Midterm Flashcards
Daguerreotype
Silver plates that the first pictures were printed on
Kinetograph & Kinetoscope
- An early motion picture exhibition device, designed for films to be viewed by one person at a time through a peephole viewer window.
- The kinetograph captured the motion, and the kinetoscope allowed one to view it
Cinematograph
- An early movie projector (1894)
- invented by the Lumiere Brothers
Thomas Edison
- Optical Phonograph 1888
Eadweard Muybridge
- 1872, he captured the first moving picture
- He was doing motion studies to see if all four of a horses feet are ever off the ground at the same time when it runs
Cinema of Attractions
- Address the audience directly
- Invites the viewer to look, pointing to things, asking us questions
- Very little character or narrative
- Emphasizes the act of display
- Solicits viewer curiosity
Nickelodeons
- Store front movie theaters where people could watch movies for a nickel
Studio System
-1917-1948
- When 5 majors and 3 minors ruled the market over films
Classical Hollywood Cinema
- 1917-1960
- Share similar approaches to storytelling
-Style is a result of production structures of the Studio System - Editing is meant to be not distracting
- Characters are clearly defined, causal agents (they do things)
- Plot centers around clearly defined goals
- Time is subordinated to the plot (what you see is dictated by the needs of the plot)
- Plot structured around cause and effect
- Closure!
Vertical Integration
- When a studio owns the means of production, distribution, and exhibition
Paramount Decision
- 1948 decision that ruled Paramount (and the rest of the big studios) as a monopoly, therefore ending the Studio System
Mode vs Genre
- Mode: A style; thematic components and recurring themes transcends drama and has many different plots
- Genre: shares plots, characters, subject matter, themes, and settings
The man in the grey flannel suit
A man who is losing his identity/purpose and blending into the crowd/status quo
Rosie the Riveter
- A government campaign to encourage women to work during WW2
- inspired a social movement that increased working women in the US by 57%
temps perdu
- Narrators tell you the ending of the film at the beginning
- “lost time”
- creates a sense of irretrievable past, predetermined fates, and hopelessness
- they have seen it all
high key/low key lighting
- Lowkey lighting is less bright light
- grey lighting is turned down
- obscures, not glamorous/flattering, harsh, and direct
Night for night shooting
Mysterious and scarier
Day for night shooting
shot during the day with a blue filter because the cameras couldnt get a good image in total darkness
“Hard Boiled” Novels
- violent, sexual, scandalous
- private detectives
Fordism
assembly line production in postwar America
Canted frame
titled to convey that things are out of wack
White Flight
Postwar when white populations left the city and moved to the suburbs
Liminal spaces
betwixt or between; things happen here that wouldn’t happen in other spaces
femme fatale
- killer woman
- gorgeous, alluring
- the protagonist falls in love with her
- she plays him
- ambiguous if she loves him back
- she leads to his demise
- women are threats against men
Who were the major Japanese Film Studios post WW2?
- Toho
- Daiei
- Schuchiku
- Nikkatsu
- Toei
Japanese New Wave
- Youth Culture becomes an important market after WW2
- late 50s-70s
- Rejection of tradition
- characters have sex, do drugs, etc
- critical of Japanese society
Bushido
- way of the warrior
- codified set of virtues that all Samurai are supposed to follow
Gi
(rectitude, justice, righteousness, integrity)
Yuki
(heroic courage, valor, bravery)
Jin
(compassion, humanity, charity, benevolence)
Rei
(respect, courtesy, etiquette, civility)
Makoto
(honesty, sincerity)
Meiyo
(honor, dignity)
Chugi
(duty & loyalty)
Ronin
- “wave man”
- a masterless samurai
- a wanderer with no home
Giri/ninjo
- Duty versus human feeling
- Human feeling that goes against social obligations
- The samurai must make sacrifices in favor of one or the other
Mono no aware
- An empathy with the world
- perspective of someone who is a relaxed observer taking in and accepting the world around them
- pure, emotional response to the world
- the “ahness” of things/life/love
Nostalgic Samuari Drama
- Focuses on a ronin
- Offers a clear moral world (you know who is good/bad)
- Heroes linked with nature
- Antagonist is a large group
- Being a samurai is about honor even in death
- Like the American Western genre
- Samurai do good deeds in exchange for food
