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The Man Who Invented Motion Pictures: A True Tale of Obsession, Murder, and the Movies
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About This Book
One of the New York Times Best True Crime of 2022 A "spellbinding, thriller-like" ( Shelf Awareness ) history about the invention of the motion picture and the mysterious, forgotten man behind it—detailing his life, work, disappearance, and legacy. The year is 1888, and Louis Le Prince is finally testing his "taker" or "receiver" device for his family on the front lawn. The device is meant to capture ten to twelve images per second on film, creating a reproduction of reality that can be replayed as many times as desired. In an otherwise separate and detached world, occurrences from one end of the globe could now be viewable with only a few days delay on the other side of the world. No human experience—from the most mundane to the most momentous—would need to be lost to history. In 1890, Le Prince was granted patents in four countries ahead of other inventors who were rushing to accomplish the same task. But just weeks before unveiling his invention to the world, he mysteriously disappeared and was never seen or heard from again. Three and half years later, Thomas Edison, Le Prince's rival, made the device public, claiming to have invented it himself. And the man who had dedicated his life to preserving memories was himself lost to history—until now. The Man Who Invented Motion Pictures pulls back the curtain and presents a "passionate, detailed defense of Louis Le Prince…unfurled with all the cliffhangers and red herrings of a scripted melodrama" ( The New York Times Book Review ). This "fascinating, informative, skillfully articulated narrative" ( Kirkus Reviews , starred review) presents the never-before-told history of the motion picture and sheds light on the unsolved mystery of Le Prince's disappearance.
Reviews
"Barring some improbably rich paper trail, no conscientious biographer can presume to know for sure, and that's a hazard Fischer has to navigate: the editorial line between strictly available truths and making a dead man come alive."
"The book bogs down in necessary but dull descriptions of the technical minutiae that went into making early motion-picture cameras, but the pace picks up as Le Prince struggles to perfect his invention, remain financially solvent and contend with an interminable patents process."
"What followed instead was Le Prince's disappearance, the theft of his ideas, and the cornering of a fledgling movie market by practices verging on gangsterism."
"Fischer adds vivid colour as he chronicles his subject's obsession with bringing the world's first motion picture camera to market, and sketches the revolutionary backdrop to this story of transatlantic treachery ..."
"an astonishing real-life whodunit ..."
"Despite deflating the drama, Fischer tells the bigger story well ..."
"Vivid character sketches, lyrical descriptions of the art and science of moviemaking, and a dramatic plot twist make this a must-read."
"the book's real strength is not its crime-solving (Fischer concludes with a plausible if not provable suspect); it's the way Fischer, who is also a film producer, helps us see how revelatory motion pictures were at the time."
"Why and how did Le Prince disappear?"
"Deftly organized facts, coupled with the technical minutiae of filmmaking, reveal fascinating details of Le Prince's life and the challenges faced in his work, while also exposing the mysterious circumstances surrounding his disappearance."
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