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Birth of Cinema: 1890s Edison and the Kinetoscope Biograph and filmmaking in…New Jersey?

Birth of Cinema: 1890s Edison and the Kinetoscope Biograph and filmmaking in…New Jersey? Edwin Porter. Lumiere Brothers popularize public screenings French film industry most successful pre-World War I. Where are films seen? Vaudeville Store-front theaters: Nickelodeon

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Birth of Cinema: 1890s Edison and the Kinetoscope Biograph and filmmaking in…New Jersey?

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  1. Birth of Cinema: 1890s • Edison and the Kinetoscope • Biograph and filmmaking in…New Jersey? • Edwin Porter • Lumiere Brothers popularize public screenings • French film industry most successful pre-World War I

  2. Where are films seen? • Vaudeville • Store-front theaters: Nickelodeon • Carnival sideshow Movies considered working class entertainment.

  3. Early Cinema and the 1900s to 1920s • Industry moves to Hollywood • Dominates movie production after World War I • “Silent” cinema? • “movie palaces” and “an evening’s entertainment”

  4. D.W. Griffith and The Birth of a Nation • Industrial, artistic, cultural significance • Cinema as ideology Ideology: those ideas, images, stories, and other systems through which we make sense of the world and our relation to it

  5. Genre films: categories of movies with reliable formulas for telling stories • Silent era oriented toward action and lavish sets: • Westerns, war movies, horror, romances, physical comedies, costume dramas, documentaries, action, melodramas Star system: discovered certain actors/actresses could attract viewers no matter film

  6. Sound Film and Studio System • Early sound: • Jazz Singer (1927) • Restrictions • New genres include: screwball comedies, musicals, character studies, crime dramas

  7. How the studio system works •  everything done (until late 1940s) "in-house" • Vertical integration: when companies with same owner handle different aspects of the film business • Three Keys Stages • 1. Production • Distribution • Exhibition

  8. 5 Major Studios by 1930 • Paramount • MGM • Warner Bros. • Fox • RKO • An evening's entertainment now includes: •  Newsreels •  Cartoons •  B movie •  Feature

  9. Movie attendance peaks in 1946 • 90 million Americans go to movies every week • U.S. vs. Paramount (1948): Divestiture agreement • Breaks up studio hold on film production, distribution, exhibition

  10. Film adjusts to the Changing Culture • TV and Movies: Enemies and partners • Movies on TV • New technologies for film

  11. Studios start producing TV shows • Disneyland and “Disneyland” • Westerns • Why? • $$$ • Fin/Syn: networks can’t own content

  12. More film industry responses: • Exhibition: theaters move out of city centers • Independent production: partnerships between producers and studios

  13. Late 60s and 1970s, Hollywood attempts to reconnect • More independent production • Younger directors • Ratings • Hays Office/Production Code was earlier response • Motion Picture Association of America • May encourage more explicit content

  14. The New Hollywood • More corporate mergers • Business reasserts control • Blockbusters: Jaws, Star Wars • Broad appeal • Foreign appeal • Cross promotion • Merchandising • Evolution or Devolution?

  15. Current structure: • Studios partner with independent producers • Agree to distribute • Tent-pole strategy: Blockbusters paired with smaller niche films for particular audiences • Blockbusters can assure solvency for a while, but often flop.

  16. Distribution and Exhibition today: • More screens, less movies. • Windows: different “arenas” for exhibition

  17. How will digital technologies shape the future of the movie industry? • Production • Distribution • Exhibition • Straight to DVD?

  18. Film Criticism: Ways of Thinking About Movies • How do you talk about film without focusing on “what happens”? • Or “thumbs up or down”?

  19. Auteur theory: director as unifying artistic voice • similarities across films

  20. Genre: films with formulas •  Set rules, expectations • Both for filmmakers and audiences Genre theory • Identify genres, subgenres (scifi, comedy) • Examine how change

  21. Symptomatic Culture • film as “symptom” • how film text connected to cultural context • looking to “subtext”

  22. Structuralism • language organizes and constructs our access to reality • film and genres as language systems • Saussure: way we make sense of the world is dependent on the language we speak and, therefore, the culture we inhabit.

  23. Langue: • language system (rules and conventions which organize it) • Parole: • utterance (individual use of language) • Task of structuralism is to make explicit the rules and conventions (langue) which govern production of meaning (parole).

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