The Musketeers of Pig Alley

The Musketeers of Pig Alley
Directed byD. W. Griffith
Written byD. W. Griffith
Anita Loos
StarringElmer Booth
Lillian Gish
Clara T. Bracy
Walter Miller
Music byRobert Israel
Distributed byGeneral Film Company
Release dates
  • October 31, 1912 (1912-10-31)
  • November 5, 1915 (1915-11-05) (U.S.)
Running time
17 minutes (16 frames per second)
CountryUnited States
LanguagesSilent film
English intertitles

The Musketeers of Pig Alley is a 1912 American short drama and a gangster film. It is directed by D. W. Griffith and written by Griffith and Anita Loos. It is also credited for its early use of follow focus, a fundamental tool in cinematography.[1]

The film was released on October 31, 1912, and re-released on November 5, 1915, in the United States. The film was shot in Fort Lee, New Jersey where many other early film studios in America's first motion picture industry were based at the beginning of the 20th century.[2][3][4] Location shots in New York City reportedly used actual street gang members as extras during the film.

It was also shown in Leeds Film Festival in November 2008, as part of Back to the Electric Palace, with live music by Gabriel Prokofiev, performed in partnership with Opera North.

In 2016, the film was added to the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

  1. ^ "Silent Era: PSFL: The Musketeers of Pig Alley (1912)". Archived from the original on September 19, 2000.
  2. ^ Koszarski, Richard (2004), Fort Lee: The Film Town, Rome, Italy: John Libbey Publishing -CIC srl, ISBN 0-86196-653-8
  3. ^ "Studios and Films". Fort Lee Film Commission. Retrieved May 30, 2011.
  4. ^ Fort Lee Film Commission (2006), Fort Lee Birthplace of the Motion Picture Industry, Arcadia Publishing, ISBN 0-7385-4501-5