Even for an early film this one stands out as a particularly pointless exercise. American Mutoscope & Biograph made a whole series of these films covering everything from the mail being collected from post boxes to being delivered to homes. This one shows a postman on a bicycle entering screen left and parking his bicycle outside a house. He dismounts his bike and knocks on th door of the house. A housewife answers and signs for the letter he is delivering. Once he has his signature the postman gets back onto his bicycle and exits screen left. All this takes about forty seconds, which is probably the films only saving grace.
2 Reviews
Not Very Special
boblipton24 May 2014
A man bicycles to a house, gets a signature at the front door, hands off a letter and bicycles off while the camera sits off to the side and watches. It's not a very interesting handling of the subject. By this time Biograph seemed to be contracting out to do series of industrial films. The previous year it had been St. John's Guild. The next year, Mr. Weed would head off to Missouri to do a series about the schools there, probably at the behest of the school district.
This movie was one of several dozen done for the United States Post Office. Put the series together and they show a large and varied operation that justified the large budgets that Congress voted them every year.
It would also drive a viewer mad with boredom. Mr. Weed's camera placement and composition was good for the era, but the action wasn't very exciting. That's the annoying aspect of these series. It would not be until Billy Bitzer's series showing off the Westinghouse plant in Pittsburgh the following year that they would start to get some lively camera movement. These are motion pictures, after all. They need motion.
This movie was one of several dozen done for the United States Post Office. Put the series together and they show a large and varied operation that justified the large budgets that Congress voted them every year.
It would also drive a viewer mad with boredom. Mr. Weed's camera placement and composition was good for the era, but the action wasn't very exciting. That's the annoying aspect of these series. It would not be until Billy Bitzer's series showing off the Westinghouse plant in Pittsburgh the following year that they would start to get some lively camera movement. These are motion pictures, after all. They need motion.
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