Richard Abel
The Red Rooster Scare
Making Cinema American, 1900-1910
$32.95, £19.95 paperback
978-0-520-21478-1
Available Now
328 pages, 6 x 9 inches, 54 b/w illustrations
March 1999, Available worldwide
Categories: Cinema & Performance Arts; Cultural Anthropology; Sociology
March 1999, Available worldwide
Categories: Cinema & Performance Arts; Cultural Anthropology; Sociology
"It is a curious fact that early cinema in America was dominated by French productions, with the Pathé-Frères company leading the way. . . . Richard Abel relies on a range of written sources—trade journals, advertisements and newspaper accounts—to create a detailed portrait of these crucial and somewhat mysterious years marking cinema's emergence.. . . This is a sprawling, meticulous researched and compelling story. . . . It is a labyrinthine tale of corporate rivalries, patent lawsuits, self-promotion and product placement that makes for for fascinating reading."—Times Literary Supplement
"The ideas presented in this book are provocative, the text makes for good reading, and the many vintage ads are a pleasure to peruse."—American Cinematographer
"The ideas presented in this book are provocative, the text makes for good reading, and the many vintage ads are a pleasure to peruse."—American Cinematographer
"This outstanding work offers a new description of the evolution of American cinema in the nickelodeon period. . . . With his usual groundbreaking research, Abel demonstrates the key role Pathé films played in this transformation. . . . Although clearly of crucial importance to film studies and film history, this treatment of the issues of the rise of nationalism within the cinema should make the work of great interest to historians dealing with modern nationalism and its relation to mass media."—Tom Gunning, author of D. W. Griffith and the Origins of Narrative Film
Only once in cinema history have imported films dominated the American market: during the nickelodeon era in the early years of the twentieth century, when the Pathé company's "Red Rooster" films could be found "everywhere." Through extensive original research, Richard Abel demonstrates how crucial French films were in making "going to the movies" popular in the United States, first in vaudeville houses and then in nickelodeons.
Abel then deftly exposes the consequences of that popularity. He shows how, in the midst of fears about mass immigration and concern that women and children (many of them immigrants) were the principal audience for moving pictures, the nickelodeon became a contested site of Americanization. Pathé's Red Rooster films came to be defined as dangerously "foreign" and "alien" and even "feminine" (especially in relation to "American" subjects like westerns). Their impact was thwarted, and they were nearly excluded from the market, all in order to ensure that the American cinema would be truly American.
The Red Rooster Scare offers a revealing and readable cultural history of American cinema's nationalization, by one of the most distinguished historians of early cinema.
Abel then deftly exposes the consequences of that popularity. He shows how, in the midst of fears about mass immigration and concern that women and children (many of them immigrants) were the principal audience for moving pictures, the nickelodeon became a contested site of Americanization. Pathé's Red Rooster films came to be defined as dangerously "foreign" and "alien" and even "feminine" (especially in relation to "American" subjects like westerns). Their impact was thwarted, and they were nearly excluded from the market, all in order to ensure that the American cinema would be truly American.
The Red Rooster Scare offers a revealing and readable cultural history of American cinema's nationalization, by one of the most distinguished historians of early cinema.
The Ciné Goes to Town, by Richard Abel
American Cinema's Transitional Era: Audiences, Institutions, Practices, edited by Charlie Keil and Shelley Stamp
The Transformation of Cinema, 1907-1915, by Eileen Bowser
Migrating to the Movies: Cinema and Black Urban Modernity, by Jacqueline Najuma Stewart
Chicago's South Side, 1946-1948, by Wayne F. Miller
Rhapsodies in Black: Art of the Harlem Renaissance, by Richard J. Powell and David A. Bailey
American Cinema's Transitional Era: Audiences, Institutions, Practices, edited by Charlie Keil and Shelley Stamp
The Transformation of Cinema, 1907-1915, by Eileen Bowser
Migrating to the Movies: Cinema and Black Urban Modernity, by Jacqueline Najuma Stewart
Chicago's South Side, 1946-1948, by Wayne F. Miller
Rhapsodies in Black: Art of the Harlem Renaissance, by Richard J. Powell and David A. Bailey