The Big Swallow (1901)

Directed by

James Williamson

Genre

comedy film, silent film

Country

United Kingdom

Runtime

1 min

Rating

6.5 of 10 from 138 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

A man gets annoyed by a photographer and ends up swallowing him along with his camera. This early silent comedy uses clever camera tricks to make the action happen on screen.

humorousplayfulinventivebriefcheekywhimsicalsilenttrick-filled

What happens

The Big Swallow (AKA: A Photographic Contortion) is a 1901 British silent comic trick film, directed by James Williamson, featuring a man, irritated by the presence of a photographer, who solves his dilemma by swallowing him and his camera whole. The three-shot trick film is, according to Michael Brooke of BFI Screenonline, "one of the most important early British films in that it was one of the first to deliberately exploit the contrast between the eye of the camera and of the audience watching the final film". The "tricks" used to produce the film were described in detail in Frederick A. Talbot's 1912 book Moving Pictures: How They Are Made and Worked. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

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