External images - How do I preload without a preloader

Confusing enough for you?

[polishhill]

OK, so I have a flash movie and I am loading external images in to it via blank movie clips. It seems that if I load the external images before they have to appear on the stage, they do not show up. So I guess that my question is:

Is there a way to load all of your external images at the beginning of the movie? Am I doing something wrong? Why won't the images load in before the movie clip that contains them is called to the stage? I am using the loadMovie("photo.jpg", photo.empty_MC); to load my images currently.

Thanks for your time!