1898 in film

Events

• May 19 – Vitagraph is founded in New York.
• August 27 – Alfred John West gives a Royal Command Performance to Queen Victoria of film from the cruise of HMS Crescent at Osborne House.
• Birt Acres invents the first amateur format, Birtac, by splitting 35 mm film into two halves of 17.5 mm.

  Films released in 1898

• The Accursed Cavern directed by George Melies
• The Astronomer's Dream, directed by Georges Méliès; re-released in 1899 as A Trip to the Moon
• The Ball Game
• The Cavalier's Dream, directed by Edwin S. Porter
• The Cave of the Demons, directed by George Melies.
• Come Along, Do!, directed by Robert W. Paul. First multi-scene film in cinema .
• Corbett and Sharkey Fight
• The Corsican Brothers, produced by G.A.S. Films
• The Damnation of Faust, directed by George Melies.
• Dewar's It's Scotch, the first advertising movie, produced by the Edison Studios
• Don Juan Tenorio, the first Mexican film with a plot, directed by Salvador Toscano.
• Eiffel Tower, directed by Louis Lumière. First crane shot in cinema .
• Ella Lola, a la Trilby, produced by the Edison Co.
• Faust and Mephistopheles, directed by George Albert Smith.
• The Four Troublesome Heads, directed by Georges Méliès
• The Humpty Dumpty Circus, directed by J. Stuart Blackton
• Jizo the Spook, Japanese
• The Magician, directed by Georges Méliès
• The Mesmerist, directed by George Albert Smith.
• The Miller and the Sweep, directed by George Albert Smith
• The Nearsighted School Teacher
• A Novice at X-Rays, directed by George Melies
• Pack Train On Chilkoot Pass, film shows landscape in Chilkoot Pass, Alaska or British Columbia
• Photographing a Ghost, directed by George Albert Smith
• Shinen no sosei, Japanese.
• Surrender of General Toral
• Smích a pláč, directed by Josef Šváb-Malostranský, the first Czech film
• Santa Claus, directed by George Albert Smith. May include the first example of parallel action in a motion picture.

  Debuts

• Josef Šváb-Malostranský
• Johnston Forbes-Robertson – Macbeth
• Salvador Toscano

  Births

• January 22
• *Denise Legeay, French actress
• *Sergei Eisenstein, Russian director
• January 23 – Randolph Scott, American actor
• February 19 – Václav Wasserman, Czech actor, screenwriter and director
• March 11 – Dorothy Gish, American actress
• March 27 – Alma Tell, American actress
• April 9 – Paul Robeson, American singer and actor
• April 26 – John Grierson, Scottish documentary filmmaker
• May 16 – Kenji Mizoguchi, Japanese film director and screenwriter
• July 10 – Renée Björling, Swedish actress
• July 19 – Olle Hilding, Swedish actor
• July 23 – Bengt Djurberg, Swedish actor
• August 30 – Shirley Booth, American actress
• September 14 – Hal B. Wallis, American film producer
• September 23 – Jadwiga Smosarska, Polish actress
• October 3 – Leo McCarey, American director
• November 8 – Marie Prevost, Canadian-born American actress
• December 20 – Irene Dunne, American actress