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The Legacy of Alice Guy-Blaché

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The Legacy of Alice Guy-Blaché

“When Pamela Green first talked to me about Alice Guy Blaché I thought, ‘how is it possible that I’ve never heard her?’ One of the great pioneers of our industry who created films alongside the

Lumières Brothers, Léon Gaumont, Georges Méliès... As far as we know, she is the first female film director, possibly one of the first narrative filmmakers EVER. A writer, producer, studio

head, with a 1000 films under her belt... The facts in this documentary blew my mind. It’s an

honor to voice this story. May Alice ’s story finally set the record straight and resto re her place in

cinema history.”

-

Jodie Foster, Actress, Director, Producer

“Alice Guy Blache’s contribution to early cinema was monumental on several levels. Her near

total absence from the vast majority of cinema history books has been nothing short of criminal. This beautiful, entertaining and obsessively researched film makes huge strides in righting this

incredible injustice.”

- Mark Romanek, Director.

“It was Hugh Hefner’s lifelong love of movies that inspired the significant contributions he made

over the years toward preserving, restoring and celebrating films and the trailblazers who helped

create them. Although Hef didn’t live long enough to see thi s documentary completed, he was looking forward to Alice Guy- Blaché’s story being told with the hope that she would finally be given her well deserved place in history.”

– Dick Rosenzweig, Producer

“It’s very humbling to see how advanced Alice’s work was a hundred years ago. It reminds you

that the history of an art form is not a straight line, and that progress - whatever that means - is

more dependent on people than it is on time”.

-

Anne Fontaine, Actress, Director, Writer

Logline

Pamela B. Green’s Be Natural: The Untold Story of Alice Guy-Blaché, narrated by Jodie

Foster, is a feature documentary that rewrites film history, revealing for the first time

the full scope of the life and work of cinema’s first female director, screenwriter,

producer, and studio owner Alice Guy-Blaché.

Synopsis

Narrated by Jodie Foster, Be Natural: The Untold Story of Alice Guy-Blaché is a

documentary about the first female filmmaker, Alice Guy-Blaché, which explores the heights of fame and financial success she achieved before she was shut out from the very industry she helped create. Guy-Blaché started her career as a secretary to Léon Gaumont and, at 23, was inspired to make her own film called La Fée aux Choux (The Cabbage Fairy), one of the first narrative films ever made. After her filmmaking career at Gaumont (1896-1907), she had a second decade-long career in the U.S., where she built and ran her own studio in Fort Lee, N.J.

Over the span of her career, she wrote, produced or directed 1,000 films, including 150 with synchronized sound during the ‘silent’ era. Her work includes comedies, westerns and dramas, as well as films with groundbreaking subject matter such as child abuse, immigration, Planned Parenthood, and female empowerment. She also etched a place in history by making the earliest known surviving narrative film with an all-black cast.

Green has dedicated more than eight years of research in order to discover the real story of Alice Guy-Blaché (1873-1968) – not only highlighting her pioneering contributions to the birth of cinema but also her acclaim as a creative force and entrepreneur in the earliest years of movie-making. Green interviewed Patty Jenkins, Diablo Cody, Ben Kingsley, Geena Davis, Ava DuVernay, Michel Hazanavicius, and Julie Delpy - to name a few--who comment on Guy-Blache’s innovations.ꢀGreen discovered rare footage of televised interviews and long archived audio interviews which can be heard for the first time in Be Natural, which affords Alice Guy-Blaché to tell her own story.

Director’s Statement

Who were the first film directors? Responses may vary, but they would rarely include Alice Guy-Blaché, who as early as 1896 made one of the first narrative films in history. Perhaps the most famous woman you’ve never heard of, Alice is a person that should never be forgotten which is why I’ve dedicated over 8 years to make this film to tell her story.

The core of this film is the previously untold story of Alice, a creative force, entrepreneur, leader, and mentor in a new field that she helped pioneer. This film is the celebration of a woman who was there at the beginning of moving pictures, at the intersection of innovation, technology, and storytelling that later became the entertainment industry as we know it today.

