Women Fetching Water from the Nile - 1897

Country: United Kingdom

Director: Henry Short

Release Date: 1897 (UK)

Filming Locations: Egypt

Production Co: Paul's Animatograph Works, Robert W. Paul

Genres: Documentary | Short

This short film was one of a series shot for Paul by Henry Short and while it gives us a good look at some of the local people, as the backdrop against which they are shot is a rugged stone wall we don't get to see much local colour – or even the Nile. The first individual we see isn't a woman at all but a white-bearded old gent stooped beneath the burden of his load. Next come the women, each of them balancing pots on their heads as they walk.  

Cupid at the Washtub - 1897

Country: United Kingdom

Release Date: September 1897 (UK)

Production Co: Robert W. Paul

Sound Mix: Silent

Color: Black and White

Genres: Short | Comedy

Groom flirts with a laundress who ducks him in a tub of suds. A playful variation on A Soldier's Courtship, Paul's smash hit from the previous year, this film spies on a young man trying to tease a kiss from a young girl doing the washing at a tub. For his efforts, the man receives a dunking in the tub himself. 

Cronje's Surrender to Lord Roberts - 1900

Country: United Kingdom

Language: None

Release Date: 1900 (UK)

Genres: Documentary | Short

This film, one of the few genuine films of the Boer war that was shot on location rather than an enactment – and which is therefore less exciting – was filmed by a doctor called Colonel Beaver. Cronje is escorted by City Imperial Volunteers, with whom filmmaker Robert Paul's brothers served, so it's entirely possible that they're up there on the screen. Cronje can only briefly be glimpsed in a carriage.

Come Along Do! - 1898

Country: United Kingdom

Director: Robert W. Paul

Also known as: Bemutató (Hungary); Exhibition (UK - alternative title)

Production Co: Robert W. Paul

Runtime: 1 min

Sound Mix: Silent

Color: Black and White

Trivia: Was one of the earliest multi shot fiction films. It is a two shot film shot entirely on a constructed set and is thought to have been joined by a simple splice, although the exact transition remains uncertain.

Plot Keywords: Nude Artwork | Artwork

Genres: Comedy | Short

Outside an art exhibit, an elderly couple are sitting on a bench, enjoying some refreshments. As two well-dressed women pass by and enter the exhibit, the man takes an extra drink from a bottle. The woman seems eager for him to finish, so that they also can go inside.

Robbery - 1897

Country: United Kingdom

Director: Robert W. Paul

Release Date: September 1897 (UK)

Also known as: A Wayfarer Compelled to Disrobe Partially (UK - alternative title)

Production Co: Robert W. Paul

Sound Mix: Silent

Color: Black and White

Genres: Comedy | Short

Robber forces wayfarer to undress. 

An Extraordinary Cab Accident - 1903

Country: United Kingdom

Language: English

Directors: Walter R. Booth, Robert W. Paul

Release Date: November 1903 (UK)

Runtime: UK: 1 min

Sound Mix: Silent

Color: Black and White

Production Co: Robert W. Paul

Plot Keywords: Hit And Run | Near Death Experience | Black Comedy

Genres: Short | Comedy

A man and a woman talk beside a street near a corner where a cop stands. Just as a horse-drawn cart rounds the corner, the man backs off the sidewalk saying good-by to his companion. The horse and cart flatten him and continue on, out of the camera's stationary range. The cop runs after the cab, the woman dashes to the body. The cop brings back the driver; is the victim dead?

The Kiss - 1914

Country: USA

Language: English

Director: Ulysses Davis

Writer: Marc Edmund Jones (story)

Stars: Patricia Palmer, George Holt and William Desmond Taylor

Patricia Palmer ... Alice, a shop girl (as Margaret Gibson)

George Holt ... Fred, her sweetheart

William Desmond Taylor ... George Dale, society man

Myrtle Gonzalez ... Helen, George's fiancée

Loyola O'Connor ... Landlady

Jane Novak ... Mazie, a saleslady

Release Date: 15 April 1914 (USA)

Production Co: Vitagraph Company of America

Genres: Short | Drama

Sound Mix: Silent

Color: Black and White

Trivia: A print of this film still exists in the Library of Congress

1914 silent film starring William Desmond Taylor and Margaret Gibson (aka Patricia Palmer). In 1922, Taylor was murdered, and many years later Gibson reportedly confessed to having murdered him.