In the early years of cinema French filmmakers truly held one of, if not the most notable position in the field. Starting from Lumiere Brothers and their first film showing in Paris in 1985 and influencing works of George Melies, French cinematography developed in parallel with and equally fast as the American industry (CITE). For many years, native films from such big companies as Gaumont and Pathe Freres dominated all French screens with great success (CITE). But the beginning of the World War I in 1918 weakened not only the country’s position and economy but also the position of France in the film industry. Big amounts of small production companies were born instead of large production corporations; single movies that were released were …show more content…
This theoretical background of their work made this group of filmmakers be labeled as “impressionists” and therefore, part of the French impressionist movement, which is also known as the first avant-garde. At the same time, few of these filmmakers had a luxury of working in the style that they nourished and preferred, as the companies ordering films were much more interested in commercially successful films, shot according to traditional stylistic approaches (CITE). That is why, it took time and effort to depart from stylistic traditions of the time and look at the new and highly independent side of filmmaking. Abel Gance, who will be mentioned further in this essay as one of the representative filmmakers within the impressionist movement, with his work “La dixieme symphonie” (1918) in some way was the starting point of the representation of impressionism in French cinema, as most of the directors followed his way with impressionist movies …show more content…
Born in France in 1889, he left school at 14 and, at first, worked as an actor, getting a contract with Theatre Royal du Parc in Brussels. A small time later he wrote his first film script and sold it, but more to earn money rather than begin a film career (Kevin Brownlow, The Parade's Gone By (London: Columbus, 1989), p.521.) and also acted in Perret’s film “Moliere”. In 1915, he started writing and directing for a new film company, Film d'Art and the same year caused great controversy with his film «La Folie du Docteur Tube». The distortion and certain subjectivity, which was created using the camera in this movie, preceded later impressionists' experiments(Cite textbook). In spite of the refusal to show this film, Gance continued working as a director and experimenting with cinematography. He established the frequent use of extreme close-ups, low-angle as well as tracking shots and was also one of the first filmmakers to try using split-screen images. His further films «J'Accuse» and «La Roue» made a use of innovative fast-paced cutting and editing, which influenced the further French avant-garde movement and antedated the Soviet movies (CITE textbook). But his most influential impressionist work was enormous «Napoleon» (1927). The techniques that were used in shooting as well as editing of this film are still relevant in
Bresson’s other films are made much in the same vein. Though, for example, L’Argent was made in 1983—far from the reaches of the New Wave era—it still has the Bresson-typical ambient sound, tortured main character, and dreariness about it. Jack C. Ellis says that Bresson’s “search for ever greater clarity and simplicity of visual-aural statement, his concentration on only those themes that most deeply concern him, place him among the very select company with which he is being considered.” So, while some directors may be debated upon continually as an auteur, it is clear from the consensus of historians and critics, as well as his consistent work in his thirteen films, that Robert Bresson has secured his role as an auteur.
Robbe-Grillet was one of the foremost filmmakers and the novelists of the French new novel, of the twentieth century. Frustrated about the lack of progress and innovation in the art of the novel since the nineteenth century, Robbe-Grillet and Nathalie Saurrate began to write complex novels that interrogated and challenged conventional narrative modes, novels that altered or abolished fictional elements such as character, plot, setting, point of view, and chronological time in favor of repetitions, an absence of emotion, minute objective and sometimes geometric descriptions, the lack of authorial analysis, and the deconstruction of time. His films also reflect his desire to challenge the conventions of filmmaking, but he is recognized principally as a novelist.
Classic film noir originated after World War II. This is the time where post World War II pessimism, anxiety, and suspicion was taking the world by storm. Many films that were released in the U.S. Between 1939s and 1940s were considered propaganda films that were designed for entertainment during the Depression and World War II. During the 1930s many German and Europeans immigrated to the U.S. and helped the American film industry with powerf...
From the beginning of cinema as an art form to cinema today, film has evolved and developed drastically. Each era of film from the Silent Film to the French New Wave was influenced by prior film generations and influenced those films that came after it. The era of Silent Film was very basic as it emerged when motion pictures had only begun. Across the sea, the age of German Expressionism, a film genre with features of the Silent Film era which conveyed the German people's struggle after World War I had started. Afterwards, the Studio Era surfaced and portrayed larger than life heroes in narratives with the gloss of a storybook. During the Studio Era, films like these were produced quickly because of success and began to appear mass produced
In 1959- early 1960 five directors released debut feature length films that are widely regarded as heralding the start of the French nouvelle vague or French New Wave. Claude Chabrols Le Beau Serge (The Good Serge, 1959) and Les Cousins (The Cousins, 1959) were released, along with Francois Truffauts Les Quatre cents coups (The 400 Blows, 1959), Jean-Luc Godards A bout de souffle (Breathless, 1960) and Alain Resnais Hiroshima mon amour (Hiroshima my love, 1959). These films were the beginning of a revolution in French cinema. In the following years these directors were to follow up their debuts, while other young directors made their first features, in fact between 1959-63 over 170 French directors made their debut films. These films were very different to anything French and American cinema had ever produced both in film style and film form and would change the shape of cinema to come for years. To understand how and why this nouvelle vague happened we must first look at the historical, social, economical and political aspects of France and the French film industry leading up to the onset of the nouvelle vague.
