Cosmic-Observation

Movie Monday: A Butterfly’s Metamorphosis 1904

Posted on June 3, 2019 Updated on July 25, 2023

One hundred, fifteen years ago, in June, the short, French film La métamorphose du papillon or, A Butterfly’s Metamorphosis was released. The two-minute silent was directed by Gaston Velle, produced by Pathé Frères and, one of the distribution companies for the US was Edison Manufacturing Company.

From Wikipedia:

Gaston Velle was a French silent film director, and pioneer of special effects, who was prominent in early French and Italian cinema during the first two decades of the 20th century. Gaston began his career as a travelling magician before putting his illusionist skills to work in cinema and, ultimately, creating more than fifty films between 1903 and 1911. He worked under Auguste and Louis Lumière before serving as the head of production for the Italian film studio Cines. […] he is best remembered for his work at Pathé where he was hired to produce trick films that might rival those of his contemporary, Georges Méliès […]. Velle also created some of the first Féerie films […]. [He] mysteriously retired from film production in 1913 and little is known about the last several decades of his life.

[Disclaimer: Very little is known about this film and the above Wikipedia information is presented without any citations.]