"The Jazz Singer": The first film to use synchronized dialogue

 "The Jazz Singer", a Warner Brothers production released in 1927, was the first film to use synchronized dialogue. It was a silent film except for the songs sang by star actor Al Jolson recorded through Warner's new vita phone process. Hearing the songs was normal for the audience, but the ad-libbed remarks by Jolson in between numbers were a complete shock. The clip above includes some examples from the film.

What struck me most while watching this clip was trying to imagine how audiences in theaters reacted to hearing dialog. It is something that is so normal to us nowadays, but if you had only ever seen silent films and expected that you were watching another one, you would be completely shocked by what you were seeing. The impact that this film had on audiences and the film industry as a whole had to have been huge.