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Contemporary Hong Kong Cinema, 1980s-1990s

Causal structure is loose so that action sequences can be inserted easily. Plots can end abruptly and there is constant movement on the screen.Stylistically, slow motion, color design, and mood lighting are trademarks. Kung fu was incorporated into hollywood like action films

horror genre

Characterized by the effect on the audience. Typically an unnatural, threatening monster and the other characters' reactions define the genre. Iconography includes setting, lighting, and makeup. Critics suggest horror films reflect social concerns.

1965-1995 new american cinema

Developed after the breakdown of the Studio System.A reaction to the failing industry in the 60s, young film school graduates offer a new perspective.innovation! range of styles! gave rise to the summer blockbuster! adapted cinema to the youth. more sex

China and Postwar Filmmaking: Taiwan

Developed independently of Hong Kong and the People's Republic.Concerned with realistic depictions of ordinary people Ang Lee, Hsiao-hsien Hou, Edward Yang

german expressionism techniques

Distorted and exaggerated settings; compositions of unnatural spaces.Use of oblique angles and nonparallel lines. Moving and subjective camera.Highly stylized acting; unnatural costumes, hairstyles, and makeup

camera obscura

(Latin for dark chamber) a location large enough for a viewer to stand inside. Light entering through a tiny hole on one side of the space projects an image from outside the space onto the opposite wall.

China and Postwar Filmmaking: Hong Kong

1920s-1970s - wuxia and kung fu.Melodramatic plot; philosophical codes of honor. lots of violence; brilliantly choreographed fight sequences.Conflicts between cops and gangsters; lavish production values

Expressionism, Impressionism, and Surrealism were all finished as film movements by about?

1930

3 types of rhetorical arguments

Argument from source (ethos) ex. Super size me Subject centered (logos) ex. Exit through the gift shop Viewer centered (pathos)

musical genre

Backstage narrative - stock characters/storylines Integrated musical - musical performances at key dramatic moments Dominated by romantic comedies and animated features. 2 types of musicals (backstage and straight)

film as social history

Bc society and culture influence the movies, and vice versa, the movies serve as primary sources for studying society. Considers such factors as religion, politics, and cultural trends and taboos

hollywood's golden age bby

Black-and-white film stock - the industry standard through the 1950s. Narrative and editing conventions adapted to sound production. improvements in lighting, design, cinematography, and editing

french impressionism 1918-1930

Young French directors after WWI saw film as art and thought cinema should express feelings. Narration has lots of psychological depth, manipulating plot time and subjectivity. Rhythmic editing and subjective shots emphasize the character's inner feelings. Not commercially successful and ceased by 1929, but was very influential to certain filmmakers, styles and genres.

pixillation

a term applied to frame-by-frame manipulation of people and ordinary objects

Backstage Musical

about people putting on a musical together. think a chorus line

two types of form for experimental films

abstract and associational

types of animated films

animation of 3d objects (clay, model or puppets, pizillation). computer imaging.

full animation

animation where figures are rendered in fine detail, with tiny, nonrepetitive movements.

enthymemes

arguments that rely on widespread opinion and usually conceal some crucial assumptions

The most important change that occurred in Hollywood during the late 1920s was the?

arrival of synchronized sound filmmaking

techniques

aspects of style that are recurring from film to film i.e. low key lighting = film noir

fictional films

assumed to be imaginary, although they may refer and comment on actual events. film are typically staged, rehearsed, filmed, and re-filmed.

indian cinema

biggest film industry in the world. 1200 features a year +more documentaries. Satyajit Ray is the dominant figure in Indian cinema. Ray's work represents the "new Indian cinema," or Parallel Cinema, meaning it exists alongside the mainstream commercial industries in the world's sixth-largest economy

The kinds of movies that saved Hollywood in the 1970s are known as?

blockbusters

musical conventions

bright lighting bright costumes crane shots high angles lip synching. backstage settings -theater & nightclub. Judy Garland.

