THE IMPACT OF FILM ON SOCIETY: Handout 5

Richard Maltby, Hollywood Cinema

"The real influence of stars lay not with their employers, but with the paying public. For more than the type of movie, stars were the commodities that most consistently drew audiences to the movies. A "star vehicle," a movie constructed around the appeal of one or more particular stars and sold on that basis, was bound to have a set of conventional ingredients, much like a genre. "Similarly, a star's repetition of performance elements over a number of movies would lead to the consolidation of that performance as a set of gestures and behavior patterns recognizable to the audience, who could then predict what the star was likely to do in any movie he or she appeared in. The studio system was committed to the deliberate manufacture of stars as a mechanism for selling movie tickets, and as a result generated publicity about the stars' offscreen lives designed to complement and play upon their screen images."

United States v. Paramount Pictures

(1947) the Supreme Court declared that block booking violated federal antitrust laws. As a result, each film had to stand on its own merits in order to be sold individually to theaters. - In 1948, the Supreme Court ordered an investigation into possibly forcing film studios to sell their theaters because they felt that owning production, distribution and exhibition facilities constituted an unfair business practice. By 1949, all the major studios agreed to sell their theaters to avoid being forced to do so. - However, the studios maintained control by forcing theaters to pay a high premium for their most desirable films (and forcing theaters to make their money at the concession stand). Studios also demanded a huge percentage of the box office (often 90%).

TOUCH OF EVIL

(1958) Touch of Evil is a film noir and makes use of shadows and moral darkness. Charlton Heston plays Vargas, a Mexican cop on his honeymoon with American wife when a bomb goes off in a car at the US-Mexico border. Vargas' investigation sets him against corrupt American police officer Quinlan, played by Welles. It is considered one of the last true examples of Film Noir.

BREATHLESS

(1960) His first feature film, A bout de souffle (Breathless) was shot using natural lighting on the streets of Paris without permission and with only fragments of a script. At the time, the film attracted much attention for its bold visual style and the innovative use of jump cuts. The film follows a petty criminal who is on the run with his American girlfriend after shooting a policeman.

MY LIFE TO LIVE

(1962) The film tells the story of Nana, a wife and mother who seeks to become an actress. After leaving her family, she's forced to become a prostitute. The film is told in episodes and follows her attempts to prove she is free, even though she is owned by a pimp.

BAND OF OUTSIDERS

(1964) The film is an adaptation of the 1958 American novel Fools' Gold. The story follows a young woman and two men who plan to steal the money stashed in the house she lives in with her aunt.

IMAGES: CHIMES AT MIDNIGHT

(1965 - Spain, 67 - US) An English-language, Spanish-Swiss co-produced film, the film centers on Williams Shakespeare's character Sir John Falstaff and his father-son relationship with Prince Hal. It stars Welles as the vain, boastful and cowardly Falstaff and he considered portraying Falstaff to be his life's ambition. The film premiered at the 1966 Cannes Film Festival, winning two awards. Initially dismissed by film critics, Chimes at Midnight is now regarded as one of Welles' highest achievements, and Welles himself called it his best work.

Andrew Sarris

(1968) American film critic, coined the term Auteur Theory in his book The American Cinema: Directors and Directions 1929-1968.

People Magazine

(1974) Launched in 1974, is the 8th highest circulation magazine in the US.

TAXI DRIVER

(1976) Set in New York City after the Vietnam War, the film follows an honorably discharged Marine who becomes a taxi driver in order to cope with chronic insomnia. He begins to fashion himself into an avenging angel who plans to murder a corrupt politician. The film was nominated for four Academy Awards, including Best Picture, and won the Palme d'Or at the 1976 Cannes Film Festival.

ANNIE HALL

(1977) A romantic comedy in which Allen stars as a man who tries to figure out the reasons for the failure of his relationship with his girlfriend. Allen described the film as "a major turning point" in which he "had the courage to abandon the safety of complete broad comedy." Along with the 1978 Academy Award for Best Picture, Annie Hall won Oscars for Best Director, Best Screenplay and Best Actress. Often listed among the greatest film comedies.

