Isidore Moray

Like many pioneers of cinema in general, and of Belgian cinema in particular, the name of Isidore Moray is completely forgotten today. And yet a tribute should be paid to this former projectionist, who created the first independent Belgian Newsreel company (Journal belge d'actualités), who made the first fiction films in his country: Zonneslag & Cie (1912), Une victime du petit coureur (1913) and mainly La famille Van Petegem à la mer (1912), all featuring famous actors of the time such as Gustave Libeau, Esther Deltenre or Fernand Crommelynck. The latter film is even more remarkable in that it is probably the first Belgian film in Kinemacolor, a two-color process invented in Great Britain by George Albert Smith and Charles Urban. During the First World War Moray was appointed director of the laboratory of the Cinematographic Service of the Belgian Army, which gave him the opportunity to insert original footage filmed on the battlefields in his post-war patriotic drama Le mystère de La Libre Belgique ou les exploits des 4 as (1920). Still active for ten more years Isidore Moray alternated between fiction (La maison dans la dune (1925) and documentaries, often official, before vanishing.