Poor Pierrot (1892)

Original title

Pauvre Pierrot

Directed by

Émile Reynaud

Genre

silent film, comedy film, romance film

Country

France

Runtime

15 min

Rating

6.1 of 10 from 118 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

A poor clown named Pierrot tries to win the heart of a woman but is interrupted by a rival. The film uses hand-painted images to tell this early love story.

playfullightheartedhistoricsimplewhimsicalvisual-pioneeringshort

What happens

Pauvre Pierrot (or Poor Pete) is a French short animated film directed by Charles-Émile Reynaud in 1891 and released in 1892. It consists of 500 individually painted images and lasts about 15 minutes originally. It is one of the first animated films ever made, and alongside Un bon bock (directed in 1888 of which only few images survive at the Cinémathèque française) and Le Clown et ses chiens was exhibited on 28 October 1892 when Charles-Émile Reynaud opened his Théâtre Optique at the Musée Grévin. It was the first film to demonstrate the Théâtre Optique system developed by Reynaud in 1888. Pauvre Pierrot is also believed to be the first known usage of film perforations. The combined performance of all three films was known as Pantomimes Lumineuses. These were the first animated pictures publicly exhibited by means of picture bands. Reynaud gave the entire presentation himself by manipulating the images. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

More like this

• Clown and His Dogs (1892)
• Pierrot og Pierette (1908)
• Pierrot (1965)
• Les Fredaines de Pierrette (1900)
• Pierrot, Pierrette (1924)
• The Clown vs. Satan (1901)
• The Clown with the Portable Body (1901)
• De leugen van Pierrot (1922)