The progress of the film industry was remarkably fast in the first quarter of this century. I have chosen two films namely The Birth of a Nation (1915) and Greed (1924) for comparison and contrast to show how much the industry had evolved within the short span of nine years. These two films are chosen for the short time span between them. This short time span will enable us to evaluate the development of the film industry in terms of the psychological build-up of the plot and the characters, cinematic qualities and the gradual acceptance of ironies in the films on the part of the American audience.D.W Griffith's The Birth of a Nation and Erich Von Stroheim's Greed are both films adapted from novels written by Thomas Dixon and Frank Norris respectively. However one of the differences between these two films lies in the human characters portrayed.
Nevertheless Italian NeoRealism was essential to Italy’s film industry at the time the war ended and while Europe was recovering from the war. Its impact on modern film has been monumental, not only in Italian film but also on French New Wave cinema, and ultimately on films all over the world.
...use of documentary style lighting and discontinuous editing that diverges from the Hollywood “invisible” editing. Through understanding the historical climates these two seemingly similar French cinematic movements were in, the psychology of a generation can be visualized in a way truly unique to the indexicality of the cinematic medium.
Although in shambles, It did not take long for film to make a resurgence in France. Domestic production was boosted following the introduction of The Centre National de la Cinématographe, a government organization that provided assistance to the industry in the form of loans and training. Imported films, especially those from America, began flowing into France following its liberation by Allied forces, and moviegoers were suddenly exposed to years of new films they had been previously cut off from all at once. As the market for films began to heat up, French filmmakers were presented with two choices; continue producing films adapted from relatively outdated literary works in the classic French tradition, or imitate the Hollywood Studio system of production, creating big-budget features for an international audience with the assistance of the CNC. These contrasting styles of filmmaking...
In this essay the following will be discussed; the change from the age of classical Hollywood film making to the new Hollywood era, the influence of European film making in American films from Martin Scorsese and how the film Taxi Driver shows the innovative and fresh techniques of this ‘New Hollywood Cinema’.
In the presented essay I will compare the style of work of selected artists in the montage of the film. I will try to point out some general regularities and features of Soviet cinema. At the same time I will try to capture especially what is common in their systems and similar or conversely what differ. For my analysis, I will draw on the feature films of the Soviet avantgarde, namely these are the movies - The Battleship Potemkin (S. Eisenstein, 1925), Mother (V. Pudovkin, 1926) and The Man with a movie camera (D. Vertov, 1929).
In this essay, I will contrast and compare the two art movements, Impressionism, and Post-Impressionism. I will be concentrating on the works of the two leading artists of these styles Claude Monet and Vincent van Gogh.
Impressionism happened during the nineteenth century particularly in France although there is also impressionist movement in other places although the number of artists involved does not match the number of artists involved in impressionism in France. The characteristics of impressionism include the use of short brush strokes (Perry, 1995) and the lack of effort to veil or hide or keep these brushstrokes from being noticeable as the audience looks at the painting. There is also a renewed attention and focus on the effect of light, particularly the natural ambient light which is why many Impressionist painters work outside the studio, the paintings featuring a subject that is often found outside or outdoors, from Claude Monet’s Woman with a Parasol to Alfred Sisley’s Bridge at Villeneuve-la-Garenne. There is ...
The Impressionism period for the longest time was considered to be the first distinctly modern movement in painting. The Impression period first started in Paris in the 1860s and its influence spread throughout all of Europe and eventually made it’s way to the United States. The originators of this time period were artists who rejected the official; government subsidized exhibitions, or what the French would call, “salons”, and they were consequently shunned away by powerful academic art institutions such as the, “Acedémie des Beaux Arts" (Academy of Fine Arts). Removing themselves from the fine finish and details to which most artists of their day aspired, the Impressionists during this time, their goal was to capture the momentary, sensory
“To my mind, a picture should be something pleasant, cheerful, and pretty, yes pretty! There are too many unpleasant things in life as it is without creating still more of them” (P.A.R Quotes). Pierre-Auguste Renoir was an artist that put his heart and soul into a painting. Prior to Renoir there were many artists. Renoir was a man after diversity and difference in his paintings. He did not want to be like everybody else. He and many others felt this way, forming a new art called Impressionism. This new concept originated in France in the 1860’s. In 1874 Impressionism really took off, these artist were going against Realism in every way. These artist of Impressionism only became a group because they were rejected by the Salon des Refuses. Their