The 1896 version of La Fée aux Choux (The Fairy of the Cabbages) is a lost film directed by Alice Guy-Blaché (then known as Alice Guy) that, according to her, featured a honeymoon couple, a farmer, pictures of babies glued to cardboard, and one live baby. The 1900 La Fée aux Choux and the 1902 Sage-Femme de Première Classe (originally titled La Fée aux Choux) are frequently confused with the original lost film, which is arguably the world's first narrative film, and the first film directed by a woman.

Alice Guy-Blaché reported that she had to remake the film at least twice and this accounts for the two films dated 1900 and 1902 that are available to view online. Guy-Blaché's 1900 version employed one actress (the fairy), two live babies, and a number of dolls. Her 1902 version, later retitled Sage-femme de première classe (Midwife First Class, which refers to a diploma for a mid-wife, not the class she caters to), employed a honeymoon couple and a female baby merchant along with numerous babies and dolls. In a still photograph from the 1902 version, Guy-Blaché appears, wearing a "costume of Normandy". She does not play the husband in the film, but said that she "for fun pulled on the peasant clothes" for the photograph.

There has been a hundred years of controversy over La Fée aux Choux, starting in 1922, when Étienne Arnaud wrote in his memoirs that Alice Guy was the “first to have the idea of staging a dramatic scene in front of the cinematographic lens.” He wrote that the film was Les Mefaits d’une Tête de Veau, creating more controversy and confusion. Léon Gaumont cemented the confusion when he reportedly said in 1935 that he himself directed the first film that was “trying to tell a story to the audience,” in front of “a painted canvas that naively represented the rue de Belleville. His feminine star was Alice Guy, and two mechanics from the studio were the first screen actors.” He also claimed his “first” film was called Les Mefaits d’une Tête de Veau.

In the evidence that has been coming in piecemeal for over a century, there are multiple points of confirmation that there were three La Fée aux Choux and that the first was filmed in the spring and early summer of 1896.