Quartile rating: 6.5/10 · 1 rating
A collection of restored prints from the Lumière Brothers.
Lumière! is a remarkable archival documentary compiling restored Lumière Brothers short films with commentary by Thierry Frémaux. Cinematography earns a 4 not for modern craft but for the sheer historical and aesthetic weight of the restored originals — these are literally the birth of cinema, visually extraordinary in their simplicity and freshness. Novelty is equally exceptional: there is nothing quite like experiencing these primitive actualities reframed as living art, with Frémaux's curatorial voice giving them new context; the film is utterly singular. Plot scores low since there is no conventional narrative — it is an anthology of vignettes held together by thematic grouping rather than story. Acting is largely irrelevant given the non-fiction, non-performative nature of the subjects, who are simply people captured in life. The ending provides a resonant close but is not dramatically exceptional.