Since the film was centered around a driving female force in the film industry, I knew it was important for me to get a strong female to narrate. Jodie Foster was a no-brainer. She is an amazing actress, director, and producer. And she speaks perfect French. We needed somebody who understood the language and the culture to help tell the story seamlessly. Beyond Foster, the support from the film community has been instrumental

in the making of this film. Robert Redford was the film’s first supporter, with Catherine

Hardwicke being the first in-depth interview I was able to conduct. What may be the biggest surprise to some people is that Hugh Hefner is the largest single donor to the film. The outpouring of support from Hollywood in general has been overwhelmingly positive and has encouraged me to complete this film.

I was first moved to begin production on this film as I was watching AMC and discovered a show called Reel Models about pioneering women in cinema, including Alice Guy-Blaché. I didn’t go to film school, but I work in the entertainment industry and I was surprised that I had never heard of her. I asked several people and I realized that they too had never heard of her. And I just kept asking. How could such an important figure in the birth of cinema be unknown? It became clear I had to tell her story. Having worked on Robert Redford movies doing title sequences, I asked him and he was surprised that he did not know of her.

The descendants of Alice Guy-Blaché gave us full access to her papers, photos, diaries, artifacts, and other materials in her personal archive. As part of the detective work for this film, we discovered a lost film collection, one of the oldest in the world, and identified some 10 films that Alice directed or produced. All of this allowed me to fill in the missing links in the story – and along with the new information, I discovered there were many controversies surrounding this remarkably creative woman.

Alice was working at the cutting edge of technological advancement in film, and I wanted to use the latest and the best technologies available today to tell her story. The aesthetic approach is guided by the look and feel of the turning point between the Belle Époque and the early 20th century filtered through a modern lens. We aim not just to

look back at Alice’s past, but to stand next to her and look into her future – our present. I felt like now was the right time, more than ever, to step forward and help bring Alice’s story to light, given all the current conversation about women’s rights and how more often than not, women’s stories are pushed to the shadows throughout history.

My hope is that this film furthers the conversation around how necessary women are to the art of cinema. If people know about Alice—or knew about and continued to remember her contributions to early cinema-- how different might the creative and business landscape be? There were many, many women filmmakers in the early years

but history has forgotten them. It’s time to change that.

In all, and in many ways, the film bridges the gap between past and present, and I believe it will inspire future generations to pick up their tools (whatever they may be) and go for it – inspiration for the generations to come.

There's an Alice in all of us. If you have a dream, and you visualize it, you can do it.

About the Filmmakers

Pamela B. Green (Writer, Director, Producer)

Originally from New York, Pamela B. Green lived most of her life in Europe and Israel and as a result, is fluent in English, French, Italian, and Hebrew. In 2005, she founded PIC, an entertainment and motion design boutique based in LosꢀAngeles, California. Green’s work ranges from feature filmꢀmain titles, motion graphics, creative directing, directing and producing music videos and commercials. She is known in the industry for creating titles sequences and story sequences using her knowledge of graphic design, animation, editorial, and archival rare stock footage research.

Green recently founded Legwork Collective, whose “media detectives” find and obtain

rights to unusual and rarely seen before footage, stills, audio, and artifacts for use in feature films, documentaries, TV series, commercials and other industries outside of entertainment.

Nominated for an Emmy for the documentaryꢀBhutto, Pamela B. Green has produced main titles, created and advised on internal story sequences and marketing campaigns

for films such as the Bourne series, Fast and Furious, The Muppets, and several Marvel

comic book franchises. She has also worked on films such as The Cabin the Woods and The Kingdom. For television and streaming, she has created titles for Supergirl, The Flash, and Quantico among many others.

In addition, ꢀPamela B. ꢀGreen has creative directed and produced TV show and award show packages for, among others, the Academy Awards, Billboard Awards, and Critics Choice Awards, and MTV Awards.ꢀ

Joan Simon (Writer, Executive Producer)

Joan Simon is a writer, curator, editor and arts administrator who works independently for museums, foundations, publishers and diverse media organizations in the United States and in Europe. For the past four years she has lived in Santa Monica, California and for twenty years prior was based in Paris.

