Bronco Billy

In 1903, Edwin S. Porter made the 9-minute film called the Great Train Robbery in the wilds of New Jersey. It was the first with a story. Earlier motion pictures had lasted about a minute, and cost just $150 to produce. It was an immediate sensation as audiences could now see what they had heretofore only read in newspapers and pulp westerns. During a close up at the end of the film a bandit firing his pistol directly into the camera caused people in the audience to scream, dive under their seat