As Founding Director of HippFest, Scotland’s first and only silent film festival, Alison Strauss is especially knowledgeable about the history of Scottish filmmaking and -going, as represented by three of her picks. But the conversation, which concludes with outlandish animation, also addresses the preponderance of short films in an era of increasingly long ones.

Alison works as Falkirk Council’s Arts Development Officer (Film and Media), programming the Hippodrome year-round. Alison is the ‘face of the Festival’ and leads on the artistic programme, commissioning, funding, research and development, and touring.

Visit the5bestfilmsofeveryyearever.com/list to submit your own top five for 1912!

Films and resources mentioned:

• Bo’ness Fair 1912 (1912) - Louis Dickson
• Mairi: The Romance of a Highland Maiden (1912) - Andrew Paterson
• Herring Harvest at Yarmouth (1912) - unknown
• How a Mosquito Operates (1912) - Winsor McCay
• The Cameraman’s Revenge (1912) - Wladyslaw Starewicz
• Annual Baby Parade, 1904, Asbury Park, N.J. (1904) - Alfred C. Abadie
• The Herring Harvest (1925) - unknown
• Drifters (1929) - John Grierson
• Patriotic Porkers (1918) - unknown
• Little Nemo (1911) - Winsor McCay and J. Stuart Blackton
• Gertie the Dinosaur (1914) - Winsor McCay
• Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988) - Robert Zemeckis
• To Demonstrate How Spiders Fly (1909) - F. Percy Smith
• The Tragic Error (1913) - Louis Feuillade
• The Mascot (1933) - Wladyslaw Starewicz
• The Cinema and Cinema-Going in Scotland, 1896-1950 - Trevor Griffiths
• Hippodrome Presentations