Comprehensive Notes: The Cinema of Attractions (Gunning, 1986)

Overview

• This set of notes summarizes Tom Gunning’s analysis of the Cinema of Attractions, its spectator relations, and its influence on avant-garde practice, drawing on his essay from Wide Angle (1986) and subsequent scholarship with Gaudreault.
• Central claim: Early cinema (roughly pre-1906) is best understood not as a precursor to narrative cinema but as a distinct mode—the cinema of attractions—focused on displaying, exhibition, and direct engagement with the spectator.
• The tension and eventual synthesis between attractions and narrative shapes the history of film form, spectatorship, and the trajectories of avant-garde practices.
• Gunning situates this heterogeneity within a broader cultural shift toward mass entertainment and fairground aesthetics, connecting early cinema to vaudeville, variety theatre, and amusement parks.

Key concepts

• Cinema of attractions: a mode that prioritizes showing something to the spectator, often through direct address, spectacle, and exhibitionism, rather than building a self-contained diegetic world.
• Exhibitionist spectator relation: films invite the audience to watch, be intrigued, and engage with the spectacle; the camera’s look at the audience (and actors looking at the camera) disrupts realistic illusion.
• Early film as a display of visibility: emphasis on the visual demonstration of cinema’s possibilities (trick effects, montage of attractions, close-ups for effect).
• The relationship to mass culture: early avant-garde interest in popular entertainments (fairground, vaudeville) as sources of energy, stimulation, and a new kind of spectator.
• The term attraction (and its lineage): borrowed from Sergei Eisenstein, who used “montage of attractions” to describe a theater model built on sensual or psychological impact; the term itself arises from the fairground and the roller coaster (American Mountains).
• Heterogeneity vs opposition: early cinema is not simply opposed to narrative cinema; rather, attractions persist underground in avant-garde practices and as components within narrative genres (e.g., musical films).

Historical context and key actors

• Lumière vs Méliès as two poles within early cinema:
  • Lumière: “placing the world within one’s reach” through travel films and topicals; an early real-world viewing strategy.
  • Méliès: cinema as stage trickery and magical display; scenario as a pretext for stage effects and tableau; emphasizes spectacular display over narrative continuity.
• The two traditions can be united under a broader conception of cinema as a sequence of views and visual attractions rather than a single, cohesive story engine.
• Early cinema’s audience experience is shaped by non-narrative exhibition—spectators are drawn to visuals and effects, not primarily to character-driven plots.

Early cinema vs later narrative cinema

• Narrative dominance (prevalent after 1906–1907): Griffith-era cinematic discourse shifts toward self-contained diegetic worlds and character psychology.
• However, attraction-based practice does not disappear; it moves underground and persists in several forms:
  • Avant-garde practices that foreground exhibition and visual shock.
  • Narrative films that incorporate attraction elements (e.g., certain genres like the musical).
• The early cinema is thus a “mixed economy” of attractions and emerging narrative strategies.

What precisely is the cinema of attractions?

• Core definition: a cinema based on the capacity to show something—an exhibitionist cinema that solicits spectator attention through visibility.
• Spectator contact with the audience: cinema that invites direct address and interaction with viewers, often via the look at the camera by actors.
• Theatrical display dominates over diegetic immersion: the primary aim is shock, wonder, and curiosity rather than fully realized character-driven stories.
• Examples of exhibitionist features:
  • Comedians and performers looking at the camera with glee or wink at the audience.
  • Conjurors and magic films that exploit magical transformations as main attractions.
  • Erotic or risqué films that display bodies and nudity, characteristic of early non-narrative attractions.
• The approach to close-ups differs from later narrative cinema: close-ups function not as narrative punctuation but as an attraction in themselves.

Specific forms and examples in early cinema

• Trick films (pre-1906): often plotless, stringing together transformations as demonstrations of cinema’s magical possibilities; Le Voyage dans la lune ($1902$) is framed by a narrative pretext but primarily showcases visual marvels.
• Early close-ups: not used for tension or advancement of plot but to reveal a visual spectacle (e.g., a close-up of a woman displaying an ankle).
  • The Gay Shoe Clerk ($1903$)
  • Photographing a Female Crook ($1904$)
  • Hooligan in Jail ($1903$)
• Non-narrative sequences and the use of offscreen supplements: early showmen often re-edited films, added sound effects and spoken commentary to enhance the attraction.
• Hale’s Tours (pre-$1906$): the largest chain of theaters showing non-narrative sequences (moving-vehicle footage) within a train-car theater, complete with conductor and simulated sounds; exemplifies exhibitionist, fairground-like experience.
• The relation to vaudeville and the variety program: films shown alongside unrelated acts and songs, creating a non-narrative, spectacle-oriented viewing context.
• The variety theater’s influence: Marinetti’s praise for astonishment and the creation of an engaged, participatory spectator; notes on the shift from a passive audience to an actively involved one.

The audience, exhibition, and the fairground impulse

• Early cinema as part of a mass-entertainment ecosystem: popular art once valued for its ability to excite spectators rather than to narrate a world.
• The fairground and amusement parks as crucial contexts: fog of novelty, crowd energy, and sensational displays shape early cinema’s ethos.
• The spectator as active participant: the audience is addressed directly, encouraged to watch, react, and engage with the spectacle.
• The relationship to the powerful rhetoric of progress and modernity: the cinema is a new technological marvel, akin to X-rays or the phonograph, that invites discovery and demonstration.
• This context helps explain why the cinema of attractions thrived in a non-narrative, exhibition-oriented environment and why it fused with other popular entertainment forms.

