| Santa Claus | |
|---|---|
Screencap from the film |
|
| Directed by | George Albert Smith |
| Starring | Laura Bayley Harold Smith Dorothy Smith |
| Release date(s) | September 1898 |
| Running time | 1 min 16 secs |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | Silent |
Santa Claus is a 1898 British short silent drama film, directed by George Albert Smith, which features Santa Claus visiting a house on Christmas Eve. The film, according to Michael Brooke of BFI Screenonline, "is believed to be the cinema's earliest known example of parallel action and, when coupled with double-exposure techniques that Smith had already demonstrated in the same year's The Mesmerist (1898) and Photographing a Ghost (1898), the result is one of the most visually and conceptually sophisticated British films made up to then."[1][2]