Une idylle sous un tunnel

To the modern viewer, it may seem peculiar that there are several movies in which a man sneaks a kiss off a young woman in a darkened railway car, all produced in the first few years of the motion picture. Most have a tinge of humor, some are intended as an exercise in editing. It's true that when a particular movie was popular, every film producer either made his own version, or bought a copy and printed it in his own dark room. But what made this movie so popular?

It's part of an old worry associated with railroads. Recall, if you will, that railroad travel only began in the 1830s, and the rail network was still a-building through the turn of the 20th century. Like every new technology, there were people who decried it. Man could not travel at speeds in excess of 25 miles an hour without dying, or the cinders flying from the smokestack would kill you, or if G*d had wanted us to travel on rails, he would have given us wheels.

One of the things that got the railroad denounced was its effect on ladies. They shouldn't be permitted to travel so far, their bodies would never stand the stress, and strangers would try to kiss them. Several publications urged young ladies to keep pins in their mouths in case some one did. And that is what this short movie is about.

You laugh. If you want horrors, though, you might consider the terrible things that riding a bicycle will do to you.