The Boutdebois Brothers (1908) *** 1/2 (out of 4) Another incredibly charming film from French director Emile Cohl. This here uses stop-motion animation to bring two action figures to life where they do a variety of tricks including jumping through hoops and walking on stilts. If you're unfamiliar who Cohl is that's really not too shocking because even though he made the first animated movie he's pretty much been forgotten by many and that includes film buffs. If you're a fan of silent cinema or animation then you really need to check out his work because he made some pretty special gems and this here is one of them. I really thought the stop-motion work was excellent and especially when you consider this was 1908. I was really impressed with the stilts sequence, which looked perfectly done and very believable. At just two minutes the film goes by at a very quick pace and it's certainly highly entertaining.

This is one of Emile Cohl's early animation efforts, what we would call today stop-motion work -- but really, it was actually a variety of trick film: the difference is that Cohl was specializing in them as more than the pieces of stage magicianry that Melies and his competitors like Segundo de Chomon were: an effort to make of these effects not the point of these films, but the grammar of them.And here is an early success as he puts the viewer in the mood of a little boy, playing with his toys, running them through the paces of his little circus. It's no more than that at this point, but it is moving forward.