Chicago Police Parade (1897) User Reviews

Lumière's Usual Good Composition & Photography

[Snow Leopard · 1 September 2005]

This feature displays the usual good composition and photography that you expect from a Lumière film, even their earliest ones. In itself, the material is rather bland. From a purely aesthetic perspective, it would probably have worked better as a still photograph than it does as a movie, because even with plenty of motion, the picture never really changes or develops in any interesting way.

The subject is a police parade in Chicago, which in itself is a pretty impressive display, with row after row of solid-looking officers going past, viewed from the diagonal perspective that you see in so many of the Lumière movies. But unlike their more memorable movies of this kind, which have motley collections of factory workers or irregular swarms of photography buffs, here there is only a steadily moving uniform mass, as another commentator here has described in detail.

The motion is captured skillfully, and for a few moments the parade is a rather impressive sight. As a whole, it's not one of the more memorable movies of its time, mainly because the film footage just doesn't capture much more than a one-frame photograph could have done.

Rather boring police parade

[Horst_In_Translation · 2/10 · 13 October 2013]

Maybe it would be more interesting if sound had been invented already and we could actually hear the trumpets or whatever was playing as the officers keep walking the street. Their uniforms sure look good and their hats are pretty spectacular, but that's not really enough to save this short movie. In their right hand every participant to the parade carries their bat to show they're always ready to turn to action. Possibly the most interesting thing is how absolutely everybody wears a mustache, which was not only extremely common for every John Doe, but it seems to be almost obligatory to have in the police force. Unfortunately, the angle of the camera is chosen in a way where we don't see the crowds at the side of the street who were most likely much more excited to watch this than myself. This way it's a pretty repetitive short-film inferior to many other works from its time.

Early minimalism

[BrandtSponseller · 7/10 · 11 April 2005]

This is an approximately 45-second long Lumière Brothers short (Lumière No. 336) showing a policeman's parade in front of a historic Chicago building (I'm not familiar enough with Chicago to know what building, unfortunately). Officers parade by, standing four side-by-side, in groups of six rows, wearing formal dress, and carrying "batons". A group of spectators stands against the building, watching the parade. Just before the cinématographe runs out of film, a horse-drawn carriage approaches behind the final group of officers.

Once again we have obliques and processionals--perhaps the most formal processional of the Lumière Brothers shorts. The oblique is formed by the angle of the camera with respect to the parade, again exaggerating perspective to give the processional a greater feeling of depth.

What is likely to stand out first for most viewers, aside from the historical novelty of the policemen's dress, is the relative conformity of the force. All of the officers are Caucasian, most are close in height and weight, and most have moustaches. The overall impression is not that far removed from the robot "armies" of a film like I, Robot (2004). This could be a police force of clones.

Given this conformity of look and motion, what catches the viewer's eye for most of the short, then, are the small variations--a slight tilt of the head, a difference of gait, an unusual size or weight, the absence of a moustache, and so on. Although unintentional, because the "school" was not to exist until far in the future, the effect of watching Policeman's Parade, Chicago at this point in time is similar to that of minimalism, especially minimalist music.

Aesthetically, it does not work as well for me, and the historical interest is not as great as in many other Lumière shorts. Although if you're interested in the history of police uniforms and/or Chicago, you'll want to seek this out.

Chicago défilé de policemen

[Michael_Elliott · 26 December 2016]

Chicago défilé de policemen (1896)

According to a few different sources this here was the first movie ever filmed in Chicago. That alone makes it worth wtching. This was one of several films that the Lumiere Brothers films in America during a 1896 trip. The film captures a police parade but it's probably more like some training. There were a lot of parades filmed from this era and they all usually have a large crowd watching. Since there wasn't any crowd to be seen I'm going to guess this here was something else. Either way, this is a pretty entertaining film from a historical nature but it's also fascinating getting to see what cops looked like back in 1896. The type of outfits they were wearing is the main focus here. Obviously there's nothing ground-breaking here but it's still great to see the film.

Interesting though bland because it's mostly marching policemen

[Tornado_Sam · 17 August 2017]

"Chicago Police Parade" is a 1897 actuality by (who else?) August and Louis Lumiere. Once the Brothers got their cameramen to film elsewhere in the world some nice material was turned out. This one was filmed in Chicago and features, say a hundred, uniformed policemen parading through the streets. This is pretty interesting footage but at the same time there's no getting around the fact that once the parade gets started the film gets tiresome after a bit. I mean, nothing really changes, just marching policemen. At the end there is a horse and buggy. Definitely worth a look because of being a look into the era, but it does get a little bland after a bit.