Although I certainly found Werner Nekes's "Film Before Film" to be too long and quite monotonous, it was an intriguing look at not only how film developed into what we now recognize it as today, but also how people entertained themselves before film existed. At first I couldn't grasp how people had amused themselves so immensely with these bizarre contraptions, but that was because I was not considering it in terms of film not being around yet....I suppose people 150 years ago were much more easily dazzled and amused.
Last year I was in New York City and forced my father to take me to the Museum of the Moving Image near Queens. It is an excellent and thorough museum about film and television and contains a floor devoted to the beginnings of film and the sorts of pre-film objects Nekes displays, as well as giving attention to foreign, avant-garde, and new wave films that are often forgotten. Definitely worth checking out for anyone in this class, and the hands-on experience with these strange pre-film toys is definitely more intriguing.
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