Uncle Josh (Charles Manley) was one of the first film character stars--as he appeared three times in Edison films. In this installment, Uncle Josh is being bedeviled by Satan--who keeps appearing and disappearing in his room. Eventually, Uncle Josh becomes so frustrated, he knocks the Devil out, ties him up and stuffs him into a hope chest! Now considering this IS the Prince of Darkness, this seems like too easy a solution and you can watch this to see if Josh prevails.This is a cute little film--probably the best of the Uncle Josh films. While the movie isn't brilliant, it makes nice use of stop-motion and is kind of funny. Not one to rush to see but worth it for cinemaniacs who love very early cinema.

Uncle Josh's Nightmare (1900) ** 1/2 (out of 4) Uncle Josh in a Spooky Hotel (1900) ** 1/2 (out of 4) Uncle Josh at the Moving Picture Show (1902) ** (out of 4)This Edison trilogy, directed by the legendary Edwin S. Porter, is considered the first film(s) to have a sequel and in fact this is probably the earliest attempt to create a franchise series. It's also worth noting that the actor playing Uncle Josh, Charles Manley, was an actor at the Ford Theatre when President Lincoln was assassinated so there's an interesting bit of history that makes this series worth checking out. In Uncle Josh's Nightmare, the Uncle is in bed trying to fall asleep when the Devil appears in his room and tries to keep him up. Uncle Josh must battle the Devil in order to try and get some sleep before morning. This film is really no different than countless films made by George Melies but it still remains slightly entertaining since there's a lot more action in this film than what we saw in the Melies movies. The action lasts for the entire movie and keeps the film moving well. In the sequel Uncle Josh in a Spooky Hotel, our good guy goes to a hotel to try and get some sleep but as soon as he walks into the room a spirit begins causing him trouble. Once again, this film really isn't any different than what we've seen from Melies but, again, the movie remains entertaining throughout. The special effects of the spirit coming up isn't the greatest in the world but the film does hae enough charm to keep it going. In the final film, Uncle Josh at the Moving Picture Show, our good guy walks in to see a movie but then thinks what he's seeing on the screen is real. This last film in the series is certainly the weakest but it still contains a little charm but it needed more of the laughs to work. We've all heard stories of people walking into a movie for the first time and freaking out by what they saw and I was hoping this film would capture that but it didn't. In the end, this trilogy of films runs just under six minutes and is worth viewing for anyone interested in the early days of cinema.

French filmmaker Georges Méliès was definitely the most important of the early pioneers of cinema. While he wasn't precisely the inventor of motion pictures; he was the one who saw the potential of the new invention as a storytelling device. A stage magician, Méliès became an early master of special effects, and his short movies were filled with the most diverse and inventive catalog of tricks, gimmicks and techniques to create real magic on the screen. Of course, imitators would soon appear, and the best of them was without a doubt American director Edwin S. Porter, who working for Edison, made the first American films able to compete with Méliès' "Cinemagic". "Uncle Josh's Nightmare" was Porter's fifth movie, a 2 minutes short devised to mimic one of Méliès' first and most famous discoveries: disappearing objects.In this movie, Uncle Josh (Charles Manley) is attempting to get some sleep, but right after he jumps to bed, strange things begin to happen to him. A demon (actor unknown, but very probably the same actor who played Mephistopheles in Porter's "The Mystic Swing") appears, and is decided to bother Uncle Josh using his many magic tricks. Uncle Josh tries to stop the annoying fiend but his attempts to catch him prove useless due to the demon's ability to disappear. Finally, Uncle Josh catches him, and after an amusing fight, he manages to lock the demon inside a box. But the box won't be enough to stop this devil, and Uncle Josh's nightmare will get a bit worse after the devil escapes from the box.Like most of Porter's early movies, this short is first and foremost, a novelty film made to impress audiences and to show off Porter's progress with camera tricks. While finally in this movie there is more of a plot than in the rest of Porter's early works, the special effects are the main attraction of the movie and everything revolves around the disappearing acts. Shot in one stage disguised as a bedroom, a thing that's worth to point out is the dynamism of the film: there is always movement on the screen. This looks like a big step ahead for Porter, as it shows his progress in editing and camera tricks. Interestingly, Uncle Josh would become one of the first "franchises" in cinema, as this character would appear in three more movies (probably directed by Porter and performed by Manley too), where his supernatural adventures would be the background for interesting displays of special effects.Of course, it still pales and comparison with Méliès' works of the same year, but by watching this modest early short one can't deny that Porter was a fast learner, and that he would make up his lack of originality with technical progress. Even when "Uncle Josh's Nightmare" has some good effects, what truly made Méliès' movies better than Porter was not only his superior tricks, but his care for putting them in interesting plots, something that Porter was at this stage still unable to do. While not a bad movie, "Uncle Josh's Nightmare" is probably more valuable for its historical importance in both Porter's career and cinema's history, than for its artistic merit or entertainment value. 5/10

There isn't much to this piece of early cinema. It is basically a novelty film that employs stop-motion editing to have objects appear or disappear from the scene. In many instances, the editing is so obvious that one can't help but laugh. However, it is this quality that makes this film slightly entertaining to watch, if only to see how far cinema has advanced in the last 100+ years.