frequently stifled creativity. Organisations like the British Film Institute Production Board, which funded experimental films, were abolished to make way for it, and the UKFC has often insisted on having the final cut on films it funds.

The past decade has not been a creative desert – Andrea Arnold's Fish Tank and Steve McQueen's Hunger are wonderful examples of daring British films with political bite and potential mass appeal. But the praise deservedly showered on their directors also serves as a reminder that others have been allowed to fall by the wayside. 

In the long run, this week's announcement could be good news for British film. Money is likely to be tighter, but there is an opportunity at least to rethink what kind of films we want to emerge from Britain in the years to come. It is encouraging that the government is now looking to work directly with the BFI, whose chair, Greg Dyke, has already fought hard to maintain the independence of his organisation.

If only he had seen this excellent graphic on his own website, the main thrust of his argument, that the UKFC has somehow ‘stifled creativity’, he would recognise the diversity and quality of the films that they have backed is an impressive showing. When he states that ‘there is an opportunity at least to rethink what kind of films we want to emerge from Britain in the years to come’; this vague, non-committal phrase may as well have been uttered by Hunt.

Perhaps he should read Sight and Sound’s take on the matter, which makes clear just how much damage the scrapping of the UKFC could do to the British film industry:

But damage will be done, and what’s most at risk is the continued existence of film in the UK, not as an entertainment medium but as a practised artform. Specifically, the prospects for British film-makers with ambitions to create truly great cinema seem very bleak indeed...

And what the statistical yearbook tells us is that the independent film sector in the UK – the proving ground for all young film-makers – is under increasing pressure. Where there were 74 independent features made in 2003, in 2009 there were just 40. You might say that’s natural during a recession, but then the industry is wrongly seen as recession-proof – and the R&D side of it is most emphatically not. Given the apparent success of our industrial activity, it is remarkable how very few new directorial talents have been nurtured here in the past decade. Where are the new Shane Meadowses and Lynne Ramsays, let alone the new Ridley Scotts? The answer is, of course, that they’re out there, but they haven’t had the chances to develop that their forebears enjoyed...

The final sentence puts the whole discussion into perspective – where will the next important British director emerge from? Where will the next Hitchock, Nolan or David Lean hone his craft?