THE LADY FROM SHANGHAI Flashcards
Director
Orson Welles
Production comapny
Columbia
Big Five
20th Century Fpx Metro Goldwyn RKO Warner Brothers Mayer
Little Three
Columbia
United Artists
Universal
Film Noir
The Lady from Shanghai can also be classified as what is known as a film noir, a body of unconventional crime films released in the 1940s and 1950s and made in a style that was largely at odds with the classical Hollywood style. Most original noirs were made by the American film industry although some key films were made outside of it. Film noir is a term that wasn’t used by the film industry or those who made the films at the time they were made, rather it was applied by French film critics in the 1940s (film noir is a French term that translates as black film or dark film). Famous film noirs include The Maltese Falcon 1941, Double Indemnity 1944, The Big Sleep 1946, The Killers 1946, Out of the Past 1947, The Third Man 1949, Night and the City 1950, The Asphalt Jungle 1950, Sunset Boulevard 1950, The Big Heat 1953, The Killing 1956, A Touch of Evil 1958 – you should try to watch as many of these films as you can. Noirs were produced by the major studios on relatively low budgets largely as B movies, films that would have shown early in the programme in the cinema before the main feature at a time when many people would have gone to the cinema for an entire morning, afternoon or evening and watched several films in succession. It could be argued that because of this the directors of noirs had the freedom to make films that dealt with grittier subject matter and were more unconventional and experimental than Hollywood’s more mainstream “A list” films. A substantial number of noirs were also directed by European directors, many of whom had fled Nazi persecution or occupation for America in the 1930s and 1940s and brought with them a different and perhaps more experimental approach to both the technical aspects of filmmaking and ways of structuring narrative than was common in the American film industry at the time (more on this later). However, noirs weren’t particularly popular with American audiences, being seen as unpatriotic, too experimental and overly pessimistic. In many cases they also pushed at the limits or even broke the Hays Code (the set of regulations that determined what could and could not be shown in films, forbidding films from showing things like a character getting away with murder or unmarried people in bed with each other). As a result, and as is the case with The Lady from Shanghai, some noirs were re-edited by the studios against the wishes of their directors to make them more palatable to a mass audience. When imports of American films to continental European countries started again in the mid 1940s the dark, pessimistic tone of film noir was much more popular there, with populations recovering from the destruction of the Second World War.
Classical Hollywood/Golden Age
BORROW THE BOOKKKK FROM SIR
Features of Classical Hollywood Films
Narrative:Narratives are logical, chronological, uncomplicated and easy to follow, with one event or action leading on naturally from what preceded it.
Characters are simple and easy to identify, leading characters are aspirational but easy to relate to. Making narratives clear and logical was prioritised over other aesthetic elements of filmmaking (lighting, cinematography, sound etc.) that had the potential to detract attention from it. Narratives may follow the three act structure, the lead character(s) will be “goal oriented” and their actions will lead to logical narrative progress towards their objective, these narratives are usually resolved satisfactorily. There is usually one main storyline although there may be subplots.
Editing: Continuity editing is used to construct a sense of realism.
Set/Setting/Location:Films are shot on a studio lot or set but made to look realistic, encouraging the audience to suspend their sense of disbelief and lose themselves in the film.
Mise en Scene:Other elements of mise en scene such as the set, performance, props and costume might strike a balance between realism and exaggeration, being realistic enough to allow the audience to suspend their sense of disbelief while also creating a world within the film that is engaging for the audience. Casting: Classical Hollywood tended to cast stars playing to type (i.e. playing the sorts of roles that they had come to be associated with) in leading roles. The Hollywood star system had developed from the silent era and was a key element of the industrial approach the studios took in the Classical era, allowing the studio to market a film easily .
Lighting:While contributing to the sense of realism lighting may also be used more expressively to direct audience response.
Cinematography:
Cinematography is used in a logical way to guide the audience through a narrative. Scenes will begin with wide shots to establish setting, medium long shots, mid shots and close ups will then be used to develop the narrative. Largely centered approach to framing with key action or characters placed in the middle third of the frame.
Sound:While diegetic sound might be used in a natural way to add to the sense of realism a non diegetic score might be used to direct the audience’s emotional response
Auterism
For this section of the exam you need to have an understanding of the concept of auteurism and of Welles’ style as an auteur. The following is adapted from notes provided by EDUQAS: The term auteur (‘author’ in French) was first used by Francois Truffaut in 1954 in the influential French film magazine Cahiers du Cinema to describe directors who were distinctive in their visual style and thematic preoccupations. Truffaut was a key director of a film movement that came to be known as the French New Wave which revolutionised filmmaking in the 1960s. The writers of the Cahiers du Cinema celebrated the individual ‘voice’ of a director and were dismissive of films identified by a studio, with directors and writers just part of the filmmaking machine (as was the case in much of Hollywood) Truffaut and other writers for Cahiers du Cinema were reacting against what they called ‘Scenarist’ French films of the time which relied on literary classics for plot and had an unadventurous style. Many of these writers went on to make their own films as part of the French New Wave. They used many Hollywood directors like Howard Hawks and Nicolas Ray, as well as Hitchcock, as their inspiration. Ironically, it was experimentation with cinematography, editing and narrative by the French New Wave that went on to inspire the directors of the ‘New Hollywood’ of the 1970s to break with the conventions of Classical Hollywood cinema.
