1. Hand in Screen Analysis2. Quick wrap up of the Silent Era3. Discussion of Hollywood studio system4. Screening of Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo (1958)

What’s up today in History of Film?

Friday, April 21, 17

How did the silent era end?The end of the silent era of films began on Oct. 6, 1927, when Warner Brothers released "The Jazz Singer," the first full-length movie with synchronized dialogue (sound on synced disc - Vitaphone). Studios continued to make silent films, but they slowly faded from popularity over the following decade as talkies became more affordable to produce (eventually synced sound on film).

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Quick Wrap up - The Silent Era Contributions

The art of motion pictures grew into full maturity in the ‘silent era’ (1894-1929) before silent films were replaced by ‘taking pictures’ in the late 1920s. Significant contributions to editing and film production techniques include:USA:Continuity Editing - Edwin Porter (Great Train Robbery), D.W. Griffith (Birth of a Nation, Intolerance) - Editing cuts that create continuity of the narrative of a story - cross cutting, parallel cutting (establish action occurring at the same time in two different locations).EUROPE: Soviet Montage - Editing technique that juxtaposes film cuts that may not relate (in a real continuity editing sense) but more so for emotional, ideological or intellectual impact. Lev Kuleshov (Kuleshov effect), Sergei Eisenstein (Battleship Potemkin)German Expressionism - Very stylized German technique: mise en scene, asymmetrical camera angles, atmospheric lighting, high contrast between dark and light - Heavy influence of Film Noir in Hollywood, many German directors fled to the US to escape the rise of Nazism in Germany. - Fritz Lang (Metropolis) F. W. Murnau (Nosfaratu, Faust)

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All these cinema techniques and visual elements

are still used in film todayin fact they became the staple of the next stage of film... The Classical Hollywood

Era from late 1920s to late 1950’s

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After the first world war and with the destruction of much structure of European cinema, the United States established itself as the world capital of the film industry.

This resulted in the founding of some major film studios and the practice of what came to be called factory film making.

The way films were made quickly became standardize as the studios became organized and different people were assigned specific tasks.

This cut cost drastically because, instead of each film having to have its own crew of various specialists, the different departments - props and scenery, costumes and make-up, advertisement and distribution, scripting and editing - worked on several films at the same time. This started in the 1912 with Mack Sennett, with KeyStone Studios and the “Slap Stick” genre, launching the carrieers of many famous silent comedians like Buster Keyton and Charlie Chaplin (who later started UA).

By the the 1920’s Hollywood had situated itself as the center of film production.

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This Era was also known as the “Golden Era” of Hollywood.With the growing popularity of films in the silent era and the rapid growth of “Nickelodeon” film theaters across the USA, production schedules and facilities had to meet this demand. Hollywood (LA California) became the hub and center of this new industry; an industrial film epoch known as the Hollywood studio system.

Year-round production schedules were necessary and provided the impetus for the development of a factory-based mode of production. In the studio era, all members of cast and crew were workers under contract to the studio, and the different kinds of work—editing, music, script, and so on—were divided into departments.

The way films were made quickly became standardize as the studios became organized and different people were assigned specific tasks.

This also standardized genres and script “formulas” based on box office results. Many of these would be considered cliche and generic by todays standards. Comedy, Drama, Western, Musicals, Sci-Fi productions would often share cast, studio facilities, writers and production teams. This factory approach to film making and genre also lead to one of the more recognizable, profitable and prolific style of film for Hollywood at the time - Film Noir.

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Hollywood Studio - Historical Context

Some have compared the Hollywood studio system to a factory, and it is useful to remember that studios were out to make money first and art second. Their product output in 1937 surged to over 500 feature films. During the Golden Age, the studios were remarkably consistent and stable enterprises, due in large part to long-term management heads--the infamous "movie moguls" who ruled their kingdoms with iron fists. Power was definitely situated with the studio heads. The rise of the studio system also hinges on the treatment of stars, who were constructed and exploited to suit a studio's image and schedule. Actors, actresses and directors were contract players bound up in seven-year contracts to a single studio, and the studio generally held all the options. Studios could also force bad roles on actors, and control the minutiae of stars' images with their mammoth in-house publicity departments.

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Warner Brothers Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) Radio-Keith-Orpheum (RKO) Paramount Twentieth Century-Fox

The Big Five…

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…and the little three

Universal

Columbia Pictures

United Artists (Charlie Chaplin,D.W. Griffith & other “artists”

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The biggest cache of stars (Greta Garbo, Joan Crawford and Spencer Tracey, among others) and tended to put out a lot of all-star productions, such as Grand Hotel (1932).

Paramount excelled in comedy, having Mae West, W.C. Fields, the Marx Brothers, Bob Hope and Bing Crosby at their disposal.

Warner Bros. developed a reputation for gritty social realism, ranging from gangster pictures, which were often based on newspaper headlines, to war pictures and Westerns.

20th Century Fox forged the musical and a great deal of prestige biographies, such as Young Mr. Lincoln (1939).

Universal thrilled and terrified audiences with the original Frankenstein (1931), Dracula (1931) and The Wolf Man (1941). United Artists, formed by silent greats Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford, D.W. Griffith and Douglas Fairbanks, specialized in distributing productions.

RKO provided a haven for Orson Welles (Citizen Kane, The Magnificent Ambersons, etc.) and dance supernovas, Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. RKO also created King Kong (1933). Columbia's major claim was director Frank Capra, including his masterpieces It Happened One Night (1934) and Mr. Deeds Goes To Town (1936), among others

Niche Studio Styles - The origins of contemporary Hollywood film genre

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Alfred Hitchcock (1899-1980) the famous English suspense and thriller director, worked on silent (originally as an artist) and early Talkie movies (some created in Germany). He was acclaimed as one of England’s best director and eventually moved to the US in 1940. David O. Selznick signed Hitchcock to a seven-year contract beginning in March 1939, and the Hitchcock moved to Hollywood. After moving to the US from England and Europe Hitchcock blossomed in the wealthier and more technically sophisticated studio system (then at its heyday) in Hollywood. Hitchcock was often displeased with Selznick's creative control over his films. In a later interview, Hitchcock commented, "[Selznick] was the Big Producer. ... Producer was king, The most flattering thing Mr. Selznick ever said about me—and it shows you the amount of control—he said I was the 'only director' he'd 'trust with a film'.

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Hitchcock was immediately recognized for is unique, cinematic style, his ability to cast & direct actors for roles and his penchant for the Film Noir & suspense/thriller genre . His style is so unique many consider him an example of Auteur Theory - the director, who oversees all audio and visual elements of the motion picture, is more to be considered the “author” of the movie than is the writer of the screenplay.

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And now... Vertigo (1958)Technical Considerations:1. Film Noir in Technicolor - Colour movieformat, to become predominant in Hollywood Films from 2. First use of a Zoom Dolly in a film, this can be seen in many scenes, breakthrougheffect at the time - This film’s famous camera technique (which essentially involves zooming forward while pulling the camera backward); Not Hitchcock rather, it was an uncredited second unit cameraman, Irwin Roberts. 3. Film was policed by the Production Code Administration for moral representation.

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Please observe and comment on...A particular scene, technique or moment that is unique to the films style... What make is special?

Or...

Address what you see as the underlying theme(s) of this movie.

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Next Week!!!Project Proposal Review - Due March 10th - Week after next!

- Setting up groups for pocket film

- Formalism, Realism, Auteur theory and genre.

Have a great week!Friday, April 21, 17