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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
"Fischer's adept character sketches bring to life dozens of people who played a role in the creation of motion pictures and help reveal the cutthroat world inhabited by late 19th-century inventors ..."
"Fischer's stellar, suspenseful narrative is a work of art unto itself that finally gives Le Prince--and the impact of his often overlooked, cut-short creative genius--his due."
"His eloquent, sometimes excitable writing style goes a long way when it doesn't wander off into the celluloid weeds."
"Fischer also gives his narrative the flavour of a whodunit, with chapters entitled 'The Crime' and 'A Gun that Kills Nothing'."
"Fischer sorts fact from conjecture as he offers a solution to this 130-year-old cold case."
"Particularly insightful are Fischer's interpretations of the likely motivations of Le Prince and his assistants as they attempted, under frequent financial duress, to complete a workable prototype of their camera and secure international patent protections."
"what Fischer does do is bring sharp forensic skills and a cool head to a narrative that has become hijacked by wild conspiracy theories ..."
"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."
"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."
"A remarkable cast of characters (including Le Prince's equally fascinating wife, Lizzie) makes for compelling reading."
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