Way Down East
Way Down East

Author:

Publisher:

Published: 1920

Total Pages: 13

ISBN-13:

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Program. D.W. Griffith presents "Way Down East," a simple story of plain people, elaborated by Mr. Griffith from the stage play by Lottie Blair Parker. D.W. Griffith Incorporated, Albert L. Grey, general manager. Scenario by Anthony Paul Kelly. Entire production under the personal direction of Mr. Griffith.

Interpretation and Film Studies
Interpretation and Film Studies

Author: Phillip Novak

Publisher: Springer Nature

Published: 2020-07-31

Total Pages: 256

ISBN-13: 3030447391

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This book argues that the sustained interpretation of individual movies has, contrary to conventional wisdom, never been a major preoccupation of film studies—that, indeed, the field is marked by a dearth of effective, engaging, and enlightening critical analyses of single films. The book makes this case by surveying what has been written about four historically important and well-known movies (D. W. Griffith’s Way Down East, Marcel Carné’s Port of Shadows, Mike Nichols’s The Graduate, and Michelangelo Antonioni’s Red Desert), none of which has been the focus of sustained critical attention, and by exhaustively examining the kinds of work published in four influential film journals (Cinema Journal, Screen, Wide Angle, and Movie). The book goes on to argue for the value of the work of interpretation, illustrating this value through extended analyses of Roman Polanski’s Chinatown and Christopher Nolan’s Memento, both of which thematize interpretation. Novak demonstrates the causes and consequences of reading poorly and the importance of reading well.

Suspense and Resolution in the Films of D.W. Griffith
Suspense and Resolution in the Films of D.W. Griffith

Author: George Pavlou

Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing

Published: 2018-12-21

Total Pages: 166

ISBN-13: 1527523993

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This book offers a significant and original contribution to studies on D.W. Griffith and film, through a systematic analysis of the director’s chase scenes, which create suspense and resolution in his films. The predominance of the emphasis of building suspense differs in the various stages of his chase scenes. The primary source of material discussed here is Griffith’s films after 1913 when he left the Biograph Company. Griffith’s post-Biograph films are more complete and representative of his techniques than his earlier films, which were subject to financial constraints while he was still innovating and developing his cinematic techniques. Most of his films used in this analysis were provided by the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. The purpose of this study is to determine a definition of a Griffithian chase scene in terms of his editing techniques. Categories are established, defining specific tools. This is done by determining and documenting consistencies, comparisons, and specific patterns occurring in his chase scenes that generally do not occur in his general editing. Griffith’s basic mechanics in editing are filmic time and space, parallel action, referential crosscutting, and decomposition. A major finding in this book is that Griffith’s chase scenes are the most important part of his films in terms of suspense and resolution. His chase scenes are complex, unique and sometimes even unpredictable. As such, this is an important new work on D.W. Griffith, and will be of interest to scholars and others interested in both the director and film, and will also be an asset to libraries and bookstores.

A Companion to D. W. Griffith
A Companion to D. W. Griffith

Author: Charles Keil

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2018-02-05

Total Pages: 624

ISBN-13: 1118341252

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The most comprehensive volume on one of the most controversial directors in American film history A Companion to D.W. Griffith offers an exhaustive look at the first acknowledged auteur of the cinema and provides an authoritative account of the director’s life, work, and lasting filmic legacy. The text explores how Griffith’s style and status advanced along with cinema’s own development during the years when narrative became the dominant mode, when the short gave way to the feature, and when film became the pre-eminent form of mass entertainment. Griffith was at the centre of each of these changes: though a contested figure, he remains vital to any understanding of how cinema moved from nickelodeon fixture to a national pastime, playing a significant role in the cultural ethos of America. With the renewed interest in Griffith’s contributions to the film industry, A Companion to D.W. Griffith offers a scholarly look at a career that spanned more than 25 years. The editor, a leading scholar on D.W. Griffith, and the expert contributors collectively offer a unique account of one of the monumental figures in film studies. Presents the most authoritative, complete account of the director’s life, work, and lasting legacy Builds on the recent resurgence in the director’s scholarly and popular reputation Edited by a leading authority on D.W. Griffith, who has published extensively on this controversial director Offers the most up-to-date, singularly comprehensive volume on one of the monumental figures in film studies

D.W. Griffith's the Birth of a Nation
D.W. Griffith's the Birth of a Nation

Author: Melvyn Stokes

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2008-01-15

Total Pages: 741

ISBN-13: 0199887519

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In this deeply researched and vividly written volume, Melvyn Stokes illuminates the origins, production, reception and continuing history of this ground-breaking, aesthetically brilliant, and yet highly controversial movie. By going back to the original archives, particularly the NAACP and D. W. Griffith Papers, Stokes explodes many of the myths surrounding The Birth of a Nation (1915). Yet the story that remains is fascinating: the longest American film of its time, Griffith's film incorporated many new features, including the first full musical score compiled for an American film. It was distributed and advertised by pioneering methods that would quickly become standard. Through the high prices charged for admission and the fact that it was shown, at first, only in "live" theaters with orchestral accompaniment, Birth played a major role in reconfiguring the American movie audience by attracting more middle-class patrons. But if the film was a milestone in the history of cinema, it was also undeniably racist. Stokes shows that the darker side of this classic movie has its origins in the racist ideas of Thomas Dixon, Jr. and Griffith's own Kentuckian background and earlier film career. The book reveals how, as the years went by, the campaign against the film became increasingly successful. In the 1920s, for example, the NAACP exploited the fact that the new Ku Klux Klan, which used Griffith's film as a recruiting and retention tool, was not just anti-black, but also anti-Catholic and anti-Jewish, as a way to mobilize new allies in opposition to the film. This crisply written book sheds light on both the film's racism and the aesthetic brilliance of Griffith's filmmaking. It is a must-read for anyone interested in the cinema.