Director Presentations

This week we all signed up for directors to do presentations on.  We’ll start these on Monday, Sept. 24th.  For more info, click on the “Director Presentations” tap at the top.

Chaplin, Keaton, and Lloyd

Here’s what the AllMusicGuide has to say about the Beatles: “Moreover, they were among the few artists of any discipline that were simultaneously the best at what they did and the most popular at what they did.”

It’s true.  Any other artists you can think of that were both the best and the most popular?  In class was mentioned Alfred Hitchcock and Steven Spielberg (maybe not right now, but when he made Jaws, E.T., Raiders of the Lost Ark, and Schindler’s List).  But it’s hard to think of others.  But back in the 1910’s and 20’s the world had not one, but three filmmakers that fit this description.

So this last week we’ve been watching short films and clips from Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, and Harold Lloyd.  80 years later, and their genius is still unmistakable, and they can still make a roomfull of jaded media-gorged teenagers laugh.

Here’s some online films:

Buster Keaton: “Sherlock Jr.”

“One Week”

Buster Keaton montage

Harold Lloyd:

“Harold Lloyd, the Third Genius” intro

“The Flirt” clip

Charlie Chaplin:

“The Immigrant”, “Easy Street”, and others

“The Gold Rush”

There’s plenty of other clips out there, so check ‘em out.  On monday we’ll be writing a response comparing and contrasting the three comedic giants.

Give it up for Silent Comedies!

I bet most of you, whether you know it or not, are fans of silent comedies. Tom and Jerry? Roadrunner and Coyote? It doesn’t get better than that. And all those guys were inspired by the early comedians like Chaplin, Keaton, Lloyd, and Lauren and Hardy.

First we watched a couple Tom and Jerry shorts to get in the right mindset.

Tom & Jerry: “Dog Trouble”

“The Cat Concerto”

“Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Mouse”

“Space Meow”

Roadrunner: “Roadrunner a-go-go”

“Guided Muscle”

And a little gem from Westphal/Riekena: “Happy Best Friend Day“

Then we moved back in time to 1929 with Laurel and Hardy in “Big Business“

More to come…

Realism, Formalism, and Classicism

These past three days we’ve been looking at some of the first films ever made, and the different traditions that they started. First we have The Lumiere Brothers who invented a portable camera, took it to the streets, and made the first documentaries. Next there was George Melies, the magician, who made fantasy films and developed some of the first special effects. Then there was Edwin Porter, director of the Great Train Robbery, who used actors and sets and effects to try and tell a believable and compelling story on film.

These three filmmakers were each pioneers for traditions that have continued throughout film history. These traditions are known as Realism, Formalism, and Classicism.

Realism, started by the Lumiere documentaries, is all about showing the truth. A realist will try to preserve the illusion that their film world is unmanipulated, an objective mirror of the actual world. We rarely notice the style in a realistic movie. They often aim for a rough look, with the idea that “if it’s too pretty, it’s false.” This means there is often handheld camera or simply a camera on a tripod. They use available light (often just the sun). They use non-professional actors (real people playing themselves). They don’t build sets, but instead find existing buildings or outdoor locations. Their films are about everyday people and everyday situations. They films often deal with social issues. For example: A man needs to find a job in order to feed his family. He is offered a job, but it is required that he own a bicycle for transportation. He and his wife pawn everything they can to buy a bike. He gets the bike and goes to work. On his first day of work the bicycle gets stolen. Now he must find the bicycle. This describes the first 10 minutes of “the Bicycle Thief.” It was shot on the streets of Italy with people who had never acted before, using just a camera on a tripod and a basic light kit.

At the other end of the scale, we have Formalism. Formalist directors have no desire to show reality. They want to show their personal vision of the world. They are concerned with spiritual and psychological truths that can best be represented by distorting and exaggerating the image. When Melies made “A Trip to the Moon” he wasn’t concerned with what a space ship or the moon might actually looked like. He wanted to be funny and use cool special effects. So he makes a purposefully fake looking bullet, which the astronauts climb into and are shot into space, hitting the moon (which does have a face) right in the eyeball. Formalistic films are often dream-like. They have detailed, exaggerated sets and costumes. They have complicated camerawork and symbolic lighting. The style draws attention to itself., as if the director is saying, “Look at me! I am an artist and I made this!” At the extreme end, formalist will avoid story and characters altogether, and instead try to convey a particular mood or emotion by showing abstract images.  Watch Melies’ “The Black Imp” or “Trip to the Moon“

