Century Film Project

One of the very first films made by Auguste and Louis Lumière, this movie takes advantage of their industrial background to depict an activity that was striking but also typical of the late-nineteenth century. It seems perhaps that the Lumière brothers were still learning some of the basics of film “grammar” as they made this.

The single-shot film depicts a huge industrial boiler suspended by ropes over the deck of a ship, evidently having been lowered onto a huge trolley or wheeled cart on a track. A ladder is propped up against it facing us, and three men climb down the ladder while others seem to check the lines and hold it steady. The ladder is removed and hauled away, and the men mill around, possibly being instructed to keep moving until the film runs out.

One gets the impression that Lumière (whichever one it was running the camera) started this shot a bit too late to get the real drama of this huge thing being swung over the deck of the boat, and tried to make up for it by having the men “look busy” after the fact. It’s also possible that, since tracking shots and pans hadn’t yet been invented, they couldn’t think of a good way to film that, and settled for this. The English title was a bit deceptive to me; I had assumed that someone would be loading coal into a boiler, not that they were loading the boiler itself onto a ship, though that is literally what “loading a boiler” means.

Director: Auguste and/or Louis Lumière

Camera: Auguste or Louis Lumière

Starring: Unknown

Run Time: 50 secs

You can watch it for free: here.