Film Final!! – Flashcards

a non-conformist approach to cinema. In opposition to dominant or mainstream cinema, some filmmakers set out to create films that challenge normal notions of what a movie can show and how it can show it. These films work independently of the studio system. Not aiming to make a profit, often shown in museums.

recognizable by its efforts at self-expression or experimentation outside mainstream cinema.”
“Man on Wire”

films that use film strips borrowed or cut from other movies or discarded footage.

non-narrative visual/sound experiences with no story and no acting. They rely on the unique qualities of motion, rhythm, light and composition inherent in the technical medium of cinema to create emotional experiences

in this form, there are recognizable forms and objects in the film
“Bridges Go Round” (Clarke, 1957) – bridges in NYC; about taking a bridge out of its everyday context
Passage a l’acte” (Arnold, 1993) – remix of “To Kill a Mockingbird” kitchen scene
Normal scene abstracted into a new meaning

unrecognizable forms and objects in the film (but aren’t the moths and leaves in Mothlight “recognizable”?) confused* (Maybe because ‘Mothlight” is not about the bits of insects and leaves but rather about the pattern on the screen and the play of light and dark, so even though there are recognizable images, they don’t represent actual insects/leaves, they’re just a means by which to experiment with (YEP! It’s just like Composition in Blue. Even though we know the objects in the film are squares and circles, it’s not about the realization of those forms, but about the texture and rhythm that’s happening in the film.) thanks guys. y’all are so smart
“Mothlight” (Brackage, 1963) – lyrical film – put insects, grass, leaves on clear film and ran it thru the camera: all about form
“Lavender Mist” (Jackson Pollock, 1950)
Film strip from “Arnulf Rainer” (Kubelka, 1958-60)
“Composition in Blue” (Fischinger, 1935) – abstract animation
German animator; patterns move to music; blues to reds, cubes to circles
flicker films are part of the non-representational abstract. with the Mothlight film we saw: it’s NOT about what is going on but about the texture, shape, and color rhythm. the film “composition in blue’ is also nonrep.

a type of form in which the film’s parts are juxtaposed to suggest similarities, contrasts, concepts, emotions and expressive qualities. (Ex: “A Movie” (Bruce Conner) – found footage/collage film; illusions of continuous space)

A type of filmic organization in which parts treat distinct subsets of a topic. For example, a film about the Unites States may be organized into 50 parts, each devoted to a state.
filmmaker uses simple patterns of development(move from small to large, local to national, personal to public, and so on). Ex. Your film on butterflies might begin with a smaller species and work up to large ones or it might go from the drab to colorful types.
organized by sections, each focusing on a subject; provides an overview and concludes with a value
March of the Penguins

addresses the viewer openly, trying to move the viewer to a new intellectual conviction, to a new emotional attitude or to action. Emphasis on opinion. Attempts to persuade the viewer to make a choice. (Argument from source, subject-centered arguments and viewer centered arguments) A type of filmic organization in which the parts create and support an argument. Organized like an essay.
“The River” (1930), “Waiting for Superman”, commercials, “An Inconvenient Truth”, “Miss Representation,” “Food, Inc.” (2008)

alternate black and white frames that are in a patterned way: it’s about editing, no subject matter. objective is editing rhythm.

(Composition in Blue)- stop motion (Non-representational)

(Bridges Go Round)- representational abstract, showed various bridges around new york.

