The Great Train Robbery (1903)

Justus D. Barnes, as the outlaw leader, aims his revolver straight down the lens in Edwin S. Porter's The Great Train Robbery for Edison. The close-up belongs to no scene in the story, and the Edison catalog told exhibitors they could run it at the start or the end of the film. Audiences in 1903 had never had a gun fired at them from a screen, and the shot keeps coming back: Martin Scorsese ends Goodfellas (1990) with Joe Pesci firing at the camera in tribute.