A Trip to the Moon
Melies most famous film is A Trip to the Moon (La Voyage dans la Lune), and was based on Jules Verne's From the Earth to the Moon and H.G. Wells' The First Men in the Moon. It was a success when it was first released and was so popular that it became the first film to be released internationally, mainly becuase it was pirated by Edison and Lubin film companies! Though Melies did not consider it his best, he understood the film's popularity.
The making of A Trip to the Moon Image Gallery Tableaux