(Passage à l’acte)- representational, took a scene from To Kill A Mockingbird and re-edited it and added different sounds. basically, rewinds short segments to create repetition. ( annoying “To Kill A Mockingbird” clip

(A Movie)-associational, collage of scenes from different movies and other b-roll w/ a single musical score (1958)

Not to entertain or educate, nor to oppose CHC, but to make one rethink cinema and what art is; thought provoking and engaging

usually a protagonist wandering in a dream like state
“Meshes of the Afternoon” (Deren, 1943) – dream structure, irrational edits

Mothlight, Delicacies of Molten Horror Synapse) -images presented as subjective experiences seen through the eyes of the filmmaker; use of abstract properties of cinema as art
“Reflections on Black” (Brackage, 1955)
Brackage was concerned with how things looked, and the imagination

Not just challenging but completely overthrowing the rules of art: art and criticism become the same thing
Looked back to “dada” and “surrealism”
“Underground” Cinema- Can someone elaborate on what this is?
Warhol was Fluxus in film, he was a minimalist but actively sought to make art a commodity; was shooting 2 films a week for under $1500x
He loved CHC and the studio system; he was already well known in pop-art movement, abstraction, and originality
Claimed not to have a larger point–>no artistic statement, just for profit
“Sleep” ( Warhol, 1965)
“Eat” – 45 minutes of his friend eating a mushroom
“Empire” – 8 hr shot of the Emp. State from dusk till dawn
He shot in 24 fps but showed his films in 16 fps (took longer to view than it did to shoot
them)

a continuous flow”; art world was too professionalized
Projects were designed so that they couldn’t be replicated
“Zen for Head” (Paik, 1960)
Is it art? Does it have to be tangible? Does there have to be an artist?
Art could be anything and anyone could be an artist

“Edie Sedgwick” (Warhol, 1965) – no narrative or story
How is it classified?
Subject does very little – to evoke emotions from you; about the experience

any process whereby artificial movement is created by photographing a series of drawings, objects, or computer images one by one. Small changes in position, recorded frame by frame, create the illusion of movement.

Film animation techniques include drawing/painting, cels, direct (manipulating the film itself), object/pixilation (The Nightmare Before Christmas 1993) and computer animation

Transferring live performances includes rotoscoping techniques (Through a Scanner Darkly, Fuji) and motion capture (animation for Gollum from Lord of the Rings)

(Winsor McCay, Gertie the Dinosaur) – Similar to flip books. Gertie was drawn on a series of cards by William McCay. Live action prologue. 12 minutes and is very basic; but there were thousands of cards to make Gertie come to life. Another example is Bambi Meets Godzilla

Layering clear plastic sheets or celluloid with each containing portions of the scene on top of each other.
Sleeping Beauty (Disney) vs Duck Amuck (Warner Bros)
Sleeping Beauty utilized cel animation to have detailed scenery.
Duck Amuck – 4 separate shots. Long take. Warped temporal flow. Plays with off screen and on-screen space. Daffy communicates with unseen animator and paint brush.
Disney’s style is more realistic while Warner Bros. usually goes for more cartoonish drawing.

Projects live-action footage onto drawing board to be traced. Can be done with paper/cards, or computer. Cheaper than doing it wrong and having to fix it.
“Fuji” – train ride sketched over on paper
Fuji – develops according to principles of abstract form. Breer introduces most of the motifs that will be varied across the film to create its principles of abstract form. Uses rotoscoping to only trace part of a figure or object. Leaves in some of the live action footage so that we know the images are tracings.
Disney’s Cinderella a notable example

Animators can scratch film and work directly on it, creating an image without a camera. (Composition in Blue)
“Blinkity Blank” etched visuals And sound onto film

Some animators use three dimensional objects that can be twisted and shaped frame by frame to create movement. “Clay-mation”. (Tim Burton’s “The Nightmare Before Christmas”) Wallace & Gromit
Pixilation is a term applied to frame-by-frame movement of people and ordinary objects. (ex: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JqPOUPcu0BQ) Also known as stop-motion

Animation close to reality without the constraints. “Monsters, Inc.,” 2001. Took years of development for technology to get where it is today. Motion captures; using special motion capture cameras and equipment to send 3D motion data to a computer. Most common type is optical. Gollum/Andy Serkis in LOTR.
James Cameron’s Avatar (at least the alien portions) were done almost entirely in motion capture

