Alice Guy-Blaché

Alice Guy-Blaché

Born: July 1, 1873
Died: March 24, 1968
in Saint-Mandé, Val-de-Marne, France
Alice Guy-Blaché (July 1, 1873 – March 24, 1968) is generally considered to be the world's first female director. French-born Alice Guy entered the film business as a secretary at Gaumont-Paris in 1896. The next year Gaumont changed from manufacturing cameras to producing movies, and Guy became one of its first film directors. She impressed the the company so much with the output (she averaged two two-reelers a week) and quality of her productions that by 1905 she was made the company's production director, supervising the company's other directors. In 1907 she married Herbert Blaché, an Englishman who ran the company's British and German offices. The pair soon went to the U.S. to set up the company's operations there. In 1910 she set up her own production company in New York and built a studio in Fort Lee, New Jersey. After a period of critical and financial success, her company's fortunes declined and she eventually shut down the studio. Although she secured work directing films for several major Hollywood studios, she returned to France in 1922 after her divorce from Blache. She was never able to secure any directorial jobs there, and never made a film again. In 1964 she returned to the U.S. and lived in Mahwah, New Jersey - not far from where her original studios were - with her daughters, where she died in 1968.

Movies for Alice Guy-Blaché...

Alice Guy, the First Female Filmmaker
Title: Alice Guy, the First Female Filmmaker
Character: Self - Filmmaker (archive footage)
Released: November 20, 2021
Type: Movie
Who, apart from moviegoers, knows Alice Guy (1873-1968) today? However, she was the first woman behind the camera and the first female director and producer of fiction films in history.
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Be Natural: The Untold Story of Alice Guy-Blaché
Title: Be Natural: The Untold Story of Alice Guy-Blaché
Character: Self (archive footage)
Released: December 7, 2018
Type: Movie
The epic life story of Alice Guy-Blaché (1873–1968), a French screenwriter, director and producer, true pioneer of cinema, the first person who made a narrative fiction film; author of hundreds of movies, but banished from history books. Ignored and forgotten. At last remembered.
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The Women Who Run Hollywood
Title: The Women Who Run Hollywood
Character: Herself (archive footage)
Released: May 16, 2016
Type: Movie
The first talkie was directed by Alice Guy, the first color film was produced by Lois Weber, who directed more than 300 films over 10 years. Frances Marion wrote screenplays for the Hollywood Star Mary Pickford and won two Oscars, Dorothy Arzner was the most powerful film director in Hollywood. And what do all of them have in common? They are all women and they have all been forgotten. Incredibly, it also took until 2010 for the first woman, Kathryn Bigelow, to win the Oscar for Best Director. Even if underrepresented women have always played a big part in Hollywood and it is this part of the film history left untold that this documentary sets out to uncover.
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The Lost Garden: The Life and Cinema of Alice Guy-Blaché
Title: The Lost Garden: The Life and Cinema of Alice Guy-Blaché
Character: Self (archive footage)
Released: January 1, 1995
Type: Movie
A biodoc about the first female filmmaker and her relative disappearance from the history of cinema.
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Title: Cinépanorama
Character: Self
Released: February 4, 1956
Type: TV
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Alice Guy Films a 'Phonoscène' in the Studio at Buttes-Chaumont, Paris
Title: Alice Guy Films a 'Phonoscène' in the Studio at Buttes-Chaumont, Paris
Character: Herself, the director
Released: January 1, 1907
Type: Movie
Behind-the-scenes footage showing Alice Guy directing an early sound film.
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Mireille
Title: Mireille
Released: January 3, 1906
Type: Movie
Lost short film
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Spain
Title: Spain
Character: Self - Presenter
Released: January 1, 1905
Type: Movie
Alice Guy shoots a travelogue documentary all around Spain.
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The Cabbage-Patch Fairy
Title: The Cabbage-Patch Fairy
Released: March 31, 1896
Type: Movie
A brief fantasy tale involving a strange fairy who can produce and deliver babies coming out of cabbages. This film is lost or never existed. Copies of it online are actually the 1900 remake.
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Animated Portrait Shot by L and A Lumière
Title: Animated Portrait Shot by L and A Lumière
Character: Herself
Released: December 31, 1895
Type: Movie
An early Kinora demonstration film.