Discovering Cinema

In "Learning to Talk," director's Eric Lang and Serge Bromberg dive deep into the fascinating and often times hilarious history of sound in film. Beginning with experiments that far preceded the "talkies", this documentary examines the many trials and tribulations of attempting to bring sound to film, particularly "Live Sound Accompaniments," "Sound on Disc," and eventually "Sound on Film."

The struggle to bring color to the black & white images of early film is profiled in this documentary, "Movies Dream in Color," the second part of the Discovering Cinema program. From the very early years of painting on glass to produce magic lantern images in the 18th century, color and colorized photography had always been in demand, way before motion pictures showed up.

An early example of the merging of silent and sound film, known as a "part-talkie", at a time when film-going audiences couldn't get enough of the new talking pictures. This short features a mishap during a flying contest in which an inexperienced pilot assumes the roll of his professional friend.

One of the very first attempts at showcasing what the new "three-strip" technicolor process could do with live action footage, "La Cucaracha" was a smash success as vibrant colors seem to explode off the screen. "La Cucaracha" helped propel the new technicolor process into an illustrious future and even garnered an Academy Award in 1935 for Best Short Subject (Comedy).