e,cided on this term, fol-and Chase. The State oflst annual FIAF confer_5. Speaking about shotshe said: ,,Such

cases aret: pT" spectacle.,, [Do_rn 5lapstick Comedy,,,

rgbl) 52_53.1lstance penley and An_na L? ry87) 42.

rften combined multi_tied by songs that thelsp,ectacle.

rirrer and Donald G.

The Cinema of Att ract ion[s] : Ear ly Fi lm,I ts Spectator and the Avant-Garde

Tom Gunning

Writing in r9zz, flushed with the excitement of seeing Abel Gance's Le RouE,Femand L6ger tried to define something of the radical possibilities of the cin-ema. The potential of the new art did not lie in "imitating the movements ofnature" or in "the mistaken path" of its resemblance to theater. Its uniquepower was a "matter of making images seen."' It is precisely this hamessing ofvisibility, this act of showing and exhibition, which I feel cinema before 19o6displays most intensely. [Its] inspiration for the avant-garde of the early decadesof this century needs to be re-explored.

Writings by the early modemists (Futurists, Dadaists and Surrealists) on thecinema follow a pattem similar to Ldger: enthusiasm for this new medium andits possibilities; and disappointment at the way it has already developed, itsenslavement to traditional art forms, particularly theater and literature. Thisfascination with the potential of a medium (and the accompanying fantasy ofrescuing the cinema from its enslavement to alien and pass6 forms) can be un-derstood from a number of viewpoints. I want to use it to illuminate a topic Ihave [also] approached before [...], the strangely heterogeneous relation thatfilm before t9o6 (or so) bears to the films that follow, and the way a takingaccount of this heterogeneity signals a new conception of film history and filmform. My work in this area has been pursued in collaboration with Andr6 Gau-dreault.'

The history of early cinema, like the history of cinema generally, has beenwritten and theorized under the hegemony of narrative films. Early filmmakerslike Smith, M6lids and Porter have been studied primarily from the viewpoint oftheir contribution to film as a storytelling medium, particularly the evolution ofnarrative editing. Although such approaches are not totally misguided, they areone-sided and potentially distort both the work of these filmmakers and theactual forces shaping cinema before ryo6. A few observations will indicate theway that early cinema was not dominated by the narrative impulse that laterasserted its sway over the medium. First there is the extremely important rolethat actuality film plays in early film production. Investigation of the filmscopyrighted in the US shows that actuality films oukrumbered fictional filmsuntil 19o6.3 The Lumidre tradition of "placing the world within one's reach"

382 The Cinema of Attractions Reloaded

through travel films and topicals did not disappear with the exit of the Cirre:;.tographe from film production.

But even within non-acfuality filming - what has sometimes been referrec :i*as the "M6lids tradition" - the role narrative plays is quite different than in :pditional narrative film. Mdlias himserf declared in discussing his working m€T_oo:

As for the scenario, the "fable," or "tale," I only consider it at the end. I can staie -:;::the scenario constructed in this manner has no importance, since I use it merel.- :-. ,pretext for the "stage effects," the "tricks," or for a nicely arranged tabreau.a

\rvhatever differences one might find between Lumiirre and Mdlies, they sh:- ;not represent the opposition between narrative and non-narrative filmmak::,at least as it is understood today. Rather, one can unite them in a conception -rdlsees cinema less as a way of telling stories than as a way of presenting a series :rviews to an audience, fascinating because of their illusoryrpower (whether ::*erealistic illusion of motion offered to the first audiences by Lumiere, or the r..r*gical illusion concocted by M6lids), and exoficism. In other words, I belier.e -:.erthe relation to the spectator set up by the films of both Lumidre and M6lies "r:many other filmmakers before 19o6) had a common basis, and one that dl-::rifrom the primary spectator relations set up by narrative film after 19o6. I -,,,11call this earlier conception of cinema, "the cinema of attractions.,, I belier.e r.m"this conception dominates cinema until about

'9o6-19o7. Although diiterer.

from the fascination in storytelling exploited by the cinema from the tiaq. :".Griffith, it is not necessarily opposed to it. In fact the cinema of attractio:::does not disappear with the dominance of narrative, but rather goes ur.i.r-ground, both into certain avant-garde practices and as a component of narre:*, *films, more evident in some genres (e.g., the musical) than irrothers.