Documentary films are those films that purport to present factual information about the world outside the film and that presents itself factually.

a type of filmic organization in which the parts relate to one another through a series of causally related events taking place in time and space.
“Food, Inc.” – aimed to work on the mind of viewers and their opinion on the food industry (rhetorical film)

documentaries can manipulate opinions and even information depending on how the footage is shot and edited together. Some people believe that “staging” a scene that may have already happened is crucial for some documentaries to get their story across.

coined documentaries to be the creative treatment of actuality.
Raw footage needed film tactics to produce a POV
Prior planning of plot, story, shots
Staged materials: recreate events
“pictorial quality” – high degree of MES control (artificial lighting, continuity editing, 35mm film)
post-synch sound and voice-of-God narration to direct attention and mood

in traditional documentaries there are staged events and high quality imaging. There is also a lot of prior planning, a high degree of MES control, continuity editing, the use of heavy and obtrusive 35mm cameras, and post-synchronous sound (“voice of God” narration. See below).
Financed by a fur trading company (Revillon Furs)– shows fur trade as healthy
– I remember her mentioning that all the footage for this documentary was lost (pretty sure it got burned in a fire), so they went back and “recreated” every shot. Plus, they told Nanook to do several things in the film, so it wasn’t truly organic. Correct–all of the original film burned in a fire so it had to be shot twice; Nanook was told to bite a music record to make it appear like he was ignorant even though he knew perfectly well what it was.

Direct Cinema – characteristically records an ongoing event as it happens, with minimal interference by the filmmaker. Emerged in 1950s and 1960s most notably in political documentaries like “Primary”
“Primary” followed Humphrey and Kennedy’s election
General Qualities: little prior planning, no staged action, rougher visual image (camera operator just followed the subject), frequently hand-held camera on 16mm, direct sound (recorded live, avoiding non-diegetics)
WWII newsreel photography – very little control over MES
More objective and minimal interference: observe and record
Invention of tape recorder and lighter cameras allowed more flexibility and movement of camera
Hoop Dreams – four years of footage in three hours – lot of subjective choice
Cinema verite – Cinema truth.

Morgan Freeman in March of the Penguins. Basic narrator that is never seen and knows everything about the subjects of the documentary, and informs the viewer.

documentaries cannot be completely objective because of the choices that go into making one (organization, which scenes are used, etc.), direct cinema aims to be MORE objective than traditional but it cannot ever be fully objective

“I wanted to make a film about self-deception..about our need to believe what we want to believe.” – Morris
Narrative film, but also enriches the basic story and suggests how difficult the search for truth can be.
Non-linear with story events.
Viewer tends to side with Adams and distrust witnesses and police, but Morris never definitively favors Adams or criticizes others.
No voice over narrator explaining the situation, and no captions to identify speakers or provide dates.
Speakers look directly at the camera. (What is the effect of this? A: It puts the viewer in the position of the detective. It’s left up to you to listen to and interpret the information provided by the different witnesses in order to form your own conclusions about who was guilty and what really happened.)
Music is unresolved (what exactly does that mean? A: Philip Glass, a minimalist composer wrote the score. The chord progressions never resolve like in a regular score and there’s lots of repetition and doesn’t fit traditional style
How is it traditional? lot of interviews, ability to edit, placement of interviews, heavily controlled MES
How is it Direct Cinema? the tape recorder at the end
How is it neither? score was the same throughout, some sounds were loud and direct, use of silence, no voice-over narration

Director can rightly be called the author of his/her film.

control of the film. The style of the director comes through the film in unique ways. Authorship criticism proposes that a single person, usually the director, may be primarily responsible for important features of films. Furthermore, by comparing a number of films by the same director, one may find significant similarities among them — and those similarities point to something like an artistic vision.

