A crucial element of any discussion of  Lumiere’s Arrival of a Train is the division between reality and fiction. Did the spectators truly belief the train was real and endangering their safety or were they aware of the illusion and its mechanisms? Was it just the realism of the image that was so surprising? Either way, I’m curious as to how early audiences reacted to the lack of colors in the images. To a modern viewer, the black and white images immediately signify a more primitive era of filmmaking. They represent a different style of editing, which is slower and therefore, for the modern viewer, less believable and, unfortunately, often considered less captivating as well. My question then is to what extent did the audience members notice the lack of color in the black and white images. Did they fill in the color mentally? When Gunning quotes Blackton and his description of the “belching smoke and fire” that he insures the audience will see, did audience members actually go on to create and envision the reds and oranges and yellows that are necessary to bring such imagery to life? Did they not associate the images with the still photographs that were so common during the time period? I’m not sure, but if there’s more discussion of the psychological phenomenon that the audience must have undergone and its relation to mental imaging and color, I’d be interested in hearing about it (wink, wink, nudge, nudge).