While the United States had the greatest number of film theatres during the nickelodeon period, the films they played very often came from Europe. Indeed, by the start of the First World War in 1914, France and Italy were the two leading film-producing countries in the world. Although the history of popular film is often associated with Hollywood and the development of the American film industry, this ignores the international scope and status of early cinema, and the particular significance of European production companies.

The prominence of the French film industry was based on the activity of Pathé-Frères. Not only did Pathé films make up to half of those shown in American nickelodeon programmes, the company dominated world markets, exporting its product in areas such as Western and Eastern Europe, Russia, India, Singapore and Japan. Pathé-Frères was a vertically integrated company, one of the first to control simultaneously the different sectors of production, distribution and exhibition. As well as manufacturing its own cameras, projectors and film stock, Pathé produced and distributed film, and in Europe owned the theatres in which they played. By 1909, Pathé had a circuit of 200 cinemas in France and Belgium. This combined with a network of agencies across the globe to administer the sale and rental of its films. By 1907, Pathé-Frères was the largest film company in the world, using mass-production methods to release as many as six film titles a week.