“Wizard of Oz” (MGM, 1939)
Head of Prod. – Louis B. Mayer
U.P. – Mervin Leroy
Ass. Prod. – Arthur Freed
They wanted Shirley Temple but she was contracted to another studio
Judy Garland as Dorothy 🙂
Director changes: Richard Thorpe–> George Cukor–> King Vidor (did the beginning and end scenes)–> Victor Fleming (specialized at technicolor)
No real single author though credit is given to Fleming: arguably Freed and 3 writers, and producers

costume, music, set design, research, directors)
Directors and actors belonged to a studio and worked for them exclusively
Head of Production – find films and assign actors
Unit Producer – assigned 6-10 films/yr, assign writers and directors
Departments(each w/ a head) – costumes, music, set design, research, art design
Directors seen as contracted laborers; actors seen as marketable

studios didn’t pay attention to the actual film and got in the way of authorship

called for changes in the way films were being made
“politique des auteurs” – director is the film’s author
director’s w/ a unique style were held in higher praise
“Rebel Without a Cause” (Nicholas Ray)
“The Rules of the Game” (Renoir, 1939)
Many Americans thought French Cahiers (note: Cahiers means “journals” in French. The people who wrote for the Cahiers du Cinéma should not be called Cahiers) critics were crazy

film was just like the book. flat and sticks to the story.
Based on respectable literature
“Hunchback of Notre Dame” (France, 1956)
Others wanted directors to have all the say

Best way to study film was to study the directors
in his book he ranks (certain) directors
can’t look at one film of a director, you have to look at them all
ideally, the strongest personality at film production should be solely the director
Wanted to fight the traditional studio system
focused on the visual style of films rather than the script, because directors had the most influence there
condemns what he calls “forest criticism,” which basically lumps all of Hollywood (the “forest”) together rather than focusing on the “trees” (individual films)

-benefits: led to greater acceptance of film as an artform
led to a reevaluation of American films
put new emphasis on visual style
had impact on film practice
-drawbacks: privileges consistency over quality
champions directors contributions at the expense of collaborators
-does not take into account maturation/development of a filmmaker over the course of a career.
Problems of Intentionality
Hawks – didn’t think himself an artist, yet was praised by cahiers as one
Welles – didn’t credit his collaborators
Hitchcock didn’t credit his collaborators or influences

spike lee did the (right thing)’dolly’ shot which is where he would put actors on a dolly and then move the dolly. made it appear as though the actors were floating. He also places characters in triangular staging.

(note: films should be italicized rather than placed in quotes)
Scorsese: “Taxi Driver” and “Mean Streets”
Spielberg: “E.T.”, “Hook”, “Close Encounters of the Third Kind”
childlike wonderment
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VS5W4RxGv4s
Burton: “Edward Scissorhands” and “Corpse Bride”
John Ford: “The Grapes of Wrath”(1940), “Stagecoach”(1939), “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance” (1962)
optimism to deep cynicism over his career thru his films
for Ford, something got lost in progression in America
Welles: beloved by auteurship
Citizen Kane 1941
The Magnificent Ambersons 1942
Journey Into Fear 1943
The Lady from Shanghai 1948
Macbeth 1948
Othello 1952
Touch of Evil 1958
The Trial 1962
F for Fake 1975
The Other Side of the Wind (filming 1970-76, release?)

temporal effects, omniscient/unrestricted narration, tons of strategies – no limit

