Karl Wratschko, curator, filmmaker, and artist, has been working as a film curator for the Il Cinema Ritrovato festival in Bologna since 2016. He brings his experience of programming screenings based in specific years, not unlike this very show (he’s even done 1902 for the festival!), to craft an abridged program you might have seen in that year.

Karl’s artistic work includes film, photography, installation, radio art, and public art. He was co-responsible for several retrospectives of early Austrian film at the Viennale and a member of the Austrian team of the EU-funded research and development project European Film Gateway and its successor EFG1914.

Visit the5bestfilmsofeveryyearever.com/list to submit your own top five for 1902!

Films mentioned:

• The Flying Train (1902) - unknown
• The Eruption of Mount Pelee (1902) - Georges Méliès
• Le Cake-walk au Nouveau Cirque (1902) - Louis Lumière
• The Little Match Seller (1902) - James Williamson
• The Fairy of the Stars (1902) - unknown
• The Life and Passion of Jesus Christ (1902) - Lucien Nonguet and Ferdinand Zecca
• Ingenious Soubrette (1902) - Ferdinand Zecca
• Gulliver's Travels Among the Lilliputians and Giants (1902) - Georges Méliès
• The Big Swallow (1901) - James Williamson
• Blade Runner (1982) - Ridley Scott
• Metropolis (1927) - Fritz Lang
• Martinique Disaster (1902) - Ferdinand Zecca
• Mt. Pelee Smoking Before Eruption (St. Pierre, Martinique) - J. Blair Smith and Edwin S. Porter
• Mt. Pelee in Eruption and Destruction of St. Pierre (Martinique) - J. Blair Smith and Edwin S. Porter
• Burning of St. Pierre (Martinique) - J. Blair Smith and Edwin S. Porter
• Le Cake-walk du Nouveau Cirque (1905) - Alice Guy Blaché
• The Infernal Cake Walk (1903) - Georges Méliès
• The Soldier's Return (1903) - James Williamson
• Serenade to the Moon (1902) - unknown
• Hamlet (1900) - Clément Maurice
• Rough Sea at Dover (1895) - Birt Acres