D.W. Griffith and the Origins of American Narrative Film
D.W. Griffith and the Origins of American Narrative Film

Author: Tom Gunning

Publisher: University of Illinois Press

Published: 1994

Total Pages: 334

ISBN-13: 9780252063664

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The legendary filmmaker D. W. Griffith directed nearly 200 films during 1908 and 1909, his first years with the Biograph Company. While those one-reel films are a testament to Griffith's inspired genius as a director, they also reflect a fundamental shift in film style from "cheap amusements" to movie storytelling complete with characters and narrative impetus. In this comprehensive historical investigation, drawing on films preserved by the Library of Congress and the Museum of Modern Art, Tom Gunning reveals that the remarkable cinematic changes between 1900 and 1915 were a response to the radical reorganization within the film industry and the evolving role of film in American society. The Motion Picture Patents Company, the newly formed Film Trust, had major economic aspirations. The newly emerging industry's quest for a middle-class audience triggered Griffith's early experiments in film editing and imagery. His unique solutions permanently shaped American narrative film.

Deathwatch
Deathwatch

Author: C. Scott Combs

Publisher: Columbia University Press

Published: 2014-09-23

Total Pages: 290

ISBN-13: 0231163479

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While cinema is a medium with a unique ability to Òwatch lifeÓ and Òwrite movement,Ó it is equally singular in its portrayal of death. The first study to unpack American cinemaÕs long history of representing death, this book considers movie sequences in which the process of dying becomes an exercise in legibility and exploration for the camera and connects the slow or static process of dying to formal film innovation throughout the twentieth century. C. Scott Combs analyzes films that stretch from cinemaÕs origins to the end of the twentieth century, looking at attractions-based cinema, narrative films, early sound cinema, and films using voiceover or images of medical technology. Through films such as Thomas EdisonÕs Electrocuting an Elephant (1903), D. W. GriffithÕs The Country Doctor (1909), John FordÕs How Green Was My Valley (1941), Billy WilderÕs Sunset Boulevard (1950), Stanley KubrickÕs 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), and Clint EastwoodÕs Million Dollar Baby (2004), Combs argues that the end of dying occurs more than once, in more than one place. Working against the notion that film cannot capture the end of life because it cannot stop moving forward, that it cannot induce the photographic fixity of the death instant, this book argues that the place of death in cinema is persistently in flux, wedged between technological precision and embodied perception. Along the way, Combs consolidates and reconceptualizes old and new debates in film theory.

Film Theory
Film Theory

Author: Philip Simpson

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2004

Total Pages: 382

ISBN-13: 9780415259736

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This major new collection identifies the critical and theoretical concepts which have been most significant in the study of film and presents a historical and intellectual context for the material examined.

Lillian Gish
Lillian Gish

Author: Charles Affron

Publisher: Univ of California Press

Published: 2002-03-12

Total Pages: 470

ISBN-13: 9780520234345

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"As someone who worked with and knew Lillian Gish for years, I found Charles Affron’s portrait revealing and moving. He rekindles the life of this intuitive and generous artist beautifully."—Eva Marie Saint

Film Study
Film Study

Author: Frank Manchel

Publisher: Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press

Published: 1990

Total Pages: 564

ISBN-13: 9780838634127

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The four volumes of Film Study include a fresh approach to each of the basic categories in the original edition. Volume one examines the film as film; volume two focuses on the thematic approach to film; volume three draws on the history of film; and volume four contains extensive appendices listing film distributors, sources, and historical information as well as an index of authors, titles, and film personalities.

The Transformation of Cinema, 1907-1915
The Transformation of Cinema, 1907-1915

Author: Eileen Bowser

Publisher: Univ of California Press

Published: 1994-05-04

Total Pages: 356

ISBN-13: 9780520085343

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"The Transformation of Cinema chronicles the history of the American film business from the days of storefront nickelodeons to the premiere of D.W. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation, complete with full symphony orchestra. Eileen Bowser here redresses the imbalance of the "Griffith did it all" cliché by discussing the efforts of countless lesser-known figures who also helped to create Hollywood and shape the growing film industry. The effect of the surroundings -- the size of the hall; whether the film was shown alone or along with vaudeville entertainment; and the size, quality, and relevance of the musical background -- are all examined for their impact on the filmgoing experience. Bowser documents the emergence of the star system, which set the stage for the classic silent-film era. By 1915 the silent film is seen as a full-fledged art form with its own style and place in the world of business."--Back cover.

Reframing Culture
Reframing Culture

Author: William Uricchio

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2014-07-14

Total Pages: 267

ISBN-13: 1400863635

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The works of Shakespeare and Dante or the figures of George Washington and Moses do not often enter into popular conceptions of the silent cinema, yet, between 1907 and 1910, the Vitagraph Company frequently used such material in producing "quality" films that promulgated "respectable" culture. William Uricchio and Roberta Pearson situate these films in an era of immigration, labor unrest, and mainstream American xenophobia, in order to explore the cultural views promoted by the films and the ways the audiences--the middle classes as well as workers and immigrants--related to what they saw. The authors associate the production of quality films with a top-down forging of cultural consensus on issues such as patriotism and morality, and reveal the surprising bottom-up negotiations of these films' "meanings.". Devoting chapters to the literary, historical, and biblical subjects used by Vitagraph, this book draws upon plays, pageants, school textbooks, and even product advertisements to illuminate the conditions of cinematic production and reception. It provides a detailed look at one aspect of the film industry's transformation from "despised cheap amusement" to the nation's dominant mass medium, while showing how cultural elites engaged in a struggle similar to that of today's American academy over the literary canon and national value systems. Originally published in 1993. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Eloquent Gestures
Eloquent Gestures

Author: Roberta E. Pearson

Publisher: Univ of California Press

Published: 1992

Total Pages: 208

ISBN-13: 9780520073654

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"Pearson writes beautifully, clearly, and entertainingly (with a touch of sardonic sarcasm here and there). This is the single best work centering on performance in film that I have read."--Thomas Gunning, author of D. W. Griffith and the Origins of American Narrative Film

From Plato to Lumière
From Plato to Lumière

Author: Andre Gaudreault

Publisher: University of Toronto Press

Published: 2009-03-11

Total Pages: 265

ISBN-13: 1442693088

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With this lucid translation of Du litteraire au filmique, André Gaudreault's highly influential and original study of film narratology is now accessible to English-language audiences for the first time. Building a theory of narrative on sources as diverse as Plato, The Arabian Nights,and Proust, From Plato to Lumière challenges narratological orthodoxy by positing that all forms of narrative are mediated by an "underlying narrator" who exists between the author and narrative text. Offering illuminating insights, definitions, and formal distinctions, Gaudreault examines the practices of novelists, playwrights, and filmmakers and applies his theory to the early cinema of the Lumière brothers and more recent films. He also enhances our understanding of how narrative develops visually without language - monstration - by detailing how the evolution of the medium influenced narratives in cinema. From Plato to Lumière includes a translation of Paul Ricoeur's preface to the French-language edition as well as a new preface by Tom Gunning. It is a must-read for cinema and media students and scholars and an essential text on the study of narrative.