At the very birth of the cinema the pioneering French magician, illusionist, film director, artist, and designer Georges Méliès (1861–1938) recognized the immense potential of the new medium to create never-before-seen worlds. Between 1896 and 1912 he directed some 500 films, of which fewer than 100 are known to have survived. Described by Chaplin as an “alchemist of light”, Méliès was at once illusionist and pantominist: in his films, human beings become comic creatures with fantastic costumes and makeup, liable to disintegrate or metamorphose into anything. This program, curated by Peter Dowd of the George Eastman House, features rare archival prints, including three dazzling, hand-colored originals. The program includes Pillar of Fire (1904), La danse du feu (1899), Voyage à travers l’impossible (1904), A Trip to the Moon (1902), The Living Playing Cards (1905), A Crazy Composer (1905), and Une indigestion, ou Chirurgie fin-de-siècle (1902).