The Great Train Robbery (1903)

Country: USA

Released: December 1st, 1903

Genre: Western, Action

Directed by: Edwin S. Porter

Produced by: Edwin S. Porter

Written by: Edwin S. Porter

According to wikipedia The Great Train Robbery is widely considered by film historians to be the first Western (despite being filmed exclusively in New Jersey), and the first american action film. So gather around the fireplace Die Hard, Die Hard 2, and Die Hard 6: The Die has Been Cast, and watch as your gran pappy weaves you a tale of action, excitement, and derring do!

It's rather amazing to see how much film techniques changed in the year between Le Voyage and Train Robbery; gone are painted, theater-like sets, now we are filming on location: in forests, on moving trains, in New Jersey(!); gone are the flat camera shots, now we have angles and depth; gone are the aliens dying in puffs of smoke, now we get... uh... melodramatic ballet?

Regardless of strange acting choices,Train Robbery still has a lot to offer in the way of visual spectacle. The story follows a group of train robbers as they, what else? Rob a train. We follow the dastardly no-good-nicks as they knock out the station manager, board the locomotive, rob it silly, and are eventually chased and gunned down by lawmen. Much like its French counterpart it really ain't got much going for it in terms of story but that's to be expected. As a predecessor to the old adventure serials popularized a few decades later, the story exists to prop up the spectacle, a common style at the turn of the century when film was still novel and not entirely taken seriously as an art form. In essence Train Robbery the 19th century equivalent of a theme park ride.

Still, the tech makes up for the lack of any meaningful plot. I was particularly impressed with the director's decision to film actors on an actual moving train, and they deserve serious props for risking their lives for what is essentially a glorified dime-novel. Ah well, I suppose such was the norm in a time when safety regulations were but a distant dream and a common source of entertainment was giving an elephant the electric chair. But by far my favourite technical advancement on display is the addition of colour.

Colour? In Film!? How novel.

This isn't your standard coloured film-reals however; the film employs an old technique used before the advent of technicolor in which frames are coloured in by hand, and I must say that I'm completely awestruck by the idea of Porter and his editors spending hour after hour painstakingly colouring every single frame with paintbrushes. Now that's what i call dedication to one's craft. Kubrick eat your heart out. The result is beautiful, with selective characters and effects popping out amid the black and white landscape surrounding them. Because of the crude technique what results is a abstract, fuzzy, dreamlike approach to colour rather than a realistic representation. This is especially apparent when a girl in a red dress finds the knocked out conductor, the slight difference in every shot making the dress feel literally alive, a spot that shifts and moves a la Rorschach mask in Watchmen.

Lastly, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the final shot where a mean looking cowboy stares at the audience and fires a gun at us. Much like the the rocket sticking out of the moon's eye in Le Voyage, the image has become synonymous with the film and a semi-iconic image for early films in general. Does it add anything to the movie? Nope. Does it make sense? Not really. In fact I can't help wonder how movie audiences today would react with such a blatant fourth wall break. Probably not favorably.

In any case much like Le Voyage, Train Robbery is best experienced through an analytical lens, akin to finding a time capsule. Besides that there isn't much to recommend. Still, seeing how the first action movies were made isn't a bad way to spend 10 minutes of your life.