My primary research question is concerned with the circumstances, in 1915, that led to film production and financial success at the Flying ‘A’ studios in Santa Barbara, California under the leadership of Samuel S. Hutchinson. The success of the studio was thanks to the quality of their production choices, distribution network, and the publicity campaigns of their films. The three key individuals who excelled at performing these roles and that I believe personally led to the studio’s most successful year were: Samuel S. Hutchinson, John R. Freuler, and Terry Ramsaye. Samuel S. Hutchinson led the production of films at the Flying ‘A’ studios. John R. Freuler managed the distribution of the studio’s films at Mutual Film Company and Terry Ramsaye was key in producing media ads for the Flying ‘A’ films and generating interest from exhibitors by publicizing the films in newspapers and film journals The film serial, The Diamond From The Sky (1915), is a useful tool to isolate their individual film industry roles during 1915. The primary research questions I am asking about them are: who were these individuals, how are they linked to each other and how did they lead the studio to …show more content…
Hutchinson co-founded The American Film Manufacturing Company (AFMC) with John R. Freuler in Chicago, IL during the Fall of 1910 and quickly expanded to La Mesa, CA. This studio expansion in La Mesa lasted from 1911 until 1912 when the studio relocated its west coast branch to Santa Barbara, CA in 1912 (“The American Studio,” 1915). The goal of AFMC west coast expansion was to capitalize on the growing popularity of western films and Santa Barbara was the perfect setting for the western genre because of its lighting, climate and geography (Ramsaye 643). The film industry in California was growing fast and the studio took advantage by producing quality films that were shipped back to the central film developing plant in
Eckstein, Arthur. “The Hollywood Ten in History & Memory.” Film History. 2004. Web. 16 Jan.
In Hollywood political conflict was also paving the way for what would later occur in Hollywood as the HUAC would attack the industry. Big business controlled the lucrative industry and the companies that controlled the market were eight major studios in Hollywood. The Metro-Goldw...
Hollywood is not simply a point on a map; it is a representation of the human experience. As with any other location, though, Hollywood’s history can be traced and analyzed up to present day. In 1887, Harvey Henderson Wilcox established a 120-acre ranch in an area northwest of Los Angeles, naming it “Hollywood” (Basinger 15). From then on, Hollywood grew from one man’s family to over 5,000 people in 1910. By then, residents around the ranch incorporated it as a municipality, using the name Hollywood for their village. While they voted to become part of the Los Angeles district, their village was also attracting motion-picture companies drawn in by the diverse geography of the mountains and oceanside (15). The Los Angeles area continues to flourish, now containing over nine million people, an overwhelming statistic compared to Wilcox’s original, family unit (U.S. Census Bureau 1). However, these facts only s...
Lewis, J. (2008). American Film: A History. New York, NY. W.W. Norton and Co. Inc. (p. 405,406,502).
The roaring twenties would be nothing without the roar of the MGM Lion. “If Hollywood had no other studio than Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, the town still would have been the movie capital of the world” (Fricke para 1). MGM enchanted audiences with its high-budgeted films and glamorous list of stars (Hanson para 1). Three failing movie companies came together in 1924 in hopes to make it big in the motion picture industry, and it did (Fricke para 3). Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer created spectacles of movies after its merging which made MGM one of the most prosperous motion picture companies in the 1920’s (Hanson para 2).
The first two musicals that I remember seeing were “Wicked” and “Aladdin”. Each show, magical in its own right, had a common feature. During a climatic moment the main character is lifted off the ground, in such a way, that it makes it look like they are flying. These two moments are stuck in my mind despite having seen these musicals years ago. Due to the large impact these two instances had on my image of Broadway, I decided to look at flying in regards to actors as my area of theatrical special effects.
Wilbur and Orville Wright spent their lives building and working with mechanical devices. They began with little toys as children and then grew up and began working with bicycles. These works lead them towards their work with airplanes. The Wright Brothers tried for many years to build a successful flying machine and succeeded. The Wright Brothers laid the foundation for aviation when they made history by being the first to create a successful flying machine.
Largely influenced by the French New Wave and other international film movements, many American filmmakers in the late 1960s to 1970s sought to revolutionize Hollywood cinema in a similar way. The New Hollywood movement, also referred to as the “American New Wave” and the “Hollywood Renaissance,” defied traditional Hollywood standards and practices in countless ways, creating a more innovative and artistic style of filmmaking. Due to the advent and popularity of television, significant decrease in movie theater attendance, rising production costs, and changing tastes of American audiences, particularly in the younger generation, Hollywood studios were in a state of financial disaster. Many studios thus hired a host of young filmmakers to revitalize the business, and let them experiment and have almost complete creative control over their films. In addition, the abandonment of the restrictive Motion Picture Production Code in 1967 and the subsequent adoption of the MPAA’s rating system in 1968 opened the door to an era of increased artistic freedom and expression.
John Ford was an American motion-picture director. Winner of four Academy Awards, and is known as one of America’s great film directors. He began his career in the film industry around 1913. According to Ellis, Ford’s style is evident in both the themes he is drawn toward and the visual treatment of those themes, in his direction of the camera and in what’s in front of it. Although he began his career in the silent film area and continued to work fruitfully for decades after the thirties, Ford reached creative maturity in the thirties. Ford, unlike other directors continued to do some of his finest work after the nineteen thirties. Nevertheless, he shaped his art into personal and full expression during those precedent-setting years. (Pg.200)
The Studio System Key point about the studio system could be: Despite being one of the biggest industries in the United States, indeed the World, the internal workings of the 'dream factory' that is Hollywood is little understood outside the business. The Hollywood Studio System: A History is the first book to describe and analyse the complete development, classic operation, and reinvention of the global corporate entities which produce and distribute most of the films we watch. Starting in 1920, Adolph Zukor, head of Paramount Pictures, over the decade of the 1920s helped to fashion Hollywood into a vertically integrated system, a set of economic innovations which was firmly in place by 1930.
Clara’s experience with the motion picture industry gives us a picture of what it was like in the 1920’s. It was new and intriguing, enticing and corrupt. The motion picture industry underpaid Bow, which is almost inconceivable today. The environment of Hollywood now pays actors and actresses corpulent amounts of money...but that may be the only change. The “star-maker” environment is still as enticing and corrupt as yesterday’s.
Thompson, K 2003, ‘The struggle for the expanding american film industry’, in Film history : an introduction, 2nd ed, McGraw-Hill, Boston, pp. 37-54
"Film History: The Motion Picture Patent Wars « The Cinephile Fix." The Cinephile Fix. Web. 17 June 2011. .
In the film, Flight, William “Whip” Whitaker is an airline pilot. Whitaker is depicted as having a substance use disorder (SUD) and more specifically, an alcohol use disorder (AUD). This paper discusses: the film, AUDs, the way Flight depicts Whitaker’s AUDs, an interpretation of the film’s depiction, and possible treatment for Whitaker.
The American motion picture studio was formed in 1912 by Carl Laemmle who was a film exhibitor, and producer. The studio started off creating low budget films, until it was purchased by the Music Corporation of America, which formed it into the most profitable and largest company for films and television in the world.