Friday, November 9, 2012
Making movies in Fort Lee in 1912.
Fort Lee for those of us who live here is sometimes just home, and it is hard to fathom the interest the outside world shows in our little borough perched atop the bluffs of the Palisades. This column has covered much of Fort Lee’s history, including our role as the birthplace of the American film industry, but this week we add an international flavor via the year 1912. This year, 2012, as noted in previous archive pieces, we celebrate some of the most important centennials in American and world cinema history, all of which occurred on the streets of Fort Lee. Madame Alice Guy Blache built and opened her Solax Studio on Lemoine Avenue (present days site of the A&P) here in Fort Lee in 1912. She produced, wrote and directed hundreds of …
Monday, July 2, 2012
Members gathered at a cemetery in Mahwah Sunday, where they dedicated a new marker at Alice Guy Blaché’s gravesite on the birthday of the “first woman director in cinema history” and the centennial of the founding of her studio in Fort Lee.
The Fort Lee Film Commission Sunday honored pioneering filmmaker Alice Guy Blaché, who founded Solax Studio in Fort Lee 100 years ago and whose birthday was July 1, by dedicating a new marker at her gravesite—one more befitting a woman who played such an important role in cinema history. Blaché, who died in New Jersey at the age of 95, is buried in Maryrest Cemetery in Mahwah, and until Sunday, her grave was only marked with her name and the dates of her birth and death, as Film Commission executive director Tom Meyers wrote in a recent column. Now, thanks to the efforts of the Fort Lee Film Commission, the marker on Blaché’s grave reads as follows: Alice Guy Blaché 1873-1968 First Woman Motion Picture Director First Woman Studio Head …
Saturday, February 25, 2012
An imaginary Academy Awards ceremony in Fort Lee to honor the Best Pictures of 1912.
This Sunday, ABC will broadcast the 84th Academy Awards live from the newly named Hollywood and Highland Center, thanks to the bankruptcy of--believe it or not--Kodak, which bought the naming rights to the theatre several years ago. As noted in a previous From the Archives piece, nominated this year for Best Picture is an actual, honest-to-goodness silent film: The Artist. This superb film certainly opens the door to a look back at some images that pre-date the Oscars and the founding of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences. What say we take a look at possible nominees for Best Picture, if the Oscars existed in 1912? Of course, since 100 years ago, Fort Lee was the center of film production in the United States, all of the films …
Friday, October 14, 2011
Directors Guild of America's Martin Scorsese presents DGA honor to Madame Blache Thursday
On Thursday night, the Directors Guild of America (DGA) honored posthumously Fort Lee filmmaker and cinema pioneer Alice Guy Blache with the DGA Special Directorial Lifetime Achievement Award. Madame Blache was honored as the first woman director in cinema history. Blache built Solax Studio in Fort Lee on Lemoine Ave., the present-day site of A&P. The Fort Lee Film Commission and the Fort Lee Historical Society placed a marker at this site at the entrance, and it is the only marker in America dedicated to Madame Blache and her Solax Studio. The Fort Lee Film Commission’s odyssey to gain DGA honors for our "Reel Jersey Girl," Madame Blache, began a decade ago. Our work started with Madame Blache biographer Alison McMahan, whose book, Alice…
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
Five things about October’s Alice Guy Blache film retrospective
The Fort Lee Office of Cultural and Heritage Affairs and the Fort Lee Public Library are presenting “Cliffhanger 2011 Fall Festival: Reel Jersey Girl” in October, highlighting Fort Lee’s own Alice Guy Blache, who is widely recognized by film historians, members the Fort Lee Film Commission and, perhaps most notably, the Directors Guild of America (DGA), as the first female director in cinema history. In fact, on October 13, 2011, the DGA will be honoring the pioneer filmmaker at their 75th anniversary celebration in New York City. Here are five things—including four important dates—you should know about the festival in Fort Lee: Number one Oct. 5: The Lost Garden: The life and Cinema of Alice Guy Blache (1995) Number two Oct. 12: Reel …
Monday, July 4, 2011
Long overdue recognition was given Friday to the first female director in the motion picture industry
On Friday morning a small group of people gathered beneath a clear Wedgewood-blue sky at Maryrest Cemetery in Mahwah. But this wasn’t just any ordinary group of people, and they weren’t here to mourn. The group that included a member of the Directors Guild of America (DGA), the founder of the Garden State Film Festival, an owner of the Allendale-based production company MediaMix Studios, the Fort Lee Film Commission, an assemblywoman and the County Executive gathered to pay a long-overdue tribute to the first woman director in the motion picture industry, Alice Guy Blache, on the occasion of her 138th birthday. “She pioneered the role of women in film,” said Diane Raver, founder of the Garden State Film Festival, when speaking about Alice …
Bergen County Executive Kathleen Donovan and Assemblywoman Joan Voss of Fort Lee were among those who honored Alice Guy Blache Friday.
Bergen County Executive Kathleen Donovan issued a county proclamation Friday honoring filmmaker Alice Guy Blache on her 138th birthday, and Sen. Loretta Weinberg (D-37) awarded Garden State Film Festival executive director Diane Raver the Fort Lee Film Commission 2011 Alice Guy Blache Award. Assemblywoman Joan Voss (D-38) also presented the Fort Lee Film Commission with a State Assembly proclamation honoring the organization for its work in furthering the cause of Blache, who established Solax Studio in Fort Lee in 1912, as the world's first female film director. Friday's birthday commemoration began at Blache’s grave site in Mahwah and ended up at Lafayette Theatre in Suffern, N.Y. Photographer Donna Brennan was on hand Friday to capture …
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
Proceeds from three events taking place Friday to benefit FLFC’s annual student film festival and FLHS Academy of Performing Arts
The Fort Lee Film Commission is sponsoring three events Friday celebrating the birthday of cinema pioneer Alice Guy Blache and raising funds for Fort Lee performing arts students and its annual high school film festival. Blache, whom film commission executive director Tom Meyers says in a blog post is the “first woman director in cinema history,” built and operated Solax Studio in Fort Lee from 1912 to 1918, “producing, directing and writing hundreds of short and feature-length films.” “Ms. Blache is just one reminder of Bergen County’s rich film history, and more specifically, Fort Lee’s role in founding the modern-day film industry,” Meyers said, adding that the Director's Guild of America will formally recognize Blache as a “cinema …
Friday, May 20, 2011
A weekly look at historical images and their significance from the archives of the Fort Lee Film Commission and the Fort Lee Historical Society
July 1 marks the 138th birthday of the first female director in cinema history, Madame Alice Guy Blache. Friday night, May 20, marks the Fort Lee High School Circle of the Arts, which is held every two years to showcase the artistic skills of our students in every art form from dance, music, media and graphic works. What, say you, is the connection between these two events, a birthday and a celebration of the arts? Something as simple as geography and as complex as the artistic soul connect the two tightly and forever. The Fort Lee High School building opened in 1929. The site that was chosen for this wonderful building is steeped in the one original art form born in our nation – film. Alice Guy Balche, one of the first three film …
Baba O'Riley
11:39 am on Monday, November 12, 2012
This is great! Maybe you could get the Bergen County Historical Society to participate. more ›