- LARGE FORMAT CROWN QUATRO SIZE (10 x 7.9 in)
​
- BOUND IN BLACK CLOTH
​
- SILVER STAMPED COVER, SPINE AND BACK COVER ART
​
- INTERNAL PRINTING ON HIGH-QUALITY 128gsm ART PAPER
 
IN 1896, GEORGES MÉLIÈS WAS THE MAN WHO FIRST BROUGHT MAGIC TO CINEMA.
​
Writer, director, actor, magician, he was the first great storyteller of the moving image and the pioneer of special effects. 
​
In 1937, a year before he died, he hand-wrote his autobiography in a 32-page document. He told the decades-long story of his central role in the creation of cinema and the subsequent fall which left him bankrupt and forgotten. 
​
This is a first-hand account of the birth of cinema from its greatest innovator, an illuminating and eccentric testimony which has been out-of-print for many decades and never previously available in English. 
 
WHAT'S IN THE BOOK?
 
A SPECIALLY COMMISSIONED ENGLISH TRANSLATION OF MÉLIÈS'S FULL ORIGINAL TEXT
​
COMPREHENSIVE ANNOTATION BY FILM WRITER JON SPIRA
​
BEAUTIFUL ILLUSTRATIONS
​
AN EXPLORATION OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE MOVING IMAGE PRE-MÉLIÈS
​
AN OVERVIEW OF MÉLIÈS'S FILMOGRAPHY 
OF OVER 500 FILMS
​
'CINEMATIC VIEWS': A BRAND NEW TRANSLATION OF A 1907 ARTICLE WRITTEN BY MÉLIÈS
​
'THE OTHER MÉLIÈS': THE LITTLE-KNOWN STORY OF GEORGES'S BROTHER GASTON
​
INTERVIEWS WITH MÉLIÈS RESTORATION PIONEER SERGE BROMBERG, BFI SILENT FILM CURATOR BRYONY DIXON AND FILMMAKER MICHEL GONDRY
​
THIS EDITION IS A SPECIAL CLOTH-BOUND HARDBACK, WITH A SILVER STAMPED IMAGE OF MÉLIÈS'S ICONIC MOON ON THE COVER AND SILVER EMBOSSING ON THE SPINE AND BACK COVER.