Hawks: his films seem flat on the surface
Oliver Stone: rapid cutting
Kubrick: lengthy tracking and lots of camera work
Spike Lee: “Do the Right Thing”
highly criticised film by whites (critics believed film would cause race riots)
4 racially motivated crimes in the movie from NYC in 1980s that derive from actual events
features a complex cluster of central characters, intertwining several story lines; complex for normal CHC (not CHC)
challenges notions of classic realism (direct camera address)
Themes: “period piece”, “social problem film”
Style: melodramatic use of music, mobile, flashy camerawork, extreme camera angles, direct address/racist rant, bright stylized color and lighting, “The Dolly Shot”, foregrounds editing via montage, triangular staging
a “street film” w/ unique style to create authentic example of the poetic creation of filmspace – tensions mount as do the street spaces
Time and space: growing racial tension in NYC, single street and day
Tonal Shifts: mix of comedy and tragedy
protagonist is Mookie, Greek chorus, causality is unclear and little resolution
Motifs: opposition, boombox, black/white, MalcolmX/MLK, violence/non, young/old, The Color RED
Welles: wide-angle lens, deep space staging, tracking, long takes
you can’t have something get in the way of unrestricted access
“Macbeth” 10 minute take and big change of style amidst
ffffffffc”Lady from Shanghai”
mirrors and fragmentation theme (Welles uses this in a lot of his movies)
technique from French New Wave
“Touch of Evil”
long tracking shot/take – follows car thru naturally lit border town
deep space theme
Interrogation scene – use of deep space and focus allowed continuity

Known as the “Master of Suspense”
– Alfred Hitchcock Presents (TV Show): further advanced his public persona and helped to make him a household brand name
– Known for his Cameos in each of his films (craftiest appearance was in Lifeboat [1944], in which he appeared in a newspaper ad about obesity)
· Hitchcock is recognized as a great director world wide.
· 1939: moved from England to America.
· Was first shunned and disliked.
Very much in the public eye, ironic commentary on murder was how he was seen

· Personally, widely recognized like Orson Welles.
· Hitchcock is now known as great artist. Subject matter stylistic techniques

areer: 1. early period (1920-1939) made movies for middle class brits and his films
contained certain techniques (snappy, rapid-fire dialogue) that were desired by the
english audience.
Blackmail (first British part-talkie and one of the first to use mentally subjective
sound)
The Man Who Knew Too Much
The Thirty-Nine Steps
2. middle period: He created films with women’s themes and had female protagonists. He also slowed the pace of his films for american audiences.
Rebecca
Shadow of a Doubt
Notorious
3. later period: hollywood (1951-1976) was the height of his popular success. majority of his most known films were made between 1951-1964
Strangers on a Train
Rear Window
Vertigo
North by Northwest
Psycho
The Birds
Marnie (last notable/critically acclaimed of his films; 1964)
Public persona: he did tv shows, she showed a clip from his talk show. Was very mysterious and eccentric. Dr. Bolding–“ironic commentary from a portly English gentleman”

he likes to put ordinary, naive characters/people in random/dangerous situations (ordinary people plunged into danger)
“The Man Who Knew Too Much” couple see a spy assassin
“North by Northwest” the “wrong man” variation – hero must prove innocence
“Notorious” average girl spying for US on Nazis
he said that psycho was a ‘fun’ film to make.
there were parallels between norman and marion- they were both escaping reality. she was fleeing and he is fleeing in his mind. they are both hiding something and leading double lives.
Transference of Guilt is another theme prevalent in Hitchcock’s films
protagonist is innocent but slightly responsible (Example: Rear Window, in which the audience is also guilty of wanting a murder just like Jeff)
“doubling” – transfer guilt from character to character thru similarities
“Shadow of a Doubt” her uncle is a serial killer
“Rear Window” audience feels guilt
“Sweetness and light merely covers up that chaos world”
Protagonist can’t trust anything once out of their own world
“Suspicion” seemingly safe place becomes dangerous
“The Birds” everywhere is threatened
Narration
Range of Narration: suspense is unrestricted, surprise is restricted (15 minutes of suspense vs. 15 seconds of surprise; Hitchcock largely preferred suspense)
Some characters know what is about to happen, most are clueless
“Rear Window” restricted to Jeff’s knowledge then a shift to unrestricted
“The Birds” clip of birds gathering behind the girl
Depth of Narration: “Vertigo” shots that suggest mental illness, retrograde zoom,
perceptual subjectivity
Style
POV editing: “Rear Window”
Innovative Sound: “Rope” moving camera, “Blackmail” one of 1st British talkies
“Dial M for Murder”
Virtuosic Visual Style: “Notorious” long crane tracking in to the key in her hand
“Topaz” directly downward camera angle over two characters, her dress
looks like a flower or blood spilling on the floor
“Strangers on a Train” style and camera work helps restrict knowledge
murder from reflection on glasses clip
“Psycho” shower murder scene, trailer showing Hitchcock’s dark humor
Critics were interested in Hitchcock’s violence towards women in his films. His films were ambivalent towards women as men were during mid 1900s. He projected the social aspects of the time in his films.

