Georges Méliès

Cinema's first magician — a conjurer who saw the Lumières' invention and built it a dream life: five hundred films from a glass studio, a rocket in the Moon's eye, and a toy stand at Montparnasse station at the end.

In images

Details

Lived: 1861–1938
Born: 8 December 1861
Birthplace: Paris
Died: 21 January 1938 · aged 76
Place of death: Paris
Nationality: French
Roles: FilmmakerActor

Selected works

Cataloged from the holding institutions' records. Reproductions appear only where the rights are verified.

Cinema

Hand-colored frame from A Trip to the Moon: the Man in the Moon's cratered face against teal clouds, a red bullet-shaped capsule lodged in his right eye

Artwork reproduction

Film

A Trip to the Moon

1902 · Silent film

The rocket in the Moon's eye: Méliès's 1902 fantasy — astronomers in wizard hats, a capsule fired from a giant cannon, umbrella-wielding battles with lunar insect-men — is the first film in the world's shared imagination, and the proof, seven years into cinema's existence, that the camera could lie magnificently.

Georges Méliès, A Trip to the Moon, 1902. Image: public domain.

Georges Méliès’s Places

The cataloged places connected to Georges Méliès — through the books, and through the documented record.

Places you can enter today appear first, followed by addresses to see from outside and sites that have vanished.

A tree-lined cobbled avenue at Père-Lachaise in summer light, moss-roofed chapel tombs and ivy on either side

Cemetery · Ménilmontant

Open — go in

Père-Lachaise Cemetery

Buried in division 64 in January 1938 — cinema's first magician, a decade after the Gare Montparnasse toy stand and the rediscovery that restored his name.

Visit the place

Organizations

Founded · 1896

Star Film

Founded his own production company within a year of seeing the Lumières' invention, and built its glass studio at Montreuil in 1897 — France's first purpose-built film studio, run as a one-man industry: director, designer, performer, technician, and distributor.

— Encyclopaedia Britannica — Georges Méliès; BFI — Georges Méliès: extracts from his autobiographical account

Sourced claims

Every connection the graph holds for Georges, with the evidence behind it.

Buried at · 1938

Père-Lachaise Cemetery

Buried in division 64 in January 1938 — cinema's first magician, a decade after the Gare Montparnasse toy stand and the rediscovery that restored his name.

— Paris Discovery Guide — 101 Famous Graves in Père Lachaise Cemetery

Founded · 1896

Star Film

— Encyclopaedia Britannica — Georges Méliès; BFI — Georges Méliès: extracts from his autobiographical account

Performed in · 1902

A Trip to the Moon

Georges Méliès plays Professor Barbenfouillis.

— Encyclopaedia Britannica — A Trip to the Moon