The Story of the Kelly Gang

The Story of the Kelly Gang is a 1906 Australian film that traces the life of legendary bushranger and outlaw Ned Kelly 18541880. It was directed by Charles Tait and shot in and around the city of Melbourne. The film ran for more than an hour with an approximate reel length of 4,000 feet 1,200 m, making it the longest narrative film yet seen in the world. It was first shown at Melbournes Athenaeum Hall onDecember 1906 and premiered in the United Kingdom in January 1908. A major commercial and critical success, it is regarded as the origin point of the bushranging drama, a genre that dominated the first decade of Australian film production. Since its release, many other films have been made about the Kelly legend.

Australian bushranger Ned Kelly had been executed only twentysix years before The Story of the Kelly Gang was made, and Neds mother Ellen and younger brother Jim were still alive at the time of its release. The film was made during an era when plays about bushrangers were extremely popular, and there were, by one estimate, six contemporaneous theatre companies giving performances of the Kelly gang story. Historian Ian Jones suggests bushranger stories still had an indefinable appeal for Australians in the early 20th century.The Story of the Kelly Gang was made by a consortium of two partnerships involved in theatreentrepreneurs John Tait and Nevin Tait, and pioneering film exhibitors Millard Johnson and William Gibson. The Tait family owned the Melbourne Athenaeum Hall and part of their concert program often included short films. Melbourne film exhibitors Johnson and Gibson also had technical experience, including developing film stock. Credit for writing the film scenario is generally given to the Tait brothers Frank, John and sometimes Charles. At a time when films were usually shorts of five to ten minutes duration, their inspiration for making a film of at least sixty minutes in length, and intended as a standalone feature, was undoubtedly based on the proven success of stage versions of the Kelly story. ........

Source: Wikipedia