film

pronunciation

How to pronounce film in British English: UK [fɪlm]word uk audio image

How to pronounce film in American English: US [fɪlm] word us audio image

  • Noun:
    a form of entertainment that enacts a story by a sequence of images giving the illusion of continuous movement
    a medium that disseminates moving pictures
    a thin coating or layer
    a thin sheet of (usually plastic and usually transparent) material used to wrap or cover things
    photographic material consisting of a base of celluloid covered with a photographic emulsion; used to make negatives or transparencies
  • Verb:
    make a film or photograph of something
    record in film

Word Origin

film
film: [OE] The notion underlying film is of a thin ‘skin’. The word comes ultimately from a prehistoric Germanic *fellam, which was related to Latin pellis ‘skin’ (source of English pelt ‘skin’). From this was derived *filminjam, which produced Old English filmen, a word used for various sorts of anatomical membrane or thin skin, including the peritoneum and the foreskin of the penis.It was generalized from the late 16th century to any thin membrane, and was applied by early 19th-century photographers to a thin layer of gel spread on photographic plates (‘The film of isinglass … peels off and will be found to bear a minute copy of the original’, William Thornthwaite, Guide to Photography 1845). As photographic technique moved on to cellulose coated with photosensitive emulsion, it took the term film with it.=> pelt
film (n.)
Old English filmen "membrane, thin skin, foreskin," from West Germanic *filminjan (cognates: Old Frisian filmene "skin," Old English fell "hide"), extended from Proto-Germanic *fello(m) "animal hide," from PIE *pel- (4) "skin, hide" (cognates: Greek pella, Latin pellis "skin"). Sense of "a thin coat of something" is 1570s, extended by 1845 to the coating of chemical gel on photographic plates. By 1895 this also meant the coating plus the paper or celluloid. Hence "a motion picture" (1905); sense of "film-making as a craft or art" is from 1920.
film (v.)
c. 1600, "to cover with a film or thin skin," from film (v.). Intransitive sense is from 1844. Meaning "to make a movie of" is from 1899. Related: Filmed; filming.

Example

1. So our film will be very different .
2. Images produced with color infrared film have a unique look .
3. But the film falls short of complicating these ideas .
4. It is a porn film posing as a documentary .
5. It is then dried to form a thin film .

more: >How to Use "film" with Example Sentences