Italo Pacchioni

Italo Pacchioni (Source: http://sempreinpenombra.com)Pioneer Italian film maker

Already established as a successful studio photographer, in 1896 Pacchioni, with the aid of his brother Enrico and a mechanic, built a motion picture camera and projector, after the Lumières refused to sell them a Cinématographe. His first film was a direct riposte to the Lumières: Arrivo del treno nella stazione di Milano, which had the advantage of a considerably more spectacular location than La Ciotat offered the Lumières. Also in 1896, Pacchioni made three one-minute staged films: La gabbia dei matti (The Madhouse), Battaglia di neve (Snow fight) and Il finto storpio (The Fake Cripple), all performed by himself and his family. During the succeeding years Pacchioni also filmed actualities: La fiera di Porta Genova, Il vecchio verziere di Milano, Ginnasi della Mediolanum, I funerali di Umberto I (1900), I funerali di Giuseppe Verdi (1901). Pacchioni also experimented with stereoscopic films, but seems to have taken little interest in cinema after the first years of the century.

David Robinson