2 form types of documentaries

categorical and rhetorical

portrait documentaries

center around a compelling person

cel

clear rectangular sheets of celluloid used in animation

western genre

conflict between civilized order and the lawless frontier.The typical hero falls in between order and lawlessness.Innovations developed include more complex protagonists and a reversal of the portrayal of Native American vs. white civilization.

iconography

consists of recurring symbolic images that carry meaning from film to film

conventions of the western genre

cowboy is often poised between savagery and civilization. extreme wide shots of vast natural spaces. John Wayne. the American frontier. revenge.

conventions of the horror genre

death and insanity. Setting: "normal world" or rural setting; often at night. Protagonist: Loner or "flawed" character. Antagonist: "The Other"; with threats of infection and conversion.

conventions of film noir

detective narrative. cynical tones. corruption & despair. low key lighting. urban setting. sharp shadows. high contrast lighting. detective. rain drenched streets. alcohol, cigarettes, pistol & trench coats. Humphrey Bogart

interview or talking head documentaries

docs record testimony about events or social movements

rhetorical documentary form

filmmakers present a persuasive explicit argument. The goal is to persuade the audience to adopt or act on an opinion. Addresses the viewer openly, trying to move the viewer. Subject is usually a matter of opinion. Often appeals to our emotions rather than facts.

compilation documentary

films assmeble images from archival sources

conventions

frequently-used stylistic techniques or narrative devices typical of particular generic traditions

Cel animation continued well into the 90s with big budget studio cartoons employing _______

full animation

gangster genre conventions

gangster's rise & fall. price of criminal success. rise to power portrayed as egotism and brutality. urban settings. realism. tommy gun

6 major american genres

gangster, film noir, science fiction, horror, western, musical

themes

general meanings that are summoned again and again i.e. isolation = horror

computer imaging animated films

he computer can perform the repetitive task of making the many slightly altered images needed to give a sense of movement. software can be devised that enable filmmakers to create images of things that could not be filmed in the real world

During the 1980s and early 1990s, a great number of innovative directors and films emerged from?

hong kong

associational form of experimental filmmaking

ideas and expressive qualities group images that may not have any logical connection. Like metaphor and simile used in poetry. Images are typically grouped into larger sets, each which is a distinct, unified part of the larger film.Repeated motifs reinforce associational connections.

mockumentaries can be best defined as films that _____

imitate the conventions of documentaries but do not pretend to be factual.

genre

in french means "kind" or "type"

new american cinema style

innovation in editing. more films shot on location. experimentation with sound design. reliance on natural acting styles.

A film is a documentary if it

is labeled as such

The movement known as Neorealism emerged in ______ after World War II.

italy

a film is a documentary if it is ______

labeled as such

Cheaper productions use ___________ with only small sections of the image moving from frame to frame. Limited animation is mainly used on tv altough japanese theatrical features also exploit it

limited animation

italian neorealism (1942-1951)

location filming. available light. non-professional actors. long takes, spare dialogue, ambiguous endings. Humanist placed the highest value on the lives of ordinary working people. as italy prospered, the movement ended.

A "tentpole" film is one that

makes enough money to shelter other, smaller pictures.

3d computer animation is so named bc it _____

makes two-dimensional drawings look three-dimensional.

