On Saturday, November 30, the Harwich venue will offer audiences the chance to experience some of the earliest colour films ever produced.
The event, titled Colour Comes To The Movies, will feature two screenings at 12.30pm and 4pm.
Curated and presented by Christopher Bird and David Cleveland, the screenings will showcase historic footage dating from 1896 to 1912.
Both Mr Bird and Mr Cleveland are lifelong film enthusiasts and historians.
Mr Cleveland, a former projectionist and filmmaker, founded the first regional film archive in Britain, the East Anglian Film Archive.
Mr Bird is an award-winning film editor and director, who has made his film history documentaries with Oscar-winning historian Kevin Brownlow.
The films will be shown on an original hand-cranked projector from 1919, operated by Mr Bird.
David Looser, chairman of the Harwich Electric Palace Trust, said: “The Electric Palace is delighted to be able to offer a rare opportunity to the public to see films made in Kinemacolor, the first successful system for filming in natural colour.
“The films shown will be modern prints made from original Edwardian-era negatives which will be projected on an original hand-cranked projector.
“The projector will be set up within the seating area of the cinema, allowing the public the opportunity to see the projector – and projectionist – in action.”
The screenings will include works from pioneering filmmakers such as Georges Méliès, showcasing early techniques including tinting, hand-colouring, and stencil colour.
The film clips will be accompanied by live music from John Sweeney, a seasoned performer at silent film festivals across Europe.
The event will conclude with a rare opportunity to see the first successful natural colour system, Kinemacolor, in action.
Kinemacolor, first publicly shown in 1908, was an early system for filming in natural colours.
It uses standard black-and-white film, but alternate frames are shot via colour filters on a rotating disc in front of the camera lens.
For full details of this event and all upcoming screenings, visit the Electric Palace website at electricpalace.com.
This post was originally published on here
