Diagonaldi
Very well executed
Supelice
Dreadfully Boring
Jenni Devyn
Worth seeing just to witness how winsome it is.
Michael_Elliott
Black Diamond Express (1896)This Edison short lasts less than thirty seconds and basically shows some men working on a railroad track. The title refers to an actual train but that isn't really seen anywhere in the film. As you'd expect from a movie of this era, there's really not any story or plot but instead it just shows us a part of life as it was in this period. I've always enjoyed watching these older films just because they can show you the land as it was back in the day or how things were done. Obviously with such a short running time there's nothing with great detail but you at least get to see how work on the railroad was done.
kobe1413
William Heise, the veteran cinematographer from the Edison Film Company's earliest years, and James H. White, the relative newcomer to Edison, both worked on this short. It was Edison's first attempt at the burgeoning train genre in silent film.It starts with several men working on the track. In the distance you can see a train making its way towards the camera. As it approaches, the men step off of the track. You can feel the speed of the train as it takes the bend. On-lookers and the riders on the train wave flags towards each other. Though not as good as Lumiere's 'Arrivee d'un train', it is still one of Edison's better early shorts.
Horst in Translation (filmreviews@web.de)
Unfortunately I did not hear this one coming as it's still from the silent era. But the people standing roadside did and they're euphorically waving their hats as it moves closer and closer. The amount of steam in the air increases rapidly and we see it has to be almost there. And there it is. Shooshhhhhhhh. And there it's gone again. It disappeared as quickly as it came, but there's no pleasure like anticipation right? Nice name for a train BTW. Sounds majestic. Unfortunately it was gone so quickly I can't say if the train does its name justice. The people inside the train were waving with their hats too though, so I guess they must have had a good time. Okay short-film all in all. A good watch for people who love silent films, especially documentaries.
Snow Leopard
Footage of moving trains made up one of the most popular genres in the very earliest years of motion pictures, and the Edison movies featuring the "Black Diamond Express" were far from the only movies of their kind. Much of their interest now lies in comparing them with the other features of the same type.The most famous and memorable of all such movies is still the Lumière feature, "Arrivée d'un train …", made the year before Edison started making the Black Diamond Express series. The composition in the Lumière feature, with the train coming in diagonally relative to the camera frame, is still the classic shot and the most effective perspective. The Edison features, though, were made more in competition with other American-made movies of trains.Like most of the features in the Edison series, this one shows the train coming straight on, rather than at a diagonal, creating a different, simpler effect. One other difference is that it catches the train at its peak speed in mid-journey, rather than as it approaches a station. Thus the sensation of pure speed is a little greater, though at the cost of a much less aesthetically pleasing camera angle.This movie is supposed to have produced the same kind of dramatic effect on its first US audiences as the Lumière feature did in France, and you can see why. Although it does not have the masterful sense of composition to be found in the Lumière features, it succeeds well enough in accomplishing its primary goal of conveying a sense of speed to its viewers.
