Essays

Jessica Elvira Borthwick

McKernan, Luke

Jessica Borthwick, named Jessie at birth, is an unusual figure in early film history. In 1913 she took it upon herself to record the war between the Ottoman Empire and the Balkan states—Greece, Bulgaria, Serbia, Montenegro—through motion pictures and still photography. An interview she gave to a film trade paper, the Bioscope, has burnished an image of an intrepid adventurer whose exploits overturn the traditional history of war filming as well as the early documentary film (625). Borthwick was undoubtedly an enterprising figure of varied and sometimes remarkable interests, but her foray into filmmaking was brief.

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Academic Units
Film
Libraries
Series
Women Film Pioneers Project
Published Here
October 15, 2019