A number of her projects have been devoted to artists who made important work in France and the United States, whether they were born there or not. Among these were

those made during Simon’s five years as curator-at-large for New York’s Whitney

Museum of American Art, including Alice Guy-Blaché: Cinema Pioneer and Alexander Calder: The Paris Years, 1926-1933 (with the Centre Pompidou). Simon’s Sheila Hicks: Fifty

Years was the first retrospective in either country for this American artist who has lived in Paris for the past five decades, and her Lorna Simpson show was the first retrospective in Europe devoted to this influential African-American artist (Jeu de Paume in collaboration with the Foundation of the Exhibition of Photography).

Most recently for Pamela B. Green’s feature documentary Be Natural: The Untold Story of

Alice Guy-Blaché, Simon served with Green as co-writer of the script and is one of the

film’s Executive Producers.

A former managing editor of Art in America (1974–83), Simon has written books, contributed to journals and exhibition catalogues, as well as to films about art and artists.

John Ptak (Executive Producer)

UCLA film school alumnus, John Ptak, began his career as an art house theater manager, after which he joined The American Film Institute, where he was part of the initial team that established AFI's Center for Advanced Studies in Los Angeles.

In 1971, he became an agent with International Famous Agency, now ICM, later moving to William Morris and then to CAA, where he became a partner. He left CAA in 2006 to form Arsenal, which provides advisory services to film production companies and financiers.

As an agent, he set up such films as Airplane, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Coal

Miner’s Daughter, Jaws, Taxi driver, National Lampoon’s Vacation, Green Card and Until the

End of the World. His personal clients included Bruce Beresford, Brian De Palma, Costa Gavras, Terry Gilliam, David Lynch, National Lampoon, Sydney Pollack, Paul Schrader, Ridley Scott, Tony Scott and Peter Weir.

At CAA, he expanded the role of the talent agent by representing the financing and distribution arrangements of over 100 films, working with Woody Allen, Kenneth Branagh, Jane Campion, Kevin Costner, Paul Haggis and Anthony Minghella on

pictures such as Crash, Dances with the Wolves, Driving Miss Daisy, The Piano, Swingers

and The Talented Mr. Ripley. He was an executive in CAA’s corporate consultancy on

accounts as Coca-Cola, IMAX, and the French bank, Credit Lyonnais, with whom he participated in the restructuring of MGM and the rebirth of United Artists.

Ptak executive produced Peter Weir's The Way Back, Matt Reeves’ Let Me In, Terry

Gilliam’s The Imaginarium of Dr. Paranssus and Reasonable Doubt.

He is a member of The National Film Preservation Board, the American Archive of Public Broadcasting Advisory Council and The National Film Preservation Foundation.

Geralyn Dreyfous – (Executive Producer)

Geralyn Dreyfous has a wide, distinguished background in the arts, extensive experience in consulting in the philanthropic sector, and participates on numerous boards and initiatives. She is the Founder of the Utah Film Center, a non-profit that curates free screenings and outreach programs for communities throughout Utah. In 2007, she co-founded Impact Partners Film Fund with Dan Cogan, bringing together financiers and filmmakers so that they can create great films that entertain audiences, enrich lives, and ignite social change. In 2013, Geralyn co-founded Gamechanger Films, the first for-profit film fund dedicated exclusively to financing narrative features directed by women.

Geralyn's independent executive producing and producing credits include the

Academy Award winning Born Into Brothels; Emmy-nominated The Day My God

Died, Academy Award-nominated and Emmy Award winning The Square; Academy Award-nominated and Peabody Award-winning The Invisible War; and multiple film

festival winners such as Miss Representation, Meet the Patels, Anita, In Football We Trust, The Hunting Ground, Dreamcatcher, Alive Inside, STEP, Bending the Arc and Be Natural.

Geralyn was honored by the International Documentary Association with the Amicus Award in 2013 for her significant contribution to documentary filmmaking. Variety

recognized Geralyn in their 2014 Women’s Impact Report highlighting her work in the

entertainment industry.