core/periphery model – type or formula. Group of films that share similar characteristics. A field of familiar conventions filmmakers can draw on when making films, and that audiences can draw on when trying to make sense of films.

Setting: ie westerns are in the west mainly “No Country for Old Men”
Formal elements: “The Killers”
Effects (emotional): “Written on the Wind”
Narrative: plots/situations, characters
gangster rise and fall
kung fu revenge
“Stagecoach” young gunslinger
“Scream” & horror/thriller – there is a formula – victim/monster
Thematic: general underlying meanings
musical: conflict is usually work vs romance
sci-fi: is technology good for us?
westerns: wilderness vs civilization, safety vs Lawless (great movie btw)
“Dracula” (Browning, 1931) sexual threat to normal couple
Stylistic (Icons)
certain images thru repetition create certain weight
“The Big Combo” (Lenis, 1955) film noir; wide angle lens, lighting
“The Searchers” (Ford, 1956) western; tiny figures set against huge landscapes, white hats are good, black are bad guys, a gun as a symbol of strength and honor, but that is different in gangster films
John Wayne is an icon
sound in horror flicks – vast change in sound (volume) and pitch

certain images thru repetition create certain weight (horror movie sounds, John Wayne)

(experimental): transplanted from other media: detective from literature, musicals from broadway. The Great Train Robbery
Development of Western Hybrids
begin to take on their own conventions
“Stagecoach” solidified western conventions by using lone ranger, transforming wilderness into civilization
John Ford used bigger stars to ground genre
“My Darling Clementine” (Ford, 1946): clip of Doc and Wyatt Erp in saloon scene

westerns in 1950s: protagonist and being a loner
hero fed up with civilization and goes a little crazy

extreme self-consciousness within genre
parodies and spoofs push conventions to absurdity
“For a Few Dollars More” (Leone, 1964) gunslinger showdown clip

“El Dorado” (Hawks, 1967)
“The Maltese Falcon”: firstly a detective film then noir later

comedy westerns, sci-fi thriller

“Dawn of the Dead”

within genres
short term fads ie “Scream” and “Saw”
distinct periods of time

the development of film led to several hybrids of genres. For example, Every Which Way But Loose is a Western AND a Comedy

analyzes the nature and functions of the cinema. Defines cinema and how it works.
criticism has theory in it, but it is not film theory

analyzes the different components that make up a text and how they are organized; break down cultures rather than language
Claude Levi-Strauss- wanted to figure out the basic systems that make cultures work
Influenced by linguistics
Myths: studied myths and found commonalities
structuralists are more scientific film scholars who helped legitimize the field of film studies

Foregrounds unequal class structures, looks at history and society in terms of inequalities
– Walter Benjamin: “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” (1936)
Loved film bc it recreated life for other people
– Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer: “The Culture Industry” (1944)
– Louis Althusser- influenced French critics (ideology)
focused on ideology: “Imaginary representation of real relations in which we live”
Studied why people oppose the broad ideologies
Comolli and Narboni (Cahiers) on Douglas Sirk: while Sirk’s films look like CHC, all the normalness crushes the characters

Response to Structuralism; basis of most film theory now
We need cultural context; Scientific approach inadequate
Spawned important branches (Psychoanalysis, Apparatus Theory, Spectatorship, etc.)

