Reverse Shot

A curated silent film series designed to intellectually challenge preconceived notions of early cinema, Reverse Shot is crafted to physically transport viewers into another time through the retrofitting of the Woodward to its early 20th-century origins. This series examines the evolutionary record of cinema, grappling with collective memory and conventional understandings of film’s early days and how they shape our perception of cinema today.

This selection of films aims to open thought and discourse around the ideas of linear progress in cinematic representation, and to reveal the ever-present confrontation between diverse, bold voices and homogenous systems. Reverse Shot features screenings of Dziga Vertov’s Man with a Movie Camera (1929), Oscar Micheaux’s Within Our Gates (1920), F. W. Murnau’s Faust (1926), and a program of silent short films from filmmakers including Lois Weber, Alice Guy-Blaché, Lotte Reiniger, and Germaine Dulac.