####

CREDITS

Cast:

  • ...
  • Alice Guy-Blaché
  • Herself (archive footage)

Other Cast:

  • Agnès Varda
  • ...

... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
Herself Himself Herself Herself Himself Himself Herself Herself Herself Himself Himself Herself Herself Herself Herself Herself Herself Herself Himself Herself Herself Herself Himself Herself Herself Herself Herself Himself Himself Himself Herself
Alan Williams Alison McMahan Anastasia Masaro Anand Tucker Andy Samberg Anne Fletcher Anne Fontaine Ava DuVernay Ben Kingsley Bobby Cohen Bryony Dixon Catherine Hardwicke Cathy Schulman Cari Beauchamp Cecile Starr Deborah Nadoolman Diablo Cody Dino Everett Drake Stutesman Elsie Fisher Evan Rachel Wood Frederik Du Chau Floria Sigismondi Gale Anne Hurd Geena Davis Gillian Armstrong Howard Cohen James Bobin Jan-Christopher Horak Janeane Garofalo

  • Jane Gaines
  • ...

... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
Herself Himself Herself Narrator Himself Himself Herself Herself Herself Herself Himself Himself Herself Himself Himself Himself Himself Herself Herself Himself Himself Himself Herself Himself Himself Himself Himself Himself Himself Himself Himself Herself Himself Himself Herself Herself Himself Himself
Jean-Michel Frodon Joan Simon Jodie Foster John Bailey Jon M. Chu Julie Anne Robinson Julie Corman Julie Delpy Julie Taymor Kevin Macdonald Kevin Stitt Lake Bell Marc Abraham Marc Wanamaker Mark Stetson Mark Romanek Marjane Satrapi Maxine Haleff Michel Hazanavicius Neil Hunt Lorenzo di Bonaventura Patty Jenkins Peter Billingsley Peter Farrelly Peter Decherney Pierre-William Glenn Rob Haworth Robert von Dassanowsky Richard Abel Serge Bromberg Stephanie Allain Tom Meyers Vadim Perelman Valerie Steele Vanessa Schwartz Walter Murch Wayne Kramer

Other Crew

Music by Peter G. Adams
Film Editing by Pamela B. Green

Dana Archer Greg Bernstein Gala Minasova
... ... ...
Public Relations Legal Services Researcher

  • René Perraudin
  • ...
  • Second Unit Director

(Germany Unit Camera & Electrical Department) Director of Photography (Second Unit Saint Louis Additional Photography) Director of Photography (Second Unit Austria) Camera Operator

  • Joshua Lassing
  • ...

  • Sebastian Thaler
  • ...

... ...
Alexandra Useche Stephen M. Rickert Jr.
Editorial Department Additional Editor

Produced By

Pamela B. Green Abigail Disney Caroleen Feeney Daniela Roth Jarik Van Sluijs Michel Merkt Nion McEvoy Jamie Wolf
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
Producer Associate Producer Associate Producer Associate Producer Associate Producer Associate Producer Associate Producer Executive Producer

  • Joan Simon
  • ...
  • Executive Producer

  • Jodie Foster
  • ...
  • Executive Producer

John Ptak Hugh Hefner
... ...
Executive Producer Executive Producer (as Hugh M. Hefner)

  • Executive Producer
  • Geralyn White Dreyfous
  • ...

  • Jamie Wolf
  • ...
  • Executive Producer

  • John Ptak
  • ...

... ... ... ... ... ... ...
Executive Producer Executive Producer Executive Producer Co-Executive Producer Co-Executive Producer Co-Executive Producer Co-Producer
Robert Redford Regina K. Scully

