Considering this movie was originally made in 1896, (despite IMDb's date) I would assume that it was not only the very first telling of the Washington Irving story, but maybe the oldest film with a story to tell in general. However, because at this point in history films consisted of only one shot, single scene clips, W. K. L. Dickson was forced into making not only one film, but eight, thus directing the first film serial in history. You can read the title of each thirty-second clip and pretty much guess what happens in that segment, i.e. "Rip Meeting the Dwarf", "Awakening of Rip", since all the segments take a particular event and film it within the constraints of the run-time.
Nowadays, it looks laughably absurd. Barely anything happens onscreen a lot of the time and each clip begins about as quickly as it ends. But considering the time, it's actually pretty advanced for 1896 and all the segments were probably projected in sequence to achieve the look Dickson wanted. Likewise, today the way the serial as a whole was supposed to look is lost if you view each segment separately; they must all be put together to create a story and none of them can be judged on their own level. The disjointed look of it all is probably the reason why Biograph decided to edit them together to make a 'full-length' film in 1903, since by then they could fully reach the look they wanted without having the projectionist pause to load the next segment.
Nonetheless, I'd recommend you see Georges Méliès's 1905 adaptation of the story if you're looking for fantasy and more elaborate storytelling. This is entertaining from a historical perspective and worthwhile for fans of early cinema, but not really something the average movie-watcher of today would enjoy.
Nowadays, it looks laughably absurd. Barely anything happens onscreen a lot of the time and each clip begins about as quickly as it ends. But considering the time, it's actually pretty advanced for 1896 and all the segments were probably projected in sequence to achieve the look Dickson wanted. Likewise, today the way the serial as a whole was supposed to look is lost if you view each segment separately; they must all be put together to create a story and none of them can be judged on their own level. The disjointed look of it all is probably the reason why Biograph decided to edit them together to make a 'full-length' film in 1903, since by then they could fully reach the look they wanted without having the projectionist pause to load the next segment.
Nonetheless, I'd recommend you see Georges Méliès's 1905 adaptation of the story if you're looking for fantasy and more elaborate storytelling. This is entertaining from a historical perspective and worthwhile for fans of early cinema, but not really something the average movie-watcher of today would enjoy.