- giri/ninjo
Anti-Feudal Drama
- Arose out of explosive issues in 1959-60 due to the Mutual Security Pact which forced Japan’s prime minister to resign
- Fear about returning to a system they were under in the past
- Heroes begin as men of rank
- The hero is tragic because he ends up destroying the system he once loved
- Heroes are linked with society
- Antagonist is a large group
- more pessimistic
Zen Fighters
- Actual historical figures/legends
- The hero has a disdain for his life and the lives of others
- ignores/transcends social context
- hand-to-hand combat; the best fighters don’t need swords
Sword Film
- Hugely popular but considered low brow
- Most violent
- nihilistic
- similar to American gangster movies and hardboiled novels
- Protagonist and antagonist are liked and well matched
- blur the distinction between fact of history and idea of history
4 films that kickstarted French New Wave
Jean Luc Godard: (Breathless)
Francois Truffaut: (The 400 Blows)
Claude Chabrol: Le Beau Serge (The Good Serge) & Les Cousins (The Cousins)
Jump cut
when the camera’s position moves only slightly (less than 30 degrees) between cuts this creates a jump or jerk on screen
30 degree rule
Every camera position should be varied by at least 30 degrees from the previous one
Direct address
When a character in a film looks at the camera and speaks directly to the audience
Long take
when a film goes a very long time without cutting the shot
“Art Film”
- Against the classical narrative mode
- realism and authenticity
- characters lack goals
- authorial expressivity (auteur)
- ambiguity
Cahiers du Cinema
- “cinema notebook”
- group of French filmmakers
- criticized contemporary French cinema
- engaged with styles and themes of films
- developed the concept of the film auteur
- criticized the ‘cinema of quality’ formulaic prestige pictures that were often adaptations of novels
Auteur
- A director’s unique distinctive style; putting a personal stamp on your film; a cohesive, personal style
- Defined by a core of meanings or thematic motifs; specific style appearing from film to film
- Granted respect to Hollywood films and directors
Avance sur recettes system
- Advance on receipt
- the French state was financially supporting the film industry
- Large pool of talent; many unknown directors got a chance to make films
- The moviegoing public was receptive to them and wanted to talk about film in a serious way
The Left Bank
- Chris Maker (La jefe, 1962)
- Alain Resnais (Hiroshima, Mon Amor, 1959)
- Agnes Varda (Cleo from 5 to 7, 1962)
- Jacques Demy (Umbrells of Cherbourg, 1964)
Characteristic of a French New Wave film?
- Self reflexivity
- Ambiguous endings
- handheld camera
- “Fast” film stock
- Available light
- On Location Shooting
- Replacement of editing with camera movement
social problem film
- issue being addressed has to be something considered a problem in the current moment
- tries to generate sympathy for the issues
- offers individual rather than systemic solutions
realism
- has no set standards
- means movies/TV shows that look like documentaries
- associated with documentary conventions
- about the “perception” of the real
- use of new subjects
- address a group that hasn’t received much on-screen attention
- focus on the everyday
- excess of detail; things that arent moving the plot forward
Dalton Duty
- AKA the Dalton Tax
- Post WW2 in Britain
- 75% tax on all foreign film imports
- Hollywood responds with British film boycott
- Tried to decrease the desire for imported films
poetic realism
authenticates and poeticizes
Characteristics of a “kitchen sink” film
- Black and white
- On location shooting in working class milieu
- Fast film stock
- “Excess” of detail
- “Long shot of our town from that hill
- Use of unknowns and/or nonprofessional actors
- Focus on “angry young man”
- Open ending
- everyday subjects
- low budget
- Documentary aesthetics such as long takes and imperfect lighting
British “Kitchen Sink” Cinema (aka, New Wave, New Cinema) 1959-1963
- Inspired by the 1930s British Documentary movement and the Free Cinema Movement
- Usually had an “angry young man” protagonist
1930s British Documentary Movement
- government funded
- produced until WW2
- no central artistic theory; more about impact
- socially responsible, educational, or instructional
- highlighted the working class and its struggles
- aimed to create political reform
- often contained reenactments
- big critique of what was presented/shaped by the middle and upper classes
Free Cinema Movement
- mid 50s