Cameron O’Reilly

Diane Stewart Gerald Herman Cosima Littlewood

  • Gala Minasova
  • Co-Producer

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    INVESTIGATION: 10-YEAR REVIEW OF GENDER & EMMY NOMINATIONS womensmediacenter.com WOMEN’S MEDIA CENTER ABOUT THE WOMEN’S MEDIA CENTER In 2005, Jane Fonda, Robin Morgan and Gloria Steinem founded the Women’s Media Center (WMC), a progressive, nonpartisan, nonpro!t organization endeavoring to raise the visibility, viability and decision-mak- ing power of women and girls in media and, thereby, ensuring that their stories get told and their voices are heard. To reach those necessary goals, we strategically use an array of intercon- nected channels and platforms to transform not only the media landscape but also a culture in which women’s and girls’ voices, stories, experiences and images are neither suf!ciently ampli!ed nor placed on par with the voices, stories, experiences and images of men and boys. Our strategic tools include monitoring the media; commissioning and conducting research; and undertaking other special initiatives to spot- light gender and racial bias in news coverage, entertainment !lm and television, social media and other key sectors. Our publications include the book “Unspinning the Spin: The Women’s Media Center Guide to Fair and Accurate Language”; The Women’s Media Center’s Media Guide to Gender Neutral Coverage of Women Candidates + Politicians”; “The Women’s Media Center Guide to Covering Reproductive Issues”; and the Women’s Media Center’s annual “The Status of Women in the U.S. Media” report. Our WMC Women Under Siege project investigates sexualized violence. Our original content channels — WMC Features, WMC FBomb, WMC Speech Project and the “Women’s Media Center Live with Robin Morgan” radio program — provide women’s perspectives on both headline stories and timely events that are ignored, not wholly captured or misrepresented in the mainstream media.
  • Girl Before a Mirror

    Girl Before a Mirror

    Hybrid Cinema In Association with Hard Working Movies Girl Before a Mirror Executive Produced by Geralyn Dreyfous, Lynne Silbert, Amy Ziering Produced by Jon Reiss Written and Directed by Jill Goldman Running time: 23:27 Picture Format: Color HD Aspect Ratio: 16:9 Shooting Format: 4K & 16mm Logline A portrait of the writer and editor Genevieve Bahrenburg who fell down a flight of stairs, suffered a traumatic brain injury and after thirteen surgeries is using art and images to reconstruct her identity. Short Synopsis: Genevieve Bahrenburg lived a seemingly enchanted life that could be torn ​ straight from the glossy pages of Vogue, where she worked as a contributing writer. In 2013 she was working on a new book about the iconic artist Chuck Close when tragedy struck. Genevieve fell head first down a flights of stairs, leaving her in a coma for over a month. Thirteen major brain surgeries later, Genevieve now suffers from aphasia, what she calls, " a writer without words". From intimate conversations with Genevieve and her close friends Chuck Close and David Blaine, to fragments of images from her dreams and memories, we will explore with Genevieve as she attempts to construct her new “I”. Synopsis Genevieve Bahrenburg’s life was picture perfect. Successful, brilliant, witty and generous, she lived a seemingly enchanted life that could be torn straight from the glossy pages of Vogue, where she worked as a contributing writer. In 2013 Genevieve had just finished two books with ​ Clayborne Swanson Frank (American Beauty and Young Hollywood ) and was working on a ​ ​ ​ ​ new book about the iconic artist Chuck Close, entitled Close to Close when tragedy struck.
  • I Am We Treatment

    I Am We Treatment

    DOCUTAINMENT films I am We A feature length documentary film Director & Producer Ron Davis I AM Executive Producers Regina K. Scully Geralyn Dreyfous Producers Nancy Talcott and Clay Westervelt OVERVIEW OF SUBJECT MATTER What happens to a helpless child who is subjected to continual sexual, physical or emotional abuse by a friend, relative or worse, a parent? How does the young victim cope, survive and live day-to-day knowing they have no escape? For some, the only way to endure the abuse is by dissociating or literally, breaking off from themselves to escape the reality of what is happening to them. DID (dissociative identity disorder, previously known as multiple personality disorder) has been described as one of the mind’s most brilliant methods of survival. DID is also one of the most controversial psychiatric disorders with no universal consensus regarding its existence, diagnosis or treatment. When children under the age of six are subjected to repeated abuse and unspeakable trauma they must find defense mechanisms in order to survive. For some, the mind creates a system allowing them to compartmentalize their feelings into separate altered parts or individual identities, which have their own personality traits, characteristics, and memories. Each identity can have its own name and personal history. Many DID survivors describe the complex co-existence of their various personalities as “a system”. This system is comprised of many self-states working together to navigate the day-to-day emotional life of the individual in order to survive the unimaginable abuse. However, as an adult freed from their childhood trauma, the dissociative system that enabled the child to survive his or her youth now only hinders their ability to thrive.
  • Jehane Noujaim