One cinematic genre that flourished in the 1930s as a result of recent technological developments in filmmaking was the?

musical

how can you organize a film based on visual qualities?

one common way is through rhytm and variations

People today have difficulty understanding older films primarily because those films?

operate according to different conventions.

associational form works most like

poetry

science fiction conventions

protagonist - down-to-earth. speculative fiction dealing with imaginative concepts. technology v. humanity. time &/or future. space ships. outer space, planets, & stars. futuristic technologies. aliens

direct cinema documentary

records an ongoing event as it happens w/ little directorial interference

series photography

records the phases of an action

subgenres

refers to distinct and fairly long-lasting types within a genre

Genre conventions, repeated from film to film reflect what?

reflect audience doubts or anxieties.

movements

shorter lived trends

categorical documentary form

show all the categories and subcategories of a subject. Development is usually quite simple. Exciting or broad categories, patterned film techniques and mini narratives can keep the subject interesting. The purpose is to inform

the development of classical hollywood cinema

silent period! Early experiments with color and animation.Feature-length films began to replace short films.The movie director was a central development. Walt Disney made his first cartoon in 1922.D. W. Griffith's developments in narrative form

classic hollywood style in hollywood's golden age. 1927-1947

sound 1927! musical emerged. studios developed their own styles. Color film changed everything. motion picture production code. $$ sucess of full length narrative films. Consolidation of the studio system. Exploitation of familiar genres

The film movement that emphasized bizarre and evocative imagery while attacking traditional notions of causality and coherence was known as?

surrealism

Georges Melies

the cinema's first narrative artist. "a trip to the moon"

early cinema (1893-1903)

the first films were very simple and usually showed scenic places and noteworthy events. Films circulated freely between countries and influenced foreign filmmakers.Narrative form was the dominant type of commercial filmmaking.

setting

the time & space where and when a film's story takes place i.e. urban = gangster

genre conventions

themes, story formula, character types, setting, presentation, stars

montage (as in soviet montage)

to fragment and reassemble footage so as to manipulate the viewer's perception and understanding

Many scholars believe that the emergence of the subgenre of family horror films in the 1970s indicated viewers'?

uncertainty about their fundamental beliefs

straight musical

when they don't acknowledge that they're singing so like La La Land they just sing but they don't acknowledge that it's a musical

The most significant technological development in film during the 1930s was the?

widespread availability of color film stocks

nature documentary

yeah exactly what you think

film noir genre

Fatalistic themes, cynical tones, emphasis on corruption and despair.Urban setting. Hard-boiled characters. Protagonist: antihero, outsider.Female characters: Femme fatales

what is film history?

Film history traces the development of moving images from early experiments with image reproduction and photography through the invention of the movies in the early 1890s, as well as subsequent stylistic, financial, technological, and social developments in cinema that have occurred up to now

surrealism 1918-1930

Filmmakers worked outside the filmmaking system and made films that shocked and perplexed most audiences.Seek to bring the unconscious to film and are anti-narrative. An eclectic movement that lost unity after 1930, but individual filmmakers continued to work for many years.

the new hollywood 1970-1980

Films tend to have personal, self-conscious messages and capitalize on films of the past. the 80s gave young filmmakers awards. continued classic hollywood style. plot driven more than character driven

Semantic approach to genre

Focus on similarities. Fixed meanings, what remains constant

the performative mode of documentary

Focuses interest on expressiveness, poetry and rhetoric, rather than on the desire for realistic representation.

Syntactic approach to genre

Focuses on relations between elements and the structure of narratives in genres. Variable relationships between structured element

Denmark and the Dogme 95 movement:

Founded in 1995 by three directors, including Lars von Trier. "The Vow of Chastity" - manifesto of ten rules Directors often broke their vows

England and Free Cinema Movement

Free Cinema (1956-1959) - a cinema of social realism and documentary films British New Cinema (1960s) - dealt with controversial issues of class, race, gender, and sexual orientation

Cinema Verite

French term for truth film, a documentary style that records fragments of everyday life unobtrusively; it often features a rough, grainy look and shaky, handheld camera work

1947 to the Present: New Cinemas in Britain, Europe, and Asia

Made a clean break with the cinematic past. Injected new vitality into filmmaking. Explored cinema as a subject in itself

experimental movies

Movies that push the boundaries of what most people think movies are, or should be

documentary movies

Movies with an allegiance to nonfiction but which still employ movie storytelling and dramatization

