George Albert Smith
Photoplayd Industry Rating
Not enough rated films yet to compute a weighted score.
Roles are weighted by involvement: director 1.0, screenwriter 0.7, lead 0.8, supporting 0.4, crew 0.1.
Along with his better-known French counterpart Georges Méliès, George Albert Smith, usually credited as G.A. Smith, was one of the first filmmakers to explore fictional and fantastic themes, often using surprisingly sophisticated special effects. His background was ideal – an established portrait photographer, he also had a long-standing interest in show business, running a tourist attraction in his native Brighton featuring a fortune teller. His films were among the first to feature such innovations as superimposition (Smith patented a double-exposure system in 1897), close-ups and scene transitions involving wipes and focus pulls. He also patented Kinemacolor – the world's first commercial cinema color system--in 1906, which was extremely successful for a time, despite the special equipment required to project it
Known for
Credits
Train Entering Hove Station (1897)
Director
The X-Ray Fiend (1897)
Director
Faust and Mephistopheles (1898)
Director
The Death of Poor Joe (1901)
Director
A Quick Shave and Brush Up (1900)
Director
The Kiss in the Tunnel (1899)
Director
Cinderella (1898)
Director
Grandma's Reading Glass (1900)
Director
Santa Claus (1898)
Director
A Visit to the Seaside (1908)
Director
The Old Maid's Valentine (1900)
Director
The Corsican Brothers (1898)
Director
The Sick Kitten (1903)
Director
Let Me Dream Again (1900)
Director
Dorothy's Dream (1903)
Director
Early British Films from the Filmoteca de Catalunya 1897-1909 (2023)
Director
The Miller and the Sweep (1897)
Director
Photographing a Ghost (1898)
Director
Grandma Threading Her Needle (1900)
Director
Comic Face (1897)
Director
Choosing the Wallpaper (1909)
Director
Brighton Seagoing Electric Car (1897)
Director
At Last! That Awful Tooth (1902)
Director
Spiders on a Web (1900)
Director
Mary Jane's Mishap (1903)
Director
Making Sausages (1897)
Director
Tartans of Scottish Clans (1906)
Director
Policeman and Burglar (1902)
Director
Two Clowns (1906)
Director
Old London Street Scenes (1903)
Director
The House That Jack Built (1900)
Director
The Inexhaustible Cab (1899)
Director
Two Old Sports (1900)
Director
The Little Doctor And The Sick Kitten (1901)
Director
As Seen Through a Telescope (1900)
Director
Hanging Out the Clothes (1897)
Director
Tommy and the Mouse in the Art School (1902)
Director
Mother Goose Nursery Rhymes (1902)
Director
Ally Sloper (1898)
Director
Choice Bouquets (1910)
Director
Scandal Over the Teacups (1900)
Director
The Sign Writer (1897)
Director
Early Fashions on Brighton Pier (1898)
Director
Photograph Taken From An Area Window (1901)
Director
Comic Shaving (1897)
Director
The Maid in the Garden (1897)
Director
The Rival Clothiers (1900)
Director
Venice and the Grand Canal (1904)
Director
Sir Hiram Maxim's Captive Flying Machines (1904)
Director
Woman Draped in Patterned Handkerchiefs (1908)
Director
Animated Doll and Toy Town Circus (1912)
Director
Fording the River (1910)
Director
Down Exeter Incline (—)
Director
Visit to Pompeii (1901)
Director
The Dull Razor (1900)
Director
Weary Willie (1897)
Director
Grand Display of Brock's Fireworks at the Crystal Palace (1904)
Director