    Jehane Noujaim

    Credits Director Jehane Noujaim Producer Karim Amer Editors Pedro Kos, Muhamed El Manasterly, Christopher De La Torre, Pierre Haberer, Stefan Ronowiscz Cinematographers: Muhammad Hamdy, Ahmed Hassan, Jehane Noujaim, Cressida Trew Composers: H. Scott Salinas, Jonas Colstrup Cast: Khalid Abdalla, Magdy Ashour, Ahmed Hassan, Ragia Omran, Ramy Essam, Aida Elkashef Executive Producers: Geralyn Dreyfous, Mike Lerner, Sarah Johnson, Jodie Evans, Lekha Singh, Gavin, Dougan, Dan Catullo III, Ibrahim AlHusseini, Lisa Nishimura, Adam Del Deo, Khalil Noujaim, Alexandra Johnes, Jeff Skoll Technical Information Duration 104 minutes Screening format HDCAM Shooting format 1080p25 Video/Audio Color/Stereo Distribution & Production Partners Noujaim Films Maktube Productions Netflix Originals Worldview Entertainment Roast Beef Productions Participant Media Publicity North America, Latin America, UK, Netherlands, Nordics: Karen Barragan, Netflix Originals ([email protected]) North American Affiliates: West Coast - David Magdael & Associates- David Magdael ([email protected]) East Coast – Susan Norget Film Promotion- Susan Norget ([email protected]) DC - PR Collaborative- Jamie Shor ([email protected]) Sales North American Sales Dana O’Keefe ([email protected]) For all other areas, please contact Sabrina Chammas at [email protected] Awards Sundance Film Festival - Audience Award: World Cinema: Documentary (2013) Toronto International Film Festival - BlackBerry People's Choice Documentary Award (2013). IDA Documentary Association-
  • A Guide to Investing in Social Change Through

    A Guide to Investing in Social Change Through

    STORY WOMEN DOCUMENTARY FILM SOCIAL CHANGE & IMPACT A GUIDE TO INVESTING IN SOCIAL CHANGE THROUGH DOCUMENTARY FILM “There have been great societies that did not use the wheel, but there have been no societies that did not tell stories.” - Ursula K. LeGuin WHO WE ARE Women Moving Millions is a dynamic We would like to give thanks to Dan community of over 220 donors who Cogan and Kelsey Koenig of Impact have each given $1 MM or more to or- Partners who authored a number of ganizations or initiatives promoting the sections in this guide. gender equality across the globe. Our mission is to catalyze unprecedented Overall writing and editing was com- resources towards the advancement pleted by Laura Moore. of women and girls around the world. We believe that in order to create a Additional support was provided more gender balanced world, we by Diana Barrett, Julie Benello, Ruth must invest in women’s philanthrop- Ann Harnisch, Ryan Harrington, ic leadership to catalyze greater Caroline Libresco, Cara Mertes, resources and promote gender-lens Sommai Pham, William White, and philanthropy. Jacki Zehner. The Women Moving Millions Film Special thanks to our “Investing in Circle is dedicated to empowering Social Change through Documentary our members to use film and media Film” Workshop Partner, GUCCI. as a philanthropic strategy, includ- ing mobilizing resources to support documentary film by, for, and about women. The Circle is chaired by Ruth Ann Harnisch and Jacki Zehner, and includes many Women Moving Mil- lions members who are deeply expe- rienced in media and documentary filmmaking. THE POWER OF STORY In 2006, An Inconvenient Truth sparked worldwide awareness and debate on global warming, and jump started a new wave of environmental and sustainability ac- tivism.