Mutoscopes
Hey, they’re making mutoscope machines again. No, really. This site has the details:
http://mutoscope-manufacturers.co.uk
What’s more they are distributing some of those naughty kind of scenes which had the folks up-in-arms in 1899. I had a quick peek, and can tell you that I was shocked, shocked, by some of the clips they show. They even have a lady undressing. Well, something like that anyway. (that’s in ‘the library’ as ‘What the Butler Saw’ if you can cope with this level of excitement).
June 26, 2007 at 8:26 pm
Very interesting. Must write something on Mutoscopes at some time to give the general background, though the company’s website provides some quite helpful information. Good luck to them. Mutoscopes were used as advertising tools, not just entertainment, so what they are doing is keeping up the tradition. The company was Mutoscope and Biograph, of course (OK, there was a variety of companies), and Biograph has been recently ‘revived’ (allegedly) by an American business claiming to be the revived American Mutoscope and Biograph Company. Their website is really quite odd: http://www.biographcompany.com/. Presumably you’ve seen their claim to have Titanic footage shot by Daniel Marvin…
(for anyone new to this story, there is no such thing as surviving film taken on board the Titanic)