\Atrhat precisely is the cinema of attraction[s]? First it is a cinema that t,:-,ey.itself on the quality that L6ger celebrated: its ability to show something. C:,:*trasted to the voyeuristic aspect of narrative cinema analyzed by chris:a.rMetz,s this is an exhibitionist cinema. An aspect of early cinema which I h:, rwritten about in other articles is emblematic of this different relationshi: .:'rcinema of attractions constructs with its spectator: the recurring look at the c.:r"era by actors. This actiory which is later perceived as spoiling the realistic : _,,:.."sion of the cinema, is here undertaken with brio, estatrilshing contact with :*audience. From comedians smirking at the camera, to the constant bowins i:r:gesturing of the conjurors in magic films, this is a cinema that displays its ir:lity, willing to rupture a self-enclosed fictional world for a chance to solicit :,*.attention of the spectator.

Exhibitionism becomes literal in the series of erotic films which play ar :::,."portant role in early film production (the same path6 catalogue would adr.er::a

Film, lts Spectator and the Avant-Garde

of the Cindma-

eerr referred toEnt than in tra-n-orking meth-

L tr can state thatre it merely as ahleau,+

x" ffire1'shouldre frJrnmaking,

mreption thatting a series ofr nr.hether thehr" or the ma-

; I heiieve thattd \{elids (andrre that differser 19o6. I will'I helieve thatrrefi di-tferentrr tfu time off attraction[s]r goes under-t of narrativeIS

ma that basesnddng. Con-t'v Christianlr-hich I haveh'anship theok at the carn-r realistic itrlu-ffict nith theG b'olrirrg and[ar-= its r-Lsihi-: to scrliit the

h p.]- an irn-ruld adrerfi--e

the Passion Play along with "scdnes grivioses d'un caractdre piquanf,, eroticfilms often including full nudity), also driven underground in laier years. AsNoEl Burch has shown in his film ConnrcrroN, prEasr on How wn Gor rNroPrcrunrs Ggzil, a film like THn Bnrns Rrrrnss (France, rgoz) reveals a funda-mental conflict between this exhibitionistic tendency of early film and the crea-tion of a fictional diegesis. A woman undresses for bed while her new husbandpeers at her from behind a screen. F{owever, it is to the camera and the audiencethat the bride addresses her erotic striptease, winking at us as she faces us, smil-ing in erotic display.

As the quote from Mdlids points out, the trick film, perhaps the dominantnon-actuality film genre before t9o6, is itself a series of displays, of magicalattractions, rather than a primitive sketch of narrative continuity. Many trickfilms are, in effect, plotless, a series of transformations strung together with littleconnection and certainly no characterization. But to approach even the plottedtrick films, such as Ls vovacr DANS LA ruNr (r9oz), simply as precursors oflater narrative structures is to miss the point. The story simply provides a frameupon which to string a demonstration of the magical possibilities of the cinema.

Modes of exhibition in early cinema also reflect this lack of concem withcreating a self-sufficient narrative world upon the screen. As Charles Musserhas shown,6 the early showmen exhibitors exerted a greatdeal of control overthe shows they presented, actually re-editing the films they had purchased andsupplying a series of offscreen supplements, such as sound effects and spokencommentary. Perhaps most extreme is the Hale's Tours, the largest chain oftheaters exclusively showing films before 19o6. Not only did the films consist ofnon-narrative sequences taken from moving vehicles (usually trains), but thetheater itself was arranged as a train car with a conductor who took ticketg andsound effects simulating the click-clack of wheels and hiss of air brakes.z Suchviewing experiences relate more to the attractions of the fairground than to thetraditions of the legitimate theater. The relation between films and the emer_gence of the great amusement parks, such as Coney Island, at the fum of thecentury provides rich ground for rethinking the roots of early cinema.

Nor should we ever forget that in the earliest years of exhibition the cinemaitself was an attraction. Early audiences went to exhibitions to see machinesdemonstrated (the newest technological wonder, following in the wake of suchwidely exhibited machines and marvels as X-rays or, earlier, the phonograph),rather than to view films. It was the Cin6matographe, the Biograph or the vita-scope that were advertised on the variety bilts in which they premiered, not [LEDfpuNrn nu n6nf,] or Trrs Bracx Dravroxn Expnrss. After the initial noveltyperiod, this display of the possibilities of cinema continues, and not only in ma-gic films. Many of the close-ups in early film differ from later uses of the techni-que precisely because they do not use enlargement for narrative punctuatior;

