What Happened on Twenty-Third Street, New York City (1901)

Tied for the best movie I have ever seen

Load of rubbish!!

Boring, over-political, tech fuzed mess

The storyline feels a little thin and moth-eaten in parts but this sequel is plenty of fun.

Yesterday I compared Edison's 1902 rendering of JACK AND THE BEANSTALK versus the entertaining new release, JACK THE GIANT SLAYER (2013), which I had seen as a double feature the day before. The gist of knowing your Jacks was that the Edison short is morally reprehensible, while the remake teaches solid American values. When you compare notorious elephant-electrocuter Thomas Edison's WHAT HAPPENED . . . to Marilyn Monroe's 1955 remake, THE SEVEN YEAR ITCH, the EXACT SAME THING is seen. Edison's henchmen have produced something akin to kiddie porn, positioning what should be an innocent young lad of 8 or 12 as the focal point for the first 69 seconds of the 82-second offering. The corrupted boy is leering and drooling uncontrollably as the rest of the many people on the sidewalk go about their business (the Edison perverts no doubt ran the youngster through 30 or 40 takes). When it comes time for the big reveal of the unsuspecting stranger lady's unmentionables, the innocent's face contorts with an expression which should have been delayed until his honeymoon. Monroe in ITCH, on the other hand, is thrown into a trying position with another consenting adult, and the New York subway does its level best to tip the pair over the line into outright adultery. However, since Edison was not around to corrupt this pair as children when their moral fibers were woven together, the summer neighbors resist their virtually undeniable attraction despite the subway's up-blown skirting, with proper decorum and marriage vows intact at the end.

What Happened on Twenty-third Street, New York City is a very old film and it clearly shows (by more than just the title). It shows people running normal errands on a typical day on Twenty-Third Street in New York City. Nothing special happens until a women and a man walk up over a hot vent that blows the woman's skirt up (not even to knee height). They laugh and then continue walking.Considering that its only 77 seconds long, there is practically nothing to lose from watching it. The plot, acting, and filming quality are really dull, but it shows how far movies have come since 1901. The fact that everything revolves around a woman walking over a steam vent is laughable.If nothing else, the glimpse of old New York is neat. It is interesting to study from a historical aspect, but probably has no real entertainment value. Then again, it will only take a little over a minute of your time, so there is little reason not to watch it at least once.

This short film starts with around forty seconds of people living their lives on 23rd Street in New York. In the distance we see a man constantly watching the camera. He made me wondering if the scene was about him. Other people walk by, some react like they are told to move out of the frame. Then a couple walks into sight and when the woman steps over an air duct her skirts lifts up, showing us her legs. The couple laughs it off and walks on. The short film ends with a young boy turning his laughing head towards the camera.One has to see this short film from the Edison Manufacturing Company as if it is 1901. When you see a women walking in a bikini top these days not so many people are surprised, but back then it was somewhat different. What we see in this short could also be the inspiration for Marilyn Monroe's lifting skirt in 'The Seven Year Itch', a scene considered by many as sexually charged. For a short film from the early days 'What Happened on 23rd Street' is pretty amusing.

Of all the short films in the four disc Edison/Kino set this is the one I liked the best. And it's amazing it's from 1901. The majority of the films from the historic Edison Co. survived only in a paper print form. That is each frame of a particular film was printed on photographic paper and deposited in the LOC(Library of Congress). It's a very good fortune that these films were randomly deposited in this manner else they might have stayed lost forever. The paper prints, fortunately, were one or two steps away from the clarity of the camera negative, thus the pictorial quality on some of these early gems is quite clear as opposed to the murky/muddy quality we're used to seeing on films of this very early vintage.WHAT HAPPENED ON 23RD STREET, is valuable as it documents a section of New York City that could probably be matched up today to the very point where the cameraman was filming. This film also has fun at tempting the sexual attitudes of it's time. Looking at it today you basically see people going about their daily affairs, though one can't help wondering if a taping measure or mark-off point has been told to the people to stay away & not look at the camera. Anyhow no one looks at the camera nor gets near it until the close of the film. Then the 'starring' couple walks up and the young woman in long skirt walks over an air duct and parts of her skirt fly up just above the knees. The lady and her male friend get a kick out of this but they would've understood the moral implications of this. They walk off laughing trying to play it off that she didn't know that there was an air grate on the sidewalk and that her dress would rise high up to her head.It's hard for us today to believe that this was being risqué. But there was a time in America that if a woman showed her legs in public it could throw men into a frenzy. And no doubt many a man enjoyed this flick for the sexually stimulating experience of seeing her skirt go up and viewing her legs. Another thing is that this film must have been available in some kind of form in the 1950s since the same type of scene is virtually aped by Marilyn Monroe in the movie The Seven Year Itch. But to less effect if you ask me.