Fantasmagorie by Emile Cohl

The first animation I have viewed for this class is Fantasmagorie, a short animated film made in 1908 by Emile Cohl, and what I understand to be one of the earliest, if not the first, animated cartoon in the history of cinema. The film shows a clown-like figure partaking in a series of seemingly random events together with objects, people, and creatures that transform into other things entirely, all throughout the span of just under one and a half minutes. Because the transformations of these objects are so spontaneous, I believe that the story the film is trying to convey (of which I was uncertain directly after viewing the film) is one that can only be expressed through animation, or at least the method in which the story is told. If Cohl was trying to convey a specific message, I believe it wouldn't have been able to be so abstractly done if he were to use live action film.