Exhibition practices and audience-controlled shows

• Offscreen supplements and live elements: exhibitors sometimes added sound effects and spoken commentary to films after purchase.
• The Hale’s Tours model: cinema as a simulated travel experience; a niche form of immersive attraction rather than pure narrative cinema.
• The look of the audience and the on-camera gaze: actors frequently address or acknowledge the spectator, enhancing the sense of direct address and visibility.

The transition toward narrative and the 1907–1913 shift

• 1907–1913 marks the true narrativization of cinema, culminating in feature films that reframe the variety format as a vehicle for drama and character-based storytelling.
• The Great Train Robbery ($1903$) represents a pivotal moment of ambivalence: it initiates direct, confrontational sight-within-the-face of the audience while also delivering a linear narrative.
• Griffith’s influence: cinematic signifiers evolve toward the narration of stories and the construction of an enclosed diegetic world; look-at-the-camera becomes taboo in mainstream narrative cinema.
• Yet, the attraction persists within cinema palaces: newsreels, cartoons, sing-alongs, and occasional vaudeville acts cohabit with narrative features, signaling a continued hybrid form.

The chase film as a transitional genre

• The chase (early narrative form) embodies a synthesis of attractions and narrative:
  • Personal ($1904$) serves as a model for chase-oriented narrative and visual stimulation.
  • For example, in a chase scene, pursuers encounter minor obstacles that slow progress, providing mini-spectacle pauses within the ongoing pursuit.
• Edison’s distribution strategy: a film like Personal could be offered as a complete film or as separate shots, enabling the audience to extract single images of interest without the surrounding narrative closure.
• The dialectic between spectacle and narrative is a recurring theme in cinema history, echoed by scholars like Laura Mulvey (visual pleasure and narrative cinema) and Donald Crafton (slapstick and narrative). It illustrates how both spectacle and narrative contribute to the classical cinema’s complex logic.

The Great Train Robbery and the ambivalent heritage

• The Great Train Robbery ($1903$) exemplifies the ambivalent heritage: direct, immersive spectacle on one hand, and a narrative progression on the other.
• The film signals a shift from pure attraction toward organized narrative, while not discarding attraction’s power entirely.
• The cinema’s capacity to draw attention remains a primal force behind Hollywood’s advertising logic (see the pragmatic emphasis on highlighting features and urging audiences to “See!”).

The ongoing relevance of attractions and the potential of the avant-garde

• The radical heterogeneity of early cinema should not be read as a fatal contradiction to narrative cinema; rather, it offers a reservoir of methods and energies for contemporary experimental practice.
• In the American avant-garde context, the tradition of popular entertainment provides a resource for experimentation:
  • A carnival-like ethos (the "Coney Island of the avant-garde") that can connect Méliès, Keaton, Un Chien andalou ($1928$), and Jack Smith.
  • The idea that spectatorship can be reshaped by programmatic, sensational, and direct-address strategies.
• The broader implication: changes in film history are inseparable from shifts in how films address and address themselves to audiences; every era redefines spectatorhood, whether through the thrill of attraction or the immersion of narrative.

Implications, connections, and larger themes

• Ethical and cultural implications:
  • Early erotic displays reveal a tension between exhibitionism and the construction of diegetic worlds; later censorship and underground dissemination reflect ongoing debates about sexuality on screen.
  • The attraction-centric approach raises questions about the ethics of viewer manipulation, the politics of spectacle, and the boundaries of what counts as cinema.
• Philosophical reflections:
  • The attraction model emphasizes perception, sensational impact, and the immediacy of viewing as primary experiences of cinema, challenging ideas of cinema as solely a medium of storytelling.
  • The persistence of attraction within later cinema suggests a more plural and less linear history of film form than a simple progression from attractions to narrative.
• Practical takeaways for study and analysis:
  • When examining early films, consider not just narrative content but the ways in which films solicit attention, demonstrate technique, and engage spectators through display and illusion.
  • Recognize the continuity between early attractions and later cinematic forms (e.g., chase sequences, close-ups, spectacle moments) and how they function within different genres.
• Real-world relevance:
  • The early cinema’s emphasis on exhibition and audience engagement foreshadows contemporary questions about user experience, immersive media, and the role of spectacle in entertainment ecosystems.

Notable terminology and references in context

• “Cinema of attractions” (Gunning): a term highlighting cinema’s early power to show, exhibit, and captivate without necessarily building a diurnal world of characters.
• “Montage of attractions” (Eisenstein): a later theoretical framework that sought to reorganize spectator impact through a montage of sensations rather than a single diegetic narrative.
• Key historical anchors and examples:
  • Lumière travel films and topicals: continued tradition of presenting the world within reach ($(1900)$–$(1906)$ contexts).
  • Méliès (magical trick films): pretext-structure and spectacular tableau ($(1902)$, Le Voyage dans la lune).
  • The Bride Retires ($1902$): illustrates the clash between erotic display and diegetic narrative.
  • The Great Train Robbery ($1903$): hybrid of attraction and narrative progression.
  • Personal ($1904$) and Edison’s re-editing practices: demonstrate distribution and narrative fragmentation.
  • Hale’s Tours: pre-1906 projection aesthetic combining cinema with train-car theater.
  • The 1920s–1928 era avant-garde lineage: Keaton, Un Chien Andalou ($(1928)$), Jack Smith, and the revival of carnival-like sensibilities.
• Foundational note: Gunning’s argument is elaborated through collaboration with André Gaudreault and situates early cinema within broader debates about film history and the spectator’s evolving role.

Summary takeaway

• Early cinema is not simply a stepping stone to narrative cinema; it is a distinct, historically significant modality—the cinema of attractions—that shapes how audiences experience moving images.
• This modality coexists with and informs later cinematic forms; its influence persists in both avant-garde experimentation and some mainstream genres.
• Understanding early film requires attention to exhibition practices, spectator address, and the cultural context of mass entertainment, not only to the aesthetic output of individual films.