Edwin S. Porter - Dream of a Rarebit Fiend, 1903 (Edison Studios)

   One of the first American films to exploit extensively the new medium's capacity for the creation of fantasy was Edwin S. Porter's adaptation of Winsor McCay's popular comic strip, Dream of the Rarebit Fiend in 1903, for Edison Studios.
   Porter was inspired by the films of Georges Méliès in France, who effectively invented fantasy film. Like Méliès, Porter explored special effects inherent in the nature of cameras and film to create fantastic scenes; like Melies, he naturally turned to the representation of dream states to justify the fantasy.