"Mark Cousins' narrative takes a chronological journey through the history of film worldwide. It is a story told from the point of view of filmmakers and moviegoers themselves. Weaving personalities, film technology, and production with engaging descriptions of ground-breaking scenes, Cousins uses his experience as film historian, producer, and director to capture the shifting trends of movie history without recourse to jargon. We learn how filmmakers influenced each other, how contemporary events influenced them, and how they challenged established techniques and developed new technologies to enhance their medium." "The Story of Film presents three epochs: Silent (1885-1928); Sound (1928-1990); and Digital (1990-Present), spanning the birth of the moving image, the establishment of Hollywood, the European avant-garde movements, personal filmmaking, world cinema, and recent phenomena such as Computer Generated Imagery and the ever-more "real" realizations of the wildest of imaginations."--Jacket

• Technical thrill (1895-1903) : the sensations of the first movies
• The early power of story (1903-18) : how thrill became narrative
• The world expansion of style (1918-28) : movie factories and personal vision
• Japanese classicism and Hollywood romance (1928-45) : cinema enters a golden age
• The devastation of war and a new movie language (1945-52) : the spread of realism in world cinema
• The swollen story (1953-59) : rage and symbolism in 1950s filmmaking
• The exploded story (1959-69) : the breakdown of romantic cinema and the coming of modernism
• Freedom and want see (1969-79) : political cinema around the globe and the rise of the blockbuster in America
• Mega-entertainments and philosophy (1979-90) : the extremes of world cinema
• Can see (1990-present) : computerization takes cinema beyond photography