Phono-kinematographic Scenes, Kine-phonographic Scenes and Phono-scenes - Text 3
A new catalogue published by Mendel, dating from the years 1910-14, contained around 300 titles of “singing” and “talking” films. Although in his descriptions Mendel speaks of “synchronism,” nothing about his system provides evidence of this. Quite the contrary, because the discs which accompany the scenes were not even pre-recorded. Manufactured under the labels Gramophone, Odéon or Pathé and available on the open market, these discs were used at the moment of the film’s projection. This means that its “perfect combination of sounds, movement, speech, songs and gestures”[2] was nothing more than a system which made possible the synchronous operation of two machines, the kinematograph and the gramophone, to show a short film and a disc recorded separately. And yet Mendel’s productions met with a degree of success amongst itinerant exhibitors, given that around 1910 he built a recording studio in Bagnolet to meet exhibitor demand.[3]
