TY - JOUR T1 - The First Eco-Disaster Film? JF - Film Quarterly SP - 44 LP - 51 DO - 10.1525/fq.2006.59.3.44 VL - 59 IS - 3 AU - MURRAY, ROBIN L. AU - HEUMANN, JOSEPH K. Y1 - 2006/03/01 UR - http://fq.ucpress.edu/content/59/3/44.abstract N2 - ABSTRACT When Bertrand Tavernier claims that the Lumièère Brothers' ““Oil Wells of Baku: Close View”” ““may be the first ecological film ever made,”” he seems to be reading the spectacular footage of burning oil wells from an eco-critical perspective. This article examines oil well fire films from 1896 to the present, asking how and why environmental disaster becomes spectacle. ER -