Mutoscope
The late 19th century saw an explosion of apparatus attempting to recreate the movement of real life, an explosion that contemporaries were conscious of. A conscientious New York Times reporter provides a list of 50 --graphs and --scopes, including "Vitascope[alternative name for the kinetoscope] and biograph are most familiar here, with cinematograph coming next at a considerable distance...Electroscope exists, and so do ...zinematograph, vitropticon, stinnetiscope, vivrescope, diaramiscope, corminograph, kineoptopscope, craboscope, vitaletiscope, cinematoscope, mutoscope, cinoscope, kinetograph, lobsterscope" ("TOPICS OF THE TIMES"). This 1898 writer asserts, "The arrangements for manipulation of the light, the band, and the lens are numerous, but they vary only in inconsequential details, and for all practical purposes the machines are identical." At least one apparatus on this extensive list contradicts that claim to sameness, and current film historians criticize that difference. "Although the Mutoscope has had a longer life than its competitor, it is the Kinetoscope that is more important in the growth of motion pictures because it used film." (Kardish 21-22)
The mutoscope shares light and lens with its scopular and graphical cousins, but lacks the "band of minute photographs" (New York Times). But this difference is not a lack; rather it is an opening for _____________________
Contents
Technology
Moving pictures vs Moving Images
"While the projected motion pictures that eventually dominated the moving image industry were inspired by the projection of magic lantern slides to a large audience, the peep show devices that were cinema’s first film apparatuses seemed to derive from such single-viewer devices as the stereoscope, the three-dimensional viewer designed for parlor use in the Victorian era. Although the basic technology that produced the images—that is, the camera—was identical for both projected and peepshow viewing, their spectorial reception is quite different, a difference that was acknowledged both in the types of film made for each apparatus and in their ultimate commercial fates.” (Gunning 341)
Hand Crank vs Electric Motor
“From 1895 to 1909, penny arcades around the country typically featured both machines among their attractions. Some viewers preferred the greater control over the speed of the image offered by the mutoscope’s hand crank. Others preferred the steady pace offered by the kinetoscope, whose electric motor pulled celluloid filmstrip over the light source. Eventually, the mutoscope proved more popular than its rival because it was able to introduce larger images without the distortion problems that plagued the kinetoscope."(Keim 10)
Circularity vs Linearity
Spectatorship
Arcades: Viewing Alone, Together
“In the early days of moving pictures, it was by no means certain that public audiences sitting in commercial theatre halls would be the main future of the medium. The Kinetoscope and Mutoscope peepshows, set up in rows in amusement arcades, tempted the more solitary spectator" (Herbert).
“Early cinema audiences were often an unruly bunch, drawn to nickelodeons and Kinetoscope parlors through the lure of sensation alone. “(Dixon & Foster 11)
Scopic Pleasure: Erotic Viewing
References
Adair, Gilbert. Flickers : An Illustrated Celebration of 100 Years of Cinema. Boston: Faber and Faber, 1995. Print.
Brown, Richard. A Victorian Film Enterprise : The History of the British Mutoscope and Biograph Company, 1897-1915.Print.
Casler, Herman. Mutoscope. Patent 683,910. 8 Oct 1901. Web. 27 Mar 2010.
Dixon, Wheeler W. and Foster, Gwendolyn Audrey. A Short History of Film. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 2008. Print.
Gunning, Tom. "Machines That Give Birth to Images: Douglas Crockwell." Lovers of Cinema: The First American Film Avant-Garde 1919-1945. Madison, Wisconsin: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1995. Print.
Herbert, Stephen. A History of Early Film Volume 1. New York: Routledge, 2000. Print.
The Illustrated History of the Cinema. Ed. Lloyd, Ann and Robinson, David. Orbis Book Publishing Corporation Ltd. and Macmillan Publishing Company., 1986. Print.
Kardish, Laurence. Real Plastic Magic: A History of Films and Filmmaking in America. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1972. Print.
Keim, Norman O. with Marc, David. Our Movie Houses: A History of Film & Cinematic Innovation in Central New York. Syracuse, New York: Syracuse University Press, 2008. Print.
"TOPICS OF THE TIMES." New York Times (1857-1922) 28 Jan. 1898,ProQuest Historical Newspapers The New York Times (1851 - 2006), ProQuest. Web. 27 Mar. 2010.