The Big Swallow

While quite simple both in concept and in execution, this early short feature is rather amusing. The self-referential idea that it explores is interesting, both as one of the earlier examples of its kind, and also for the way that it is handled. Whereas so many present-day movies handle references to themselves and to other movies in such a labored and often pretentious manner, the idea here is carried off not only with some skill, but also with an appropriately light touch.

Unlike many of the characters in these earliest films, who are sometimes too indistinct to have any real presence on the screen, in this feature the actor playing the main character, whose responses to being filmed form the basis for the story, does a pretty good job of carrying the movie with his mannerisms and facial expressions. He has a slight hammy touch that works pretty well here, and it helps in making a very simple feature turn out rather well.

A delightful experiment in self-reflexivity from the days of early cinema, when enquiry about this new form was still encouraged before the standardisation of production and genre. A man finds he's being filmed; angered at this intrusion of his privacy, he approaches the camera and its operator, and eats them both!

The slow, looming mouth is a parody avant la lettre of horror films, an ordinary person turned into a monster, a giant by the cinema, in the same way ordinary people suddenly became huge when projected on a screen. Here we see that film doesn't just record things, it can enlarge, focus in close-up, distort, simply by magnifying a familiar feature. Maybe this is what the Indians meant in decrying soul-destroying photography; here, this ordinary man's soul becomes, punningly, negative.

Of course, the conceit isn't fully worked out - while it's lovely seeing the munching satisfaction of the avenging diner, especially as the shrunken cameraman was slurped up like so much spaghetti, it would be impossible for a camera in a man's belly to film the man from outside. There is always a second camera, filming silently on. This is the concerted power of cinema - you can do what you like, even eat its minions, but it'll still be there, like a Gothic doppelganger, immovable, watching your every move.

The first film that shows a man devouring a camera from the camera's perspective. This takes some mundane, contrived event and makes it quite interesting. I'm sure early audiences must have found it quite fascinating and humorous.

This early film by James Williamson's Kinematograph sees a man enraged by photographer who is setting up to take his picture. The yelling man gets closer and closer until all we see his gaping mouth, into which the hapless photographer falls, camera, tripod, and all. The film-maker's camera then pans back and we see the man, no longer angry, chewing in a very satisfied way. I imagine in 1901 the twist ending was quite surprising. Comical in an archaic, anarchic way.

I watched this film on a DVD that was rammed with short films from the period. I didn't watch all of them as the main problem with these type of things that their value is more in their historical novelty value rather than entertainment. So to watch them you do need to be put in the correct context so that you can keep this in mind and not watch it with modern eyes. With the Primitives & Pioneers DVD collection though you get nothing to help you out, literally the films are played one after the other (the main menu option is "play all") for several hours. With this it is hard to understand their relevance and as an educational tool it falls down as it leaves the viewer to fend for themselves, which I'm sure is fine for some viewers but certainly not the majority. What it means is that the DVD saves you searching the web for the films individually by putting them all in one place – but that's about it.

A man sees he is being filmed and starts to remonstrate with the camera crew about it. Finally losing his temper the man closes in the camera and, well, eats it. This sounds simple and it is but I had assumed that the film would merely end on the darkness of the man's mouth as the punchline. Instead the delivery is cleverer than that and we step back to see the camera and the cameraman falling into the "mouth" before we then cut back to the man walking backwards chewing. It is a clever combination of camera shots to create the gag and invention work from Williams. Not brilliant but quite clever when you look at it in context.