Features of Film Noir
Subject Matter/Genre – while there is variation amongst them noirs are crime films. Noirs dealt with grittier subject matter than their classical Hollywood counterparts – a world of criminality, corruption and immorality.
Characters – Noir characters tend to be complex, there are certain key characters that feature in many noirs. More often than not the noir protagonist is an outsider, morally ambiguous, deeply flawed and down on their luck. While many noir protagonists are detectives they tend to be private investigators and are therefore not part of the establishment. This is in contrast to Noir antagonists who are frequently outwardly respectable men in positions of power and authority. Many noirs also feature a female antagonist character defined as the femme fatale (deadly woman), who uses her sexuality to gain power over men and is irresistible to the protagonist.
Narrative – Noirs are defined by deliberately complex narratives built around enigma and often without satisfactory narrative resolution. Narratives are not always chronological in noir, often making use of flash back and in many cases (but not always) beginning with the protagonist looking back at an event in their recent past which becomes the narrative of the film. The fragmented narrative style of film noir is used symbolically, to emphasise the mental fragility, confusion and vulnerability of central characters.
Lighting – As the name implies, one of the defining features of noir is low key lighting which reflects the metaphorical darkness of the narrative. High contrast chiaroscuro lighting is also used in many noirs in a more expressive way than in classical Hollywood pictures. This chiaroscuro lighting, often used in a way that casts strong geometrical shadows is often used to emphasise characters’ inner turmoil or sense of entrapment or danger – a technique pioneered in German expressionist cinema of the 1920s, a movement that directors of noir (many of whom had fled from Europe to America to escape Nazi persecution) would have been part of or aware of.
Cinematography – As with its approach to narrative and lighting Noirs often use cinematographic techniques such as canted angles to emphasise the vulnerability of central characters. Unconventional shot composition, often with characters placed close to the camera in the left or right thirds of a shot rather than being centered are used for a similarly unsettling effect. Deep focus and deep staging encourage active spectatorship, forcing the audience to look around a shot and encouraging multiple interpretations, adding to the sense of ambiguity. These two last two techniques in particular were developed by Welles and his cinematographer Greg Tolland and have come to be seen as distinctive of Welles’ signature style as an auteur.
Editing – While many noirs make use of continuity editing, the predominant editing style used during the classical Hollywood period, noir directors also took a more unconventional approach to editing in sections of their films. Transitions such as dissolves and fades and use of montage editing and jump cuts, especially in the dream sequences that were part of many noirs added to the sense of narrative ambiguity and and complexity and drew attention to the editing process rather than encouraging the audience to suspend their sense of disbelief.
Settings – In many film noirs settings are predominantly urban and nocturnal. Often the settings inhabited by noirs’ unconventional protagonists are tough and dangerous and this world will often collide with the more refined environment of the rich and powerful. Whether settings used in noirs are urban or rural, tough or refined, they tend to emphasise the isolation of the central characters.
German Expressionism
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Regulation-The Hays Code
Film Noir and the films Welles were making in the 1940s and 1950s pushed at the official boundaries of what was deemed acceptable to show in film at the time. Studios weren’t officially censored or regulated at the time, but most of them were voluntarily signed up to a regulatory system known as the The Motion Picture Production Code, otherwise known as The Hays Code (after William Harris Hays, the first chairman of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America). The Hays Code was supposed to ensure films met certain moral standards, making it easier for the studios to market their films and avoid the controversy and boycotts that could accompany films that didn’t meet the Production Code’s standards. The Production Code was in place from 1930 to 1968 although it wasn’t universally popular, with critics accusing it of stifling creativity and artistic expression and imposing a form of censorship on the industry. It became increasingly difficult to enforce from the late 1940s onwards as filmmakers (including Welles and many noir directors of the 1940s and 1950s) pushed against its limitations. Some key features of the production code were:
Sexual content and nudity were banned. There are restrictions on filmmakers even implying that characters are involved in a physical relationship, especially outside of marriage or as an infidelity. Homosexuality and interracial relationships could not be shown.
Audiences could not be encouraged to sympathise with criminals, criminal characters in films should be shown to be punished for their crimes.
Religion could not be represented in a way that mocked it.
Restrictions were placed on the use of swearing.
Drug taking could not be shown.
Distributors
Columbia Pictures
Actors
Rita Hayworth...Elsa Bannister Orson Welles...Michael O'Hara Everett Sloane...Arthur Bannister Glenn Anders...George Grisby Ted de Corsia ...Sidney Broome (as Ted De Corsia) Erskine Sanford... Judge Gus Schilling...Goldie Carl Frank...District Attorney Galloway Louis Merrill...Jake Bjornsen Evelyn Ellis...Bessie Harry Shannon...Cab Driver
Characters
Elsa Bannister Michael O'Hara Arthur Bannister George Grisby Sidney Broome (as Ted De Corsia) Judge Goldie District Attorney Galloway Jake Bjornsen Bessie Cab Driver