In between the two we have Classicism. This is typified by “The Great Train Robbery” and most hollywood style films that came after it. Classicism is all about ideal storytelling. The goal of a classicist is to tell a story in the best way possible. They want to you get caught up in the characters and their problems, to feel what they feel, but not be distracted by the filmmaking techniques. Classicists will build sets that resemble reality and get them exactly right for the story. They will make polished pictures with the camera, but nothing that will make you gasp “look at that camerawork!” They will use professional actors who can portray the characters emotions, and who will bring in a big audience. If there are special effects, they will look as realistic as possible.

Realism: A Clip from “Spinal Tap” by Rob Reiner. Even though it’s a fictional movie with actors pretending to be in a rock band, they shoot it like a documentary. handheld camera, natural lighting, etc.

Realistic Classicism: United 93 

Classicism: The Empire Strikes Back. It’s obviously fictional, taking place on another planet with spaceships and junk, but they try and make it as believable as possible, and have calculated the camerawork, editing, music etc. so that you empathize with Luke and feel his tension. The camerawork is good, but doesn’t call attention to itself.

Formalistic Classicism: City of the Lost Children 

Formalism: Blinkity Blank by Norman Mclaren. No characters, no story, just abtract pictures with music. All put together to create emotion and a psychological experience.

download the following handout and answer the questions:

realism vs formalism handout

Great Films

Today we talked about what makes a “great film”  I passed around the American Film Institute’s list of the top 100 films of all time, and we tried to figure out why in the world “Titanic” and “Citizen Kane” were on there.  It turns out there are a few reasons.

Some films are Aesthetically innovative.  This means they have a unique style or vision, they were really well made, they influenced the look and style of later films.  This would apply to “Citizen Kane” and “2001″ and “Raging Bull.”  Those films don’t look like anything else and have a unique feel to them.

Other films are Technologically important.  “King Kong” was one of the first to combine animation with live action.  “Toy Story” was the first computer animated feature.

Some deal with important social or political issues.  “Do the Right Thing” deals with race relations in New York and America.  “The Shawshank Redemption” deals with issues of poverty, corruption, and criminal justice.

Others are historically important, such as “Schindler’s List” or “Saving Private Ryan” that portray historical events that we need to remember.

We also find movies that are culturally significant.  When “Gone with the Wind” came out, nearly everyone in America saw it.  Likewise with “Star Wars” and “Titanic.”  These films were such a phenomenon at the time they were released that they had a huge impact on the culture.

So, the assignment is to take a look at the list, and think of five films you think should be on there, and give some reasons why, how they pertain to these five categories.

Downloads: AFI top 100 films

First Day of Class

Well, folks, I think this is gonna be a fun class.  That’s what I think.

Today was your basic introductory stuff.  We introduced ourselves and went over the syllabus and that kind of thing.  If you were absent or need another copy, you can download the syllabus below.  You need to read it and sign it and get your parent/guardian to sign it and bring it back by Friday, Aug. 31st.

Film History Syllabus

Welcome back!

Hey kids,

Welcome back to East Hollywood.  I’m looking forward to teaching film history again this year.  I’ve been watching tons of cool movies over the summer that are gonna knock your socks off.  Are you ready for some Fellini?  Or Melville?  Jean-Pierre Melville?  Oh, boy, this is gonna be good.  I’m writing this before the first class, so there’s nothing particularly important to say yet.  But I’ll be updating this at least every week, maybe more, so keep checking back.  And now it’s time for a fundamental question:

 If, at this moment, you knew that you could only watch five more movies, and then have to give up movie watching for the rest of your life, what five movies would you watch?

Brandon says:

1. It’s a Wonderful Life

2. My Neighbour Totoro

3. Babette’s Feast

4. Freaks and Geeks season1

5. The Hudsucker Proxy

What about you?

4/23/07

So all this tragedy and comedy stuff is all well and good, but it takes time to develop well rounded characters and the big boys in hollywood don’t like things that take time. They want to crank out Cinderella parts 2,3,4,5, and 6 and watch the money flow in.

