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The historiography of Haitian cinema is very limited. It consists only one double issue of the journal of the French Institute of Haiti Conjonction, released in 1983, devoted to film; a book by Arnold Antonin, published during the same year, entitled Matériel pour une préhistoire du cinéma haïtien ; and an article by the same author in the 1981 book Cinéma de l’Amérique latine by Guy Hennebel and Alfonso Gumucio Dagrón.
Cinema appeared in Haiti at almost the same time as in other countries. On December 14, 1899, Joseph Filippi, a representative of the Lumiere cinema, made the first public screening at the Petit Séminaire while visiting the island. The next day he filmed a fire in Port-au-Prince.
There are many films from the period of U.S. occupation in the Library of Congress; these depict Marines and official ceremonies.
Other early movies filmed in Haiti, depicting health care, agriculture, and scenes of social life may be found in the Library of Congress and the Pathé-Ciné Library.