The Cinema of Attfactions Reloaded

but as an attraction in its own right. The close-up cut into porter,s T,,r Gaysrror Crnnx ogoi may anticipatiater *.",t:il? ,"chniques, but its principalmotive is again pure exhibitio.,ir-, as the rady rifr her rti'ritr"-, exposing herankle for alr to see. Biograph films such as pnorocnapHrNc a Fnuarr Cnoox(tgo+) and HoorrcaN rN Jarr ogo., consist of a singre shot in which the camerais brought crose to the main "t,u.u"tur,

until they aL in mid_shot. The enrarge_ment is not a device expressive of narrative tension; it is in ibelf an attractionand the point of the film.s[To summarize, the cinema of attractirincitinsvisuatcuriosity,andsupplyi"rJ,Hrl'fi itl.::X':'::tff :;::::n1a unique evenf whether fictionif or do'cumentary thatls of interest in itself. Theattraction to be displayed may also be of a cinematic natury-such as the earryclose-ups just described, or trick films in which a cinematic manipuration (slowmotion' reverse motion, substirution, murtipre

".p.r;;;t;;;;;", the firm,s no_velty. Fictionar situations tend to be restricted to gags, vaudevilre numbers orrecreations of shocking or curious incidents 1"*u.t.rtiorrr, current events). It isthe direct address of the audience, in which an attraction i" oliur"a to the spec_tator by a cinema showman, that defines this approach to filrnmaking. Theatri_cal display dominates over narrative absorption, emphasizing tt" diru"t stimu_lation of shock or surprise at the "*p".,."

of unfording u ,iory or creating adiegetic universe. The cinema of attractioracterswirhpsvchorogicarmorivations".Hi;fi ;:i;:;[ffi fl;:?,rur"::";both fictionar and non-fictional attractions, its energy moves outward an ac_knowledged spectator rather than inward towards the character_based sifua_tions essential to classical narrative.]The term "attractions" comes, of co..r"e, from the young sergei MikhailovichEisenstein and his attempt to find a new moder and

-oiu or-u.alysis for thetheater' In his search

f:..rn" "unit of impression" of theatricar art, the founda-tion of an anarysis which wourd .r.rder*ir," rearistic representational theater,Eisenstein hit upon the term " attraction.,,e An attraction aggressivery subjectedthe spectator to "sensual or psychological- impact." accoraing to Eisensteirytheater shourd consist of u *tr,tug" or"r.r"r,

"*""tro.,r,-"."",iig a reration tothe spectator entirely different rrori hi" absorption in ,,inusory [depictionsJ.,,,o Ipick up this term partly to [underscore] the relati"" to til-:;tator that thislater avant-gar'de practice shares with early cinema: that of exhibitionist con_frontation rather than diegetic absorption. of course the ,,experimentalry

regu_lated and mathematically carculated; montage of attractions demanaed by Ei_senstein differs enormousry from these eJy fihs (;, ";;-;""scious andoppositional mode of practice will from a popular one;.;, Ho#u*r, it is impor_tant to rearize the context from which Eisenstein serected the term. Then, asnow' the "attrachon" was a term of the fairground, and for Eisenstein and his

The Cinema of Attraction[s]: Early Film, lts Spectator and the Avant-Garde

friend Yutkevich it primarily represented their favorite fairground attraction,

the roller coaster, or as it was known then in Russia, the American Mountains."

The source is significant. The enthusiasm of the early avant-garde for film

was at least partly an enthusiasm for a mass culture that was emerging at the

beginning of the century, offering a new sort of stimulus for an audience not

acculturated to the traditional arts. It is important to take this enthusiasm for

popular art as something more than a simple gesture of epater les bourgeois. The

enofinous development of the entertainment industry since the rgros and its

growing acceptance by middle-class culture (and the accommodation that

made this acceptance possible) have made it difficult to understand the libera-

tion popular entertainment offered at the beginning of the century. I believe that

it was precisely the exhibitionist quality of tum-of-the-century popular art that

made it attractive to the avant-garde - its freedom from the creation of a dieg-

esis, its accent on direct stimulation.

Writing of the variety theater, Marinetti not only praised its aesthetics of as-

tonishment and stimulatioo but particularly its creation of a new spectator who

contrasts with the " static," "stupid voyeur" of traditional theater. The spectator

at the variety theater feels directly addressed by the spectacle and joins in, sing-

ing along, heckling the comedians.'3 Dealing with early cinema within the con-

text of archive and academy, we risk missing its vital relation to vaudeville, its

primary place of exhibition until around r9o5. Film appeared as one attraction

on the vaudeville program, surrounded by a mass of unrelated acts in a non-

narrative and even nearly illogical succession of performances. Even when pre-

sented in the nickelodeons that were emerging at the end of this period, these

short films always appeared in a variety format, trick films sandwiched in with

farces, actualities, "illustrated songs," and, quite frequently, cheap vaudeville

acts. It was precisely this non-narrative variety that placed this form of enter-

tainment under attack by reform groups in the early 191os. The Russell Sage

Survey of popular entertainments found vaudeville "depends upon an artificial

rather than a natural human and developing interest, these acts having no nec-

essary, and as a rule, no actual connection."'a In other words, no narrative. A

night at the variety theater was like a ride on a streetcar or an active day in a

crowded city, according to this middle-class reform group, stimulating an un-

healthy nervousness. It was precisely such artificial stimulus that Marinetti and