study of sign systems.
Sign= signifier (word, picture, or gesture)
Signified= mental concept that the word, picture, or gesture, provokes

dream screens: cinema screens represent your blank dreaming mind.
Mirror Stage: when an infant looks in a mirror and recognizes itself as human individual, but this image is misrecognition for the image is an illusion
helps us experience things as human subjects
but the truth is a lie bc its only a reflection
Dream Screens: Studied movies like studying dreams
desires, repression, etc.
Voyeurism, repression, narcissism, and complicated relationships with parents

objectification of female bodies.
a woman as the image and a man as the bearer of the look or gaze.
women are visual pleasures in narrative cinema. (laura mulvey)
Laura Mulvey: “Visual Pleasures in Narrative Cinema”
the camera in CHC is a male way of gazing at women
men tend to be the active agent, women are passive
“Winter’s Bone”

Mulvey’s binary is heterosexual; it oversimplifies desire and excludes lesbian and gay viewpoints
Does the gaze have to be straight and male?

he never thought of himself as an adaptor nor did he want the public to view him as an adaptor. “what i do is, read a story only once and if i like the basic idea, i forget all about the book and start to create cinema’

The case over the copyrighting of “It Had to be Murder”. The Stewart is actor Jimmy Stewart. The Supreme Court ruled in favor of Abend. This case was a game-changer for copyrights in Hollywood.

The short story had a male assistant named Sam, while the movie had a female nurse named Stella. Additionally, the movie features a love interest named Lisa. In the book, Thorwald dies. He is arrested in the film. In the movie, we know that Jeff is in a cast from the very beginning while we only find this out in the last lines of the short story. The sound of a cricket chirping was supposed to be the sound of death.

Throne of Blood = Samurai setting
Kurosawa’s adaptation of Macbeth had Lady Macbeth provide a logical argument for Macbeth to murder the king. Either die being known as a traitor or become a traitor to save your own life and reputation. Lady Macbeth states that Banquo will notify the king of the witch’s prophecy.

Also this adaptation makes use of the play’s view of the witches with beards and the adaptation uses an androgynous forest spirit. The forest spirit also states the prophecy of Banquo and Macbeth with an eerie voice which can either be male or female. Lastly, the spirit is seen spinning a wheel of thread. Thread is commonly used to represent the connection of fate. Such as red thread being tied between two lovers who are destined for one another.

The studio system was thought to have died out in the 1950’s (supposedly due to home television; ticket sales were at an all-time high in 1946 but have always been on the decline since then)
Today’s moviemaking studios mostly DISTRIBUTE (all $$ is in the distribution)

a paramount case (ha) that decided the fate of movie studios owning their own theatres and holding exclusivity rights on which theatres would show their films
Seen as the “first nail in the coffin” of the Hollywood Studio System
The United States issued this case due to the fact that the studios had vertically integrated the market by producing, distributing, and exhibiting films at their own theatres. (OLIGOPOLY)
Brought about a slump in the movie business
Before this there were the “Big 5” studios and the “Little 3”
Big 5- Paramount, Warner Bros, Loews’/MGM, 20th Century Fox, RKO
Little 3- Columbia, Universal, United Artists

no money from distribution deal and no money from studio during production.

Produced by New Line Cinema which operated independently from Time Warner until 2008 and had 26 international distributors.

Digital Production
Lower image quality, slowly getting better
Film Stock vs. Digital
film stock better quality but more expensive
Film
35 mm film stock
Billions of color shades
7000 lines of resolution
5000 when the print is made “shimmer”
Expensive
Digital
Millions of color shades
4000 lines
No “shimmer”
More affordable
Exhibition
At the turn of the century, there were only around 15 digital projectors that were inside theatres across the world.
However, due to the success of Avatar, digital projectors are appearing in theatres everywhere.
It is believed that at the end of 2013, around 99% of movie theatres will have a projector with digital capability.