1001 Movie Club - Great Train Robbery, The (1903)

#2. The Great Train Robbery (1903)

Why It's In The Book: "Most histories regard The Great Train Robbery as the first Western, initiating a genre that was in a few short years to become the most popular in American cinema. Made by the Edison Company in November 1903, The Great Train Robbery was the most commercially successful film of the pre-Griffith period of American cinema and spawned a host of imitations. What is exceptional about Edwin S. Porter’s film is the degree of narrative sophistication, given the early date. There are over a dozen separate scenes, each further developing the story… There’s one extra shot, the best known in the film, showing one of the robbers firing point blank out of the screen. This was, it seems, sometimes shown at the start of the film, sometimes at the end. Either way, it gave the spectator a sense of being directly in the line of fire. One actor in The Great Train Robbery was G.M. Anderson… Anderson was shortly to become the first star of Westerns, appearing as Bronco Billy in over a hundred films beginning in 1907." -1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

Member Ratings

Kim Wilson - 8/10
"The closing shot (and at the time of the film sometimes the opening shot) of a man aiming a pistol point blank at the audience is one of the most iconic shots in film."
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Adolytsi - 8/10
"This was an early example of narrative, and it holds together quite well."
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Movie Guy Steve - 6/10
"This is the birth of American filmmaking, and it’s equally the birth of removing the cameras from a stage and putting them out in the world."
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Siochembio - 6/10
"Although it exists in a vastly simpler form compared to today’s blockbusters, The Great Train Robbery has all the basic elements of modern film. It is not just a recording of daily life. It is not just a recording of a stage play. It is truly a movie."
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TSorensen - 6/10
"Where Le voyage dans la lune provided us with the rocket-in-the-eye-of-the-moon image, The Great Train Robbery gave us the cowboy shooting at the audience."
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Nicolas Krizan - 5/10
"Rather boring despite the historically groundbreaking stuff"
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Overall Rating: 6.5/10