What Happened in the Tunnel
Directed byEdwin S. Porter
StarringBertha Regustus
Gilbert M. Anderson
CinematographyEdwin S. Porter
Production
companies
  • Edison Mfg. Co.
  • Kleine Optical Co.
Distributed by
  • Edison Mfg. Co.
  • Kleine Optical Co.
Release date
  • November 6, 1903 (1903-11-06)
Running time
1 minute
CountryUnited States
LanguageSilent

What Happened in the Tunnel is a 1903 short film starring Bertha Regustus and Gilbert M. Anderson. The film was directed and shot by Edwin S. Porter, produced by Edison Mfg. Co.,[1] and distributed by Edison Mfg. Co. and Kleine Optical Co.[2]

Plot

Inside a railroad car, a black maid sits next to a white woman. Behind both women sits a white man reading a newspaper. The woman drops her handkerchief. The man hands it back to her and starts to flirt with her. The train enters the tunnel and the film fades to black. As the train emerges from the tunnel, the two women have switched places and the man is kissing the black maid. The man looks around to see if anyone else saw and sits back down in embarrassment as the two women share a laugh over their prank.

Cast

Reception

In the book, For the Love of Pleasure: Women, Movies, and Culture in Turn-of-the-century Chicago, the author describes how the film deals with "how widespread and exemplary is this syntactical employment of gendered, classed, and racial elements for the empowerment, not of a generalized but of a highly particular kind of female gaze."[4]

See also

References

  1. Porter, Edwin; Anderson, Gilbert (1903). "What happened in the tunnel". Library of Congress.
  2. "What Happened in the Tunnel". American Film Institute Catalog. ProQuest 1746546976.
  3. "What Happened in the Tunnel (1903)". Century Film Project.
  4. Rabinovitz, Lauren (1988). For the Love of Pleasure Women, Movies, and Culture in Turn-of-the-century Chicago. Rutgers University Press. ISBN 0813525349.
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