Born in Paris in 1861 and died in 1938, Méliès was a stage magician who turned the camera into a magic trick. He pioneered stop-motion substitution, multiple exposures, dissolves and hand-coloured film, and built Europe's first film studio at Montreuil. His company went bankrupt after the First World War and he ended up running a toy stall in a Paris railway station, until film lovers rediscovered his work in the 1920s.
Filmography
- The Vanishing Lady (1896)
- The Haunted Castle (1896)
- Cinderella (1899)
- A Trip to the Moon (1902)
- The Impossible Voyage (1904)