Guisado on Sunset

A visual essay by filmmaker and critic David Cairns. Recorded for Arrow Video in 2023. Included as a special feature on the 2024 Limited Edition Blu-ray and DVD release of The Shootist.

The Big Bad Wolf stalks Little Bo Peep and steals one of her sheep. She enlists Little Boy Blue and a dancing scarecrow to assist her and her mischievous black sheep in rescuing it. Singing, dancing, hilarity and impalement ensue.

The first woman to appear in front of an Edison motion picture camera and possibly the first woman to appear in a motion picture within the United States. In the film, Carmencita is recorded going through a routine she had been performing at Koster & Bial's in New York since February 1890.

A child is born. We see underwater swimmers representing this. He is young, in a jungle setting, with two fanciful "instincts" guiding him as swooping bird-like acrobats initially menace, then delight. As an adolescent, he enters a desert, where a man spins a large cube of metal tubing. He leaves his instinct-guides behind, and enters a garden where two statues dance in a pond. As he watches their sensual acrobatics of love, he becomes a man. He is offered wealth (represented by a golden hat) by a devil figure. In a richly decorated room, a scruffy troupe of a dozen acrobats and a little girl reawaken the old man's youthful nature and love.

The sculptor Sergio Camargo died 20 years ago. If the bones left in the grave are in fact his remains, would his sculptures be living remains? What's ephemeral and what's lasting? Is there a possible eternity? We see the movie through the eyes of the daughter confronting both the artist and the man.

Three years after her partner's untimely death, Dr. Lena Thierry, a neuroengineer, has been unable to move on. After years of research and development, she attempts to upload his consciousness into a computer software program.

Steal This Film focuses on Pirate Bay founders Gottfrid Svartholm, Fredrik Neij and Peter Sunde, prominent members of the Swedish filesharing community. The makers claimed that 'Old Media' documentary crews couldn't understand the internet culture that filesharers took part in, and that they saw peer-to-peer organization as a threat to their livelihoods. Because of that, they were determined to accurately represent the filesharing community from within. Notably, Steal This Film was released and distributed, free of charge, through the same filesharing networks that the film documents.

In 1946 ethnographic researcher Rouch had attempted to film a "Bangaoui," a hippopotamus hunt along the river Niger, but the results were unsatisfactory.Five years later, he returns and makes the extra effort to get it right this time.

The earliest surviving celluloid film, and believed to be the second moving picture ever created, was shot by Louis Aimé Augustin Le Prince using the LPCCP Type-1 MkII single-lens camera. It was taken in the garden of Oakwood Grange, the Whitley family house in Roundhay, Leeds, West Riding of Yorkshire (UK), possibly on 14 October 1888. The film shows Adolphe Le Prince (Le Prince's son), Mrs. Sarah Whitley (Le Prince's mother-in-law), Joseph Whitley, and Miss Harriet Hartley walking around in circles, laughing to themselves, and staying within the area framed by the camera. The Roundhay Garden Scene was recorded at 12 frames per second and runs for 2.11 seconds.

A film by Louis Aimé Augustin Le Prince, shot in late October 1888, showing pedestrians and carriages crossing Leeds Bridge.

Because she believes she is standing in the way of her parents' happiness, seven-year-old Sarah runs away from home. But the world is too big for the little girl and treacherous and insidious dangers are lurking everywhere. But luckily Sarah has her snow globe, a gift from her father, and his promise that whenever the moon rises in the sky, round and yellow and fat as a grapefruit, something quite wonderful will happen. Because inside the snow globe live two fairy tale characters.

Lucy begins to realize she is not like the other teens in school.

A delightfully pleasing and beautifully hand-colored series of panoramic views, giving the history of the fan. A large ostrich feather fan opens and closes alternately, showing each time a different scene and the various styles of fans in use throughout ages and by many peoples. Scenes illustrated are: Adam and Eve, The Egyptians, The Greeks, Romans, Sixteenth Century, Modern Use.

Several unique specimens of highly ornamented porcelain are shown in series. In each case the various pieces of ware are in reality formed of living people. After a short time has been allowed for admiration of each article, it disintegrates into the individual models, who pose in various figures and dances. In the following pictures are seen a powder box, a clock, candle sticks, a loving cup and a vase, all of wonderfully ornate design, beautifully colored. (Moving Picture World)

Have you ever woken in the night unable to move, certain that you are not alone? This is an experimental documentary examining what happens when dreams leak into waking life. It is about what is real, what is not, and if it even matters.

A cut-out animation depicting the Twelve Labours of Hercules.

The various parts of Faust are played by puppets.

The opening scene is in a tailor's shop, showing the four assistants more or less in love with their employer's daughter. After some time, the tailor says he will give his daughter to the one who shows himself to be the cleverest. Some very amusing incidents follow. The various feats accomplished during the contest are clever examples of trick photography. (Moving Picture World)

A newlywed couple's life is torn apart when a demon abducts Robert's the wife, leading the him on a perilous journey between the opposing worlds of science and magic to save her.

From polar bears in the arctic tundra to black bears in the Northern Rockies, you'll see some of the most spectacular footage ever shot of these enterprising omnivores. Catch salmon with a group of hungry grizzlies on the McNeil River in Alaska. Crawl inside a den with a mother black bear and her cubs. Learn about the challenges facing each of these species as their habitat diminishes.