talking picture

noun

1. Older Use. a motion picture with accompanying synchronized speech, singing, etc.

Word History and Origins

Origin of talking picture¹

First recorded in 1905–10

Example Sentences

The first talking picture, “The Jazz Singer,” starred Al Jolson as a cantor’s son who wanted to go pop.

From Los Angeles Times

His father, a singer and dancer, and his mother, a former Ziegfeld Girl, had moved from New York to work in talking pictures but returned to Broadway as the Great Depression settled in.

From New York Times

When I was small, and spent as much time as allowable in front of a TV set, the history of talking pictures was only four or five decades old; you could take it in whole.

From Los Angeles Times

Godard responded: "This is what happens when silent movies meet talking pictures."

From BBC

Is that ironic given that the plot centers on a very specific upheaval in film history, the coming of talking pictures in the mid-1920s?

From Washington Post

Related Words

• cinema
• feature
• film
• flick
• motion picture
• picture
• show
• videotape