Eisenstein wished to borrow from the popular arts and inject into the theater,

organizing popular energy for radical Purpose.What happened to the cinema of attraction[s]? The period from r9o7 to about

1913 represents the tnte narratiaization of the cinema, culminating in the appear-

ance of feature films which radically revised the variety format. Film clearly

took the legitimate theater as its model, producing famous players in famous

plays. The transformation of filmic discourse that D.W. Griffith typifies bound

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The Cinema of Attractioni Reloaded

cinematic signifiers to the narration of stories and the creation of a self-encloseddiegetic universe. The look at the camera becomes taboo and the devices of cin_ema are transformed from playful ,,fricks,, - cinematic attractions (M6lids ges_turing at us to watch the lady vanish) - to erements of dramatic expressiory en_tries into the psychology of character and the world of fiction.

However, it would be too easy to see this as a cain and Abel story with nar-rative strangling the nascent possibilities of a young iconoclastic form of enter_tainment. Just as the variety format in some sense survived in the movie paracesof the rgzos (with newsreel, cartoory sing-along, orchestra performance andsometimes vaudeville acts subordinated to, uut sul coexistinj with, the narra_tive feature of the evening), the system of attraction remains an essential part ofpopular filmmaking.

The chase film shows how, towards the end of this period (basicaily fromr9o3 to t9o6), a synthesis of attractions and narrative was already ,r.rd"r-uy.The chase had been the originar truly narrative genre of the cinema, providinga model for causality and linearity as well as a basic editing continui$2. A filmlike Biograph's psnsoNat (rgo4, the model for the chase fi-lm rn many ways)shows the creation of a narrative linearity, as the French nobleman runs for hislife from the fiancdes his personal corumn ad has unleashed. However, at thesame time, as the group of young women pursue their prey towards the camerain each shot, they encounter some slighi obstacre (a rencg a steep srope, astream) that slows them_ down for the spectator, providing a mini-spectaclepause in the unfolding of narrative. The Edison Company sJe*ea particularlyaware of this, since they offered their pragiarized versiorr of this Biograph film(Howa FnrNcn Nonrs*{ar{ Gor a wrir TnnoucH rHE Nnw yonx Hrnaro psn_soNAL CoruivrNs) t" ,yg formE as a complete film or as separate shots, so thatany one image of the ladies chasing the man could be uougit without the incit_ing incident or narrative closure.'5

As Laura Mulvey has shown in a very different context, the dialectic betweenspectacle and narrative has fuelled much of the classicar cinema.,6 por.rura i.Jton in his study of slapstick comedy, "The pie and the Chase,,, has shown theway slapstick did a balancing act between the pure spectacle of gag and thedevelopment of narrative.'7 Likewise, the ltraaitionar] spectacle film [...]proved true to its name by highlighting moments of pure visuar stimulationalong with narrative. The r9z4 version of Br* Hun was in fact shown at a Bos-ton theater with a timetable announcing the moment of its prime attractions:

8135 The Star of Bethlehem8:4o jerusalemRestored

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The Hollywood advertising policy of enumerating the features of a film, each

emblazoned with the command, "See!" shows this primal power of the attrac-

tion running beneath the armature of narrative regulation.

We seem far from the avant-garde Plemises with which this discussion of

early cinema began. But it is important that the radical heterogeneity which I

find in early cinema not be conceived as a truly oppositional program, one irre-

concilable with the growth of narrative cinema. This view is too sentimental

and too a-historical. A film like TnE GnEan TurN Ronssnv (rgol) does point in

both directions, toward a direct assault on the spectatol (the spectacularly en-

larged outlaw unloading his pistol in our faces), and towards a linear narrative

continuity. This is early film's ambiguous heritage. Clearly in some sense recent

spectacle cinema has reaffirmed its loots in stimulus and camival rides, in what

might be called the Spielberg-Lucas-Coppola cinema of effects.

