| Carmencita | |
|---|---|
Screencap from the short film Carmencita |
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| Directed by | William K.L. Dickson |
| Produced by | William K.L. Dickson |
| Starring | Carmencita |
| Cinematography | William Heise |
| Release date(s) | 1894 |
| Running time | 0:21 seconds at 30 frame/s |
| Country | United States |
| Language | Silent |
Carmencita, is an 1894 American short black-and-white silent documentary film directed and produced by William K.L. Dickson, the Scottish inventor credited with the invention of the motion picture camera under the employ of Thomas Edison. The film is titled after the dancer who features in it.
This video is one of a series of Edison short films featuring circus and vaudeville acts. It features a dancer going through a routine she had been performing at Koster & Bial's in New York since February 1890. According to film historian C. Musser, Carmencita was the first woman to appear in front of an Edison motion picture camera and may have been the first woman to appear in a motion picture within the United States.[1]
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The film was produced by the Edison Manufacturing Company[1] which had begun making films in 1890 under the direction of one of the earliest pioneers to film, William K.L. Dickson. It was filmed entirely within the Black Maria studio at West Orange, New Jersey, in the USA, which is widely referred to as "America's First Movie Studio." Filming on this work took place between March 10, 1894 and March 16, 1894.
According to the Internet Movie Database the film is 15.24 m in length. It was made in a 35 mm format with an aspect ratio of 1.33 : 1. The movie was intended to be displayed through means of a Kinetoscope.[2]
Given the age of this video, its copyright has now expired and it is freely available on the internet to download. A copy is kept by the Library of Congress and can be viewed on their American Memory website.[1] An alternative version can be found on Google Video, although this contains additional footage shot at around the same time.[3]
The film has also come to public attention as the first title listed on the Internet Movie Database. The website runs a system of providing each title in the database with a unique 7 digit code. This title has the code tt0000001, however, it is notably not the oldest movie listed on the site.[4]