On Dec. 28, 1895, cinema stepped into public life when the Lumière brothers held the first commercial movie screening in Paris.
Audiences paid admission to watch short moving pictures at the Salon Indien du Grand Café. Using their invention, the Cinématographe – a device that filmed, developed and projected film – the brothers showed everyday scenes, including workers leaving a factory and a train arriving at a station. The films lasted under a minute but amazed viewers unused to motion on a screen.
That night transformed film from novelty into shared entertainment, laying the foundation for movie theaters and narrative cinema worldwide.
– Staff report with AI assist*, The Today 100
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