But effects are tamed attractions. Marinetti and Eisenstein understood that

they were tapping into a source of energy that would need focusing and inten-

sification to fulfill its revolutionary possibilities. Both Eisenstein and Marinetti

planned to exaggerate the impact on the spectator[s], Marinetti proposing to

iiterally glue them to their seats (ruined garments paid for after the perfol-

mance) and Eisenstein setting firecrackers off beneath them. Every change in

film history implies a change in its address to the sPectatol, and each period

constructs its spectator in a new way. Now in a period of American avant-garde

cinema in which the tradition of contemplative subjectivity has perhaps run its

(often glorious) course, it is possible that this earlier camival of the cinema, and

the methods of popular entertainment, still provide an unexhausted resource -

a Coney Island of the avant-gatde, whose never dominant but always sensed

current can be traced from M6liEs through Keaton, through UN CnrsN ANDA-

Lou (7928), and Jack Smith'

Notes

First publishedinWide Angte8.3-4 (1986): 63-7o; and subsequently, with some variations,

n faily Cinema: Space Frame Narratioe, ed. Thomas Elsaesser (London: British Film Insti-

tute, r99o) 56-62. Ttrc variations and additions to the original version are Put between

squared brackets.

L. Femand L6ger, "A Critical Essay on the Plastic Qualities of Abel Gance's Fllm The

IMeeI," Functions of Painting, ed. and intro. Edward Fry trans. Alexandra Anderson

(New York Viking, t973) zr.2. see my articles l'The Non-Continuous Style of Early Film," Cinema tgoo-t9o6, ed.

Roger Holman (Bruxelles: FIAF, rgSz) and ',An unseen Energy swallows space:

The Space in Earlv Film and its Relation to American Avant Garde Fllm," FiIm Before

Th"!ryg:?q.,ractions Reloaded

Grffith, ed' John L. Fell (Berkeley: u of Califomia p, ryg) 355-66,and our collabora_tive paper delivered by M. Gaudreault at tl" *rf;::;;i,C;;"" Film History(August t98) "Le cinema des premiers temps: un ddfi a l,histoire du cin6ma?,, Iwould arso like to note the importance of my discussions with Aaam simon andour hope to further in;uestigate-ihe history and the archaeology of the f'm spectator.3' Robert C. Aileru vauderiili and FiIm: fii5-t9t5, A study rn*lleara Interaction (NewYork: Amo, rygo) t59,2a2_.r.1.4' Georges M6lids, "Importance du sc6nario,', in Georges sadoul, Georges Mdriis (pais:

feghers, ry6r) n6 (my translation).5' Christian MetZ The-,Imaginary signifier: Psychoanalysis and the Cinema,trans. CeliaBrittoru Annwyr william! nen gr"ewste, u'i err"a Guzzettt(Bloomington: Indiana. yl,r98z), parricutarty 58-8o, gr_97.t

:r11;lJVlusser' 'American vliag"uph t897-t9o.'," Cinema lournal zz.3 (spring

7' Raymond Fierding "Hale's Tours: tltrarearism in the pre_r9ro Motion picfure,,,Film Before Grffith l:rl_jo.8. I wish to thank Ben Brewster for his conpaper which pointed out the r-p",";";;':?ilii"xtfi li:, "U"1*l"JJ"fl"**;attractions here.g' s'M' Eisenstern, "How I Became a Film Direct or,,, Notes of a Fitm Director(Moscow:

l:yfl Language publishing House, n.d.) 16.

10. s'M. Eisensteiru "Montage oiAttractionq i, oun".Daniel Gerould, The Drama Reztieznr8.r (March ry79:78_79.r-r.. Eisensteiry ,,Montage

of Attractions,, Zg_7g.72. Yon Barna, Eisenstein (Bloomington: Indiana Up, ryp) 59.a3. F.T. Marinetri, ,,The. Variety Thlater ]:rgrZli, futririionyntos, ed,.Umbro Apollo,nio (Newyork: Viking, ryp) o7.14. Michael Davis, The. Exproitation of preasure (New york: Russell sage Foundation"

?ept..o_f Child Hygiene, pamphtei rgrr).

1'5' David Levy, "Edison sales poliry ur'ti *r" Contirluous Action FIm t9o4_r9o6,,, FilmBefore Grffith 207-22.t6'

f];u tut"t""t "visuar pleasure and Narrarive cinema,,, screen ,63 (Farl ry75):

17' Paper delivered at the FIAF Conference on slapstick, May ryg5,New york City.18' Nicholas vardas From stage to screen: Theairical Methlds- yiom carrirt to Grffith(New York Benjamin Blom, ry6g) 42.