The invention of the devil is the cinema, this means of defeating time. This film shows the stages in the discovery of cinema throughout the 19th century, from the phantasmagoria of Robertson, to the final development of the invention by the Lumière brothers. The works of all the precursors, John Paris, Plateau, Purkine, Muybridge, Marey, Reynaud are presented in motion thanks to a very important animation work. The prints of time place in counterpoint the historical stages of the century.