dsewizzrd-1 Richard Attenborough, Ronald Shiner, Sidney James, Margaret Rutherford, Googie Withers, Thora Hird, Marius Goring, Stanley Holloway, Eric Portman, Dennis Price, David Tomlinson, Peter Ustinov, and just about every other contemporary British actor have roles in this film about the life of the British inventor of the motion film camera, produced for the postwar "Festival Of Britain". William Friese Greene, a dedicated and spendthrift inventor starts work as a photographer's assistant and then starts his own studio. He starts a partnership with a Scottish man which he later falls out with. His first wife dies and he re-marries but after some period, she divorces him.

grahame12 A beautifully filmed and acted British gem. I have the Studio Canal release which I think is very good for picture and sound.For its age the colour is excellent, perhaps due to William Friese-Greene. As you are watching it you have to keep pausing and rewinding to see which film star you thought you saw in the crowd. It is amazing; the cover says "SEE 60 FAMOUS FILM STARS". How the director got so many stars to appear, some for just a few seconds is astonishing. If you get the chance watch this film. I am a Margaret Rutherford fan and was delighted to see her cameo role here. It was only short but adds to my collection.

Neil Doyle For all of his dogged determination to succeed, William Friese-Greene never quite established himself firmly in the public's mind as the inventor of the first motion picture camera, THE MAGIC BOX. That honor seems to rest with Thomas Edison. But as the film goes on to suggest, it was "Willie" who developed the first camera similar to what motion picture cameras use today. The film gives credit to Edison and other inventors with Greene as "one of the first pioneers." The story is told slowly, with flashbacks, and captures the time and customs of a bygone era with careful attention to detail. And for added interest, almost every small role is played by one of Britain's most famous actors. Keep an eye out for Margaret Rutherford, Kay Walsh, Joan Hickson, Laurence Olivier, Leo Genn, Eric Portman, Richard Attenborough, Glynis Johns, and others.Maria Schell, as one of the inventor's wives, wears a perpetual smile or grin on her face which always irritates me--let's face it, she's never been one of my favorite actresses and unfortunately she's in a good many of the scenes. I wish another actress had been cast in the role of his understanding first wife.It's an interesting story, well told and extremely well acted by most of the cast with Margaret Rutherford standing out as one of the photographer's best customers and Laurence Olivier doing a fine job as the policeman called hurriedly to Donat's laboratory to witness motion pictures taken in Hyde Park and staring at the screen in amazement.Donat's illness shows in many of the early scenes where he's supposed to be a young man, so that he looks more natural in the age make-up sequences as an older chap. The age make-up makes him resemble Mr. Chips again. I thought the ending was overly sentimental and not the way I would have preferred the story to conclude.Well worth viewing.

psteier The production values are great and almost every major British actor of the day gets a cameo, but nothing can help the script's confusing flashback structure and the fact that the protagonist, the British cinema pioneer William Freise-Greene, is neither likable nor interesting in the film. He comes over as someone so obsessed with his research that he ignores or walks over everyone around him.