Ferdinand Zecca

Broke into French film in 1899 as an actor and ascended to the director's chair with Pathe in 1901. More business-oriented than his opposite number George Melies, Zecca neglected technical innovations in the pursuit of commercial opportunities. However, his search for ever more dramatic subject matter lead him to exploit France's previously unexplored lower-classes in such films as "Histoire d'un crime" (1901) and "Les Victimes de l'alcolisme" (1902), paving the way for crime and poverty melodramas that followed in the teens.