- tried to get rid of the elitist middle/upper class influence on working class documentaries
- belief in freedom, importance of everyday people, and significance of everyday
- the image speaks
Angry young man
- coined mid 50s
- diverse novelists and playwrights writing about class issues
- characters are unhappy with the status quo and they are outspoken about it
- celebrate the working classes
- very frank
- kicked off in 1956
- Look Back in Anger, John Osbourne
Closed text vs. open text
- closed text: the ending is resolved, we understand what happens, there are a limited number of meanings
- open texts: the meaning is open-ended and ambiguous; it can be interpreted many ways
“cinema of hunger”
- cinema novo
- suffering creates violence
- emphasis on social issues
- foreign observers enjoy class/poverty tourism
“camera as gun”
- the camera is a gun that can shoot 24 frames per second
- the camera is an inexhaustible expropriator of image-weapons
1968
- Time of social upheaval
- Martin Luther King assassinated
- Bobby Kennedy assassinated
- riots over the Vietnam war
- College students were really involved in politics
- Mai Lai Massacre US soldiers killed civilians and photos of it circulated
Major Filmmaking Regions in Africa
North African Cinema: Algeria, Tunisia, Morocco, Egypt (commercial)
Sub-Saharan: Senegal, Mali, Burkina Faso, Nigeria (Nollywood), South Africa (commercial)
Colonial
- Political/economic control over a dependent country
- “dominant” population goes into a territory, claims it as their own, and overtakes it
Post-colonial
used to describe a country that has gained their independence from colonial countries
Bantu Educational Kinema Experiment (BEKE)
- 1935-1937
- Linking people of different languages through cinema
- 35 films
- Films about “helping” the people; pros of getting vaccinated or better sanitation
- actors could be black but not always
British Colonial Films Unit
- 1939-1955
- similar goals to BEKE
- intervention, not entertainment
Wolof
the local Senegalese dialect in Black Girl
Magical realism
- formal departure from the constraints of the dominant mode of representation
- accept magical occurrences as a part of everyday reality
FESPACO (Panafrican Film and Television Festival of Ouagadougou)
- 1909
- largest film exhibition venue in Subsaharan Africa
- half a million people attend
First Cinema
- commercial films made for profit and entertainment (classical Hollywood cinema)
- passive viewer
- bourgeois worldview
- reality as conceived by the ruling classes
- closed text
Second Cinema
- alternative to first cinema
- non-standard language i.e., non traditional cinema techniques
- draws attention to itself as film
- cultural decolonization
- art cinema
- experimental but not explicitly political
- trapped inside the fortress
- upper-class audience
Third Cinema
- made by countries under colonial powers
- populations doing the talking
- questions structures of power
- aims for the liberation of the oppressed
- challenges viewers to reflect
- interaction amongst masses
- education and dialogue
Fourth Cinema
- indigenous cinema
- produced by the indigenous population of a particular country
- tied to ‘fourth world nations’
General Characteristics of “New Hollywood” Cinema
New narrative structures and strategies
Different “world view”
More violent, more sexual
Films become more creatively daring
Film School Generation
Pastiche & Nostalgia
Breaking the Production Code
- European films being imported were looser with their violent/sexual content and this influenced American filmmakers and audiences
- The Moon is Blue (1953): two men competing to have sex with a virgin
- Otto Preminger released the film without the production code seal of approval and people still went to see it
- Low-budget exploitation films were able to get into low-rent theaters
- Jack Valenti is made head of MPAA in 1966 and decides to abolish the production code
-
Violence after the Production Code
- slow motion
- squibs
- color
- ‘realistic’; real world/person on person violence
- use of real time long takes
- visible/audible signs of a victim’s pain
- the more we perceive a victim to suffer, the more violent something feels to us
catharsis
viewers can purge socially destructive impulses in the safe realm of art to the benefit of society as a whole
slow motion montage
- Kurosawa and Peckinpah use slow motion to accentuate moments of violence
- different cameras running simultaneously at different speeds to produce a depicted violence that looks both spastic and balletic and to extend ferocity of action