So they brought us a little something called Melodrama. Usually we associate the word with overdramatic acting with lots of crying and life-threatening diseases and adultery and that kind of stuff. But there’s more to it than that. If you were gone, download the powerpoint and the worksheet. Keep in mind that while “melodrama” usually has negative connotations, it can be pretty cool too. Look at the top box office earners (Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Shrek, Spiderman, etc.) and most of them are melodrama. You know you love it.

Melodrama worksheet

melodrama powerpoint.ppt

3/28/07

Hey, if you’re looking for what we did Yesterday, on 4/9/07, go down to the next entry.  Sorry.

“What does it mean, what does it mean!?”

-Jack Skellington

Today we talked about 3 terms you need to know. Theme, Tone, and Presentation.

When a young fan wrote a letter to C.S. Lewis asking for advice on how to be a writer, Lewis responded, “Decide what you want to say, and then say it as clearly as possible.” Here Lewis was talking about a little thing called theme. A theme is the overall message or argument that a film is trying to make.

Movies (and all other works of art) are about something. Even bad movies are about something. Even Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift is about something. It has a theme, even if it doesn’t want to. Screenwriter Paul Schrader says, “When you write, you have to know in some way what you are about to do… There has to be some sense of why you are doing this.”

For some movies, the theme is obvious.

Spiderman: With great power comes great responsibility;

An Inconvenient Truth: The planet is gradually getting warmer because of things we humans are doing, and we can change it;

Star Wars, a New Hope: If you are selfish and run away from the fight but then change your mind and decide to do the right thing and help your friends in the fight against evil, it’s better to wait until the fight is almost over and then swoop down out of nowhere and blow away Darth Vader so Luke can get a clear shot. That way you’ll be safe and be a hero.

Other movies take more thought to figure out what it’s really trying to say. But this is the most important thing to learn in this class. Every director is trying to tell you something. But just like any other profession, there is a great variety in purposes and intentions among directors. Some are like clowns and just want to cheer you up. Some are like doctors or coaches and encourage you to do things that aren’t very fun but are good in the long run. Some are like political activists and want to change the public’s mind about a certain topic. And unfortunately, some are like drug dealers and don’t care about you or what happens to you as long as you pay them money. It’s up to you to figure out what they’re trying to say, and decide how you feel about what they’re saying.

So a theme is the message or moral of a story. Tone, on the other hand is the overall mood or feeling of a film. To figure out the tone, think to yourself “How does it make me feel?” Tone is easy to notice in music. Metallica or Slayer or Nine Inch Nails have a particular mood to them, a way they want you to feel when you listen to them. And that mood is very different from The Beach Boys. And all those are different from Led Zeppelin or Radiohead or Sufjan Stevens or Gnarls Barkley.

Presentation is how the work of art is made. In music, the presentation would be the instruments, the sound effects, the notes and chords. The Beatles’ presentation started out with two guitars one bass one drum set and two or three voices. Over the years they added more instruments like organs, horns, and strings, or sometimes subtracted and only used one piano or one guitar. They also got more complicated in song structure, changing from 4/4 time to 3/4 time in the same song. Def Lepard or Van Halen had a different presentation. They preferred distorted guitars with high pitched guitar solos.

These are things we need to think about when watching movies. What is the theme? What is it trying to say? What is the tone or mood? How does the director feel and how is he trying to make me feel? What is the presentation? How was it made? What did they do with acting, movement, lighting, editing, music and all that? Once you’ve explored these questions, you’re on your way to personal truth, and an A in this class.

We listened to two songs and watched one short film. Come in during project to listen to them and watch and fill out the worksheet.

 

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvINxJFOcCU

4/9/07

Hey folks,

Well, Spring break’s over. It was a nice week, but now we’re back and it’s time to talk about Tragedy. See, back in the old days, around 350 B.C. or so, there was this old guy with a beard named Aristotle. He lived in Greece, and was friends with some other old bearded guys named Plato and Socrates. They all sat around thinking about stuff all day, and Aristotle, just like you and me, liked to think about movies. Except they didn’t have movies back then, they only had plays. But you take what you can get, so he watched plays and wrote about them. He figured out that there were two types of plays: tragedy and comedy (yes, there’s more types now, but not back then, so deal with it).

So he wrote a book about tragedies and comedies and what makes some better than others.

I put together a little powerpoint presentation on the subject, and it has all the answers to the worksheet in it.

Have fun!

Downloads:

tragedy and comedy powerpoint

tragedy and comedy worksheet