Examples From 1920’s Silent Cinema
(from last week)
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Charlie Chaplin – The Kid (1921)
Buster Keaton – The General (1927)
If time: Oscar Micheaux’s Body and Soul
(1925)
Cantinflas (Mexico)
What Classical Hollywood Taught Us
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Three point lighting
180 degree rule
Star system
Narrative Structure
Categorization of film Genres
Organization of film crews (hierarchy)
Key Light
This is the main light. It is usually
the strongest and has the most
influence on the look of the scene.
It is placed to one side of the
camera/subject so that this side is
well lit and the other side has some
shadow.
Fill Light
This is the secondary light and is
placed on the opposite side of the
key light. It is used to fill the
shadows created by the key. The fill
will usually be softer and less bright
than the key. To achieve this, you
could move the light further away
or use some spun. You might also
want to set the fill light to more of a
flood than the key.
Back Light
The back light is placed behind
the subject and lights it from the
rear. Rather than providing direct
lighting (like the key and fill),
its purpose is to provide definition
and subtle highlights around the
subject's outlines. This helps
separate the subject from the
background and provide a threedimensional look.
180 Degree Rule
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The 180° rule is a basic
guide which suggests that two
characters (or other elements)
in the same scene should
always have the same
left/right relationship to each
other.
If the camera passes over the
imaginary axis connecting the
two subjects, it is called
crossing the line. The new
shot, from the opposite side, is
known as a reverse angle.
This rule helps to keep your
film coherent in terms of
spacing!
The Star System
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The 'star system' flourished with each studio having its own
valuable 'properties. The 30s was the age of lavish glamour and
sex appeal, and MGM became the biggest, most predominant and
most star-studded studio of all, making it "The Home of the Stars."
MGM promised "more stars than there are in heaven."
The studio also had high quality productions due to its great
craftsmen, including King Vidor, Victor Fleming, and George Cukor.
By 1934, MGM had over 60 big-name actors under contract. MGM
had the largest 'stable' of stars of all the studios, including: Joan
Crawford (originally a shopgirl named Lucille Le Sueur), Clark
Gable, Myrna Loy, William Powell, Greta Garbo, Norma Shearer,
Jean Harlow, Robert Montgomery, Judy Garland, Mickey Rooney,
Katharine Hepburn, Spencer Tracy, James Stewart, the
Barrymores, and Spencer Tracy.
The Importance of Hollywood’s Star
System
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After 1932, the development of
sound-mixing freed films from
the limitations of recording on
sets and locations. Scripts from
writers were becoming more
advanced with witty dialogue,
realistic characters and plots.
Screenplays were tailored for
certain actors.
Warner Brothers
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Warner Bros. developed its own style by
producing gritty narratives, social problem
pictures and a succession of tough, realistic
gangster movies in the sound era, reflecting the
era's shaken confidence in authority and the
country's social traditions.
Examples: Rags to Riches (1922), Scarface
(1932), Maltese Falcon (1931).
Examples of Classic Hollywood
Narrative Structure
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Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933, 1935, 1937)
Grand Hotel (1932)
It happened one night (1934)
Wizard of Oz (1939)
Gone With the Wind (1939)
Watch The Studio System
Effects of the Depression on
the Film Industry
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The Great Depression hurt nearly all the movie studios.
Studios had to reorganize, request government assistance,
cut budgets and employees, and close theatres when profits
plummeted.
Attendance at theatres was drastically affected. Special
incentives and giveaways (such as 2-for-1 features, dish
nights, and other contests and attractions) helped to
maintain audiences.
Affected films so that narratives had to reflect both the
realism and cynicism of the Depression period, while also
providing escapist entertainment to boost the morale of the
public by optimistically reaffirming values such as thrift and
perseverance (without offending the censors).
Watch “Hollywood Style”
Looking at
Narrative
Film Structure Formula #1
Watch How to Write a Script
What is Narrative Structure?
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Narrative structure – a narrative is a chain
of events in cause-effect relationship
occurring in time and space.
Differences between PLOT and STORY
Cause and effect relationship that is usually
predictable according to human behavior or
real-life situations.
Plot versus story
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Story: all the events we see or hear on the
screen, including the implicit and inferred
events.
Plot: A structure for presenting everything
that we see and hear in a film, with
emphasis on causality – the arrangement
of diegetic events in a certain order or
structure and nondiegetic elements.
Narrative (from chapter 3)
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Narrative is a story.
Narrative is a type of movie.
Narrative is a way of structuring fictional or
fictionalized stories presented in narrative films.
Narrative is broader concept that both includes and
goes beyond any of these applications.
The industry looks at narrative in terms of how the film
will be delivered – theater, television, DVD, etc).
Classic Hollywood Narrative Form
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Stories based on psychological causes:
decisions, choices, and traits of characters,
desire
Clear exposition of motivation
Unrestrictive narration – we see things that main
characters don’t
Closure at the end
Hollywood likes to give audiences “shortcuts” to
decipher movie narrative – why?
Other forms of narrative
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Documentary
Experimental
Others?
Looking at Genres
Film structure formula #2
An introduction to genres…
Genre
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Genre refers to the categorization of narrative
films by the stories they tell and the ways they
tell them.
Western, horror, science fiction, musical, and
gangster films (common examples). Additional
genres include action, biographies or biopics,
melodramas, thrillers, romantic comedies and
bromedies, fantasy, etc.
What is the significance of genres?
Genre conventions
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Theme – unifying idea that the film expresses through its narrative
or imagery (e.g. Western).
Setting – where the action is located and how the environment is
portrayed.
Presentation – the cinematic language that communicates tone and
atmosphere. (e.g. low key lighting in film noirs).
Character types – e.g. the cowboy, the detective, etc.
Story formulas – the way the story is structured.
Stars –actors that are “typecast” and identified with a particular
genre – e.g. Bruce Willis, Jet Lee, etc.
Categorization of Film Genres
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Development of film genres (gangster films,
musicals, newspaper-reporting films, historical
biopics, social-realism films, lighthearted
screwball comedies, westerns and horror)
Musicals, screwball comedies and gangster
films were most popular during the 1930’s.
Motion Picture Production Code of 1930 - set
film guidelines regarding sex, violence, religion,
and crime.
Your film - Considerations
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What is the narrative in your film?
What is the plot structure of your film?
What is the genre of your film?
What character types exist in your film?
What Hollywood stars are in your film?
Look at one scene from your movies and
create a lighting plot of that scene.