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FILM HISTOR

Y

Sequential Photography• Étienne-Jules Marey,• Physician, professor of

natural science

• Eadweard Muybridge, 1877• Landscape photographer• High Speed photos• Capture horse in motion

through trip wire shutter triggers

• Illusion of Motion through ordered pictures• zoopraxiscope

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Kinetograph and Kinetoscope• W.K.L. Dickson/

Thomas Edison• Kinetograph:

moving picture camera, 1892

• Kinetoscope: peep hole viewing machine, 1893

• Columbian Exposition, Chicago, 1893

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Kinetoscope

1. 35mm b/w motion picture (15 sec)

2. dancers, acrobats, prize fighters, vaudeville performers

3. Edison ‘studio’4. http://

www.youtube.com/watch?v=WmZ4VPmhAkw

5. disappear by 1900

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Inventing the Projector

Francis Jenkins/Thomas Armat • basic principle, 1895

Auguste & Louis Lumière•cinematograph in Paris, 1895•“Workers Leaving Lumière Factory” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4nj0vEO4Q6s

•“Arrival of a Train at a Station”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1dgLEDdFddk

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Showings: Phase One, 1895-1905• Vaudeville

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hkC1jKa3ztY

• Movies as novelty acts • Eventually used as

‘chasers’

• Penny Arcades• owners buy/rent projectors• regular film screenings

• Traveling shows• itinerant exhibitors• tent shows

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Nickelodeons (1905-1918)

• Films Only• continuous showings

• Growth:• 1914: 18,000 theaters

(US)• 7 mil daily admissions

• Longer films • 10-15 minutes• one-reel westerns,

melodramas

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Nickelodeon: Audience Growth1. Urbanization2. Industrialization3. More Disposable Income4. More Leisure Time

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Leisure and Culture (early 1900s)

Low Culture• arcades• dance halls• vaudeville• saloon• pool hall• minstrel shows• burlesque theatre

High Culture• parks• libraries• school rec.

programs• Museums• Opera/Theatre• church socials• Progressive Era

Reformers

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Nickelodeon/Low Culture

• poor sanitation, smells, overcrowding

• gaudy designs, outside barkers, handbills, lights

• darkness and morality

• raunchy vaudeville opening acts

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The Story of Film (Mark Cousins, 2001)• Nickelodeons• Stars/Star System• Industrialization of Cinema• Studio System / Studio Control

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Silent Films (mid-1920s)

• Commercial Success• 1927

• 800 films/year• 100 mil. weekly attendance • 25,000 cinemas

• Aesthetic Success• “The Tramp” • Wings (1927)• Mary Pickford, Charlie Chaplin,

Clara Bow

• visual storytelling

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Experiencing Silent Films, 1920s• Elegant, ornate

cinemas• musical

accompaniment

• Popular Art• Audience imagination• “subjective

experience” not passive viewing

• Chaplin’s “The Kid” (1921)• http://

www.youtube.com/watch?v=qNseEVlaCl4

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Talkies

• The Jazz Singer (1927), first sound film

• primarily visual to primarily verbal• comedy: pantomime to

dialogue

• standardized, less individual interpretation

• writers-journalists/literati• theatre actors/directors• NY/Hollywood

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Star System/Studio System

High cost sound moviesStars as Assets•Studios (Paramount, MGM)•order and predictability•300-400 films a year; “A” & "B" movies •proving ground for new stars•7-year contracts1930s/Depression•stability in turbulent times•stereotypical mold for stars

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City and Social AlienationCountry• family tradition• Religion• framework of

purpose• community

norms• close-knit

community• character

City• impersonality• normlessness• Anomie: ‘lost in the

crowd’• self-help manuals• personality

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Stars as Models for Personality• models: newcomers/new

situations• stage, screen, playing field

• define success, attractiveness• confident behaviour• decisive; "harmonious personalities.“

• whole person; well-integrated self• celebrated actors as

“personalities"

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Star System/Star Gazing

Studio investment•lengthen stardomPromotion•Fan Mail•Fan Clubs

• 1934: 535 clubs • 750,000 members

•Photography•Close-up Shot; faces

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Rise of Hollywood Studio System• Post-mid-1920s (MGM, Paramount, etc)• vertical integration• production, distribution, and exhibition• Long term contracts with actors

• Studio ties and feature filmmaking

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Women and Film• Why many women novelists today but few

women filmmakers?• Between 1939-1979, 7400 feature films produced,

but only 14 directed by women. • Kathryn Bigelow (“The Hurt Locker”, 2010), first

female director to win Academy Award for director• Bechdel Test• Why so few women (directors/writers)?

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Nell Shipman Canada’s first female filmmaker Back to God’s Country (1919)

Wrote, direct, act Critical & financial success http://www.youtube.com/

watch?v=9B9_GRCJO9c Nell Shipman Productions

Shipman “cottage industry” vs “industrialization” of filmmaking

Female characters: “active, competent, courageous, and self-reliant,” “rescuers”

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Women FilmmakersEarly film and novelty• popular entertainment; vaudeville;

theatre (women)Economic Factors (post-1925)• Filmmaking & Capital Investment• Entrance Barriers For Newcomers

Social Factors• Female Exclusion• “Old Boy’s Network”

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Film in Canada During the Studio EraDomination of American films• Vertical integration• 95% of British market • 70% of French market

US Branch Plants• “quota quickies”

Integration difficult in Canada • Sparse population • Geographical distance • Preference for American film

Canadian exhibitors • Alliances with American producers 23

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National Film Board (NFB)Canadian Motion Pictures Bureau, 1918• Non-commercial educational film• Representations of Canada as “an inducement to capital

to come to this country”

Replaced by NFB, 1939• headed by John Grierson• assigned with “interpreting Canada to Canadians”High Cultural Stance• Combat American cultural product• emphasis on documentary• Developed by “social reformers aiming to use the

medium of film as a communications technology for consolidating middle ground opinion in Canada” (Druick 259)

• Nation building, Ideal citizenship

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