timeline of film Flashcards
(15 cards)
what was the first film? (1878)
’ a horse in motion’
- edweard muybridge commissioned to take some photos of a horse.
- first ever moving image
- he discovered that projecting the images quickly meant you could see the horse in motion
what was film like in the early 20th century?
- complex storylines started to emerge
- static wide shot
- no close ups or complex shooting techniques
- notable films include: ‘a trip to the moon’, ‘the great train robbery’ and ‘the birth of a nation’
what was the soviet montage theory (1927)?
- sergei eisenstine had 5 methods of montage:
- metric
- rhythmic
- tonal
- overtonal
- intellectual
- found that cutting can create complex ideas more efficiently than the content of the shot
what was the kuleshov effect (1920s)?
- expressionless man face cut next to soup, a girl in a coffin and an attractive women
- audiences assumed the man felt hungry, sad and lust
- this shows audiences do not have to be told how to feel
when was the creation of sound? (USA)
- in 1927 ‘the jazz singer’ was the first movie with both songs and dialogue
- films with sound nicknamed ‘talkies’
- sparked huge growth
- sound recording required large equipment which meant filming was moved indoors
- studio system born
what where the big 5 movie production companies?
(1930s-‘golden age’)
- metro-goldwyn-mayer (MGM)
- paramount
- RKO
- warner bros.
- 20th century fox
how did hollywood become a machine?
(1930s-‘golden age’)
- 400 motion pictures a year / 90 million americans watching movies per week
- birth of movie stars: james dean, james stewart, audrey hepburn, marilyn monroe
what was film noir?
(1930s-‘golden age’)
- stylized hollywood crime drama
- marked by a mood of pessimism, fatalism and menace
- french new wave
- e.g. citizen kane - ‘one of the greatest movies of all time’
what was block booking?
(1930s-‘golden age’)
- studios signed a deal with cinemas to show every film the company made that year
- few a-list movies a year
- lots of b-list movies to be shown throughout the year to make profit
who was alexandre astruc?
(1950s france)
- wrote ‘the birth if a new avant-garde - la camera stylo’
- argued the true creator of a film was the director - directing is a true act of writing as a director writes with his camera
- said “would citizien kane be satisfactory in any other form than the one given to it by orsen welles?”
- auteur theory - directors are true artists and their work should be recognised
what was the paramount case?
(1960s USA)
block booking banned
why did the golden era end?
(1960s USA)
- actors/ filmmakers now freelance and not attached by studio contracts
- baby boomers enjoyed movies of the french new wave, spaghetti westerns and japanese cinema so studios had to accommodate the new young demographic
what was the new hollywood movement?
(1960s USA)
- mid 1960s to 1980s
- new generation of filmmakers such as martin scorsese and stephen speilburg
- challenges conventional film making genres and rules, such as breaking stereotypes
- blockbusters were created: 2001: a space odyssey, the godfather, jaws
what was cinema like in the 1980s?
- blade runner, star wars, back to the future sparked the sci-fi genre
- special effects meant long action sequences
- became almost comical as almost every movie has an explosion
what was cinema like in the 1990s?
- terminator 2 and jurrasic park lay foundations for CGI movies
- indie filmmakers such as quentin tarantino emerged creating character driven and unique storylines
- speilburg inspired the action realism movement of the 2000s with ‘saving private ryan’
- 1999 matrix marked the end of an era - blockbuster sci-fi with lots of CGI, taking inspiration from asia, cool soundtrack and explosions
- CGI created superhero movies - new american movie genre
- mexican film created the ultra-long camera shot