When moving pictures arrived in Johannesburg, no one seemed to take notice.On March 9 1896 Johannesburg's film industry came into being, but it was all a bit of a whimper.That day cinema debuted at the Empire Palace of Varieties on the corner of Commissioner and Ferreira streets.The black-and-white shorts were shown as part of a magic show, but during those first weeks hardly anyone came to see them."There was a reason for that," explained Pervaiz Khan, of the Wits School of Arts. "Johannesburg was under martial law following the Jameson Raid a couple of weeks earlier."But soon word got around and those earlier Joburgers who saw those flickering images of waves breaking on a sea wall in Brighton, and Londoners strolling across Blackfriars Bridge, had difficulty understanding what they were seeing.The Star newspaper reported: "The pictures are so life-like in size and other respects that the spectator had some difficulty in realising that the figures are mere representations."Those citizens were able to see those early films so soon after moviemaking's invention because Johannesburg even then was a unique city."It showed that Africa was part of that loop of modernity, and Johannesburg had electricity, which was needed for film shows," said Khan.After that film spread quickly and a local industry took root. There are records of a lost film shot by a camera strapped to the front of a tram that drove down Rissik Street in the 1890s.In 1915 Killarney Film Studios opened and production began. A year later the first South African hour-long feature film was released, De Voortrekkers, about the Great Trek.Other films followed, cinemas were built, and with the coming of cars drive-ins became part of the Johannesburg film culture.And now, a century later, Joburg could be on the cusp of a new era in the movie business.The plan is to create a local version of Hollywood's Universal Studios.The Johannesburg Expo Centre, also known as Studio Joburg, is where movies such as District 9 and commercials have been shot.This month it was announced that the expo centre would be expanded to incorporate film and theatre schools, and a five-star hotel for film crews and actors."More studios means that film-making becomes cheaper and it helps locally with genre spread. You can create environments in studios that you can't create on location," said Helen Kuun, of Indigenous Film Distribution. She said that the local film industry battled to make period dramas and action movies because they needed studio shooting.Kuun said the past 15 years had been a golden period for local film.She said that although Cape Town was an attractive destination for foreign film crews, the South African movie hub was in Gauteng."I would say that 70% of local films are made in Gauteng. If you look at agencies, crew and hiring of equipment, a lot of those skills are in Gauteng," she said.Also giving Gauteng films an advantage are rebates from the Department of Trade and Industry, which help in the raising of cash for productions, Kuun said.But it is the stuff that made Johannesburg unique all that time ago, that allowed film to grab a toehold on Africa, that the Gauteng Film Commission hopes will continue to fuel the industry. That and world-class infrastructure and expertise.With South African film-makers having greater access to studios and, therefore, being better equipped to produce historical dramas, perhaps one day the story of that first movie shown to a bunch of wild-eyed Joburgers will be told...