Germany and Das Neue Kino (1962-1980s)

Oberhausen Manifesto (1962) - sought to create a new cinema free from historical antecedents, one that criticized bourgeois German society and exposed viewers to new modes of looking at movies

keyframing

Once the basic visual material is digitalized you would create the most important bitsof the figures movements. The software fillis in the frames between those poses saving you the effort of creating every frame yourself

abstract form of experimental film

Organized around colors, shapes, sizes, or movements of the images. Often uses theme and variations. Goal is to make the viewer notice relationships and elements they wouldn't normally notice.

french new wave (1959-1964)

Origins: 1930s poetic realism; philosophy of Jean-Paul Sartre. Cinéma vérité style - lightweight filmmaking devices. André Bazin - realism, mise-en-scène, authorship. Director as auteur. new wave has a lighter tone. discontinuity editing. ambiguous endings.

cycles

Over history, genres rise and fall in prestige and popularity. The result is the phenomenon known as ____

Japan's and Postwar Filmmaking

Owed much to Japanese literacy and theatrical traditions. Strongly influenced by John Ford, Howard Hawks, and Orson Welles. Akira Kurosawa is the most recognizable (and Western-style) director, followed by Kenji Mizoguchi and Yasujiro Ozu

gangster genre

Rags-to-riches-to-destruction theme. Urban setting. Questioning authority, institutions. Protagonist: antihero, outsider. Female characters: molls and mothers

soviet montage 1924-1930

Russians saw film as a powerful tool for education and propaganda.Sergei Eisenstein, Vsevolod Pudovkin, Dziga Vertov, and Alexander Dovzhenko created the classic Montage style which championed the powers of editing to create new meaning. By the 1930s, the Russian government criticized experimentation.

french avant garde 1918-1930

Short dadaist and surrealist films of an anticonventional, absurdist nature. Short naturalistic psychological studies. Feature-length films that emphasized pure visual form

science fiction genre

Technology versus humanity theme. Speculative (often futuristic) setting. Protagonists: Down-to-earth. Antagonists: "Others" (aliens, computers, robots, etc.)

german expressionism (1919-1931)

The government began backing the German film industry after WWI, which caused its growth and spread of influence. Expressionism in film began with The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari and was set apart by its stylized mise-en-scene.The movement disappeared by 1927 but influenced many American filmmakers, even today.

expository mode of documentary

This is associated with the classic documentary, and based on illustrating an argument using images.

observational mode of documentary

This mode allowed the director to record reality without becoming involved in what people were doing when they were not explicitly looking into the camera.

the participatory mode of documentary

This mode presents the relationship between the filmmaker and the filmed subject. Makes the director's perspective clear by involving them in the discourse.

reflexive mode of documentary

This mode raises the audience's awareness of the means of representation itself and the devices that have given it authority.

the poetic mode of documentary

It aims to create a specific mood and tone rather than to provide the viewer with information.

China and Postwar Filmmaking: People's Republic

Since 1976 (the death of Chairman Mao), filmmakers are more concerned with individuals.Chen Kaige, Yimou Zhang, Tian Zhuangzhuang have managed to make films about taboo subjects despite a repressive society

hong kong: formal characteristics

Spectacular studio settings and natural locations.Saturated colors; moody lighting. Constant motion (slow and fast); disjointed editing techniques. Extensive computer manipulation of images and motion

Hong Kong New Wave (late 1970s-early 1980s)

Stimulated cinematic innovations.Encouraged the movement of directors between TV and mainstream cinema. Introduced new genres and tackled formerly taboo subjects

oldest type of animated film

drawn animation

Directors in the Soviet Montage movement put the greatest emphasis on?

editing

plot elements

elements such as character types that provide similar actions and purposes in a story (ie questioning of authority)

model or puppet animation

employs figures with bendable wires or joints

modes of documentaries

expository, observational, participatory, the reflexive, poetic, and the performative