Départ en voiture

Early films by the Lumiere Brothers included perfectly ordinary subjects that today seem exotic -- for the past is a foreign country where they do things differently. As a basic study in composition in movement, this film of people saying goodbye and getting into a car is totally unremarkable.... except that no one today travels by horse carriage unless they are nobility or royalty on their way to a a monarch's wedding or funeral.

Notice how the Lumieres build their composition within the camera's frame and use the objects to form that composition. This is basic technique to painters and to photographers, yet it remained a mystery to many movie makers for a quarter of a century, and caused them to adopt the use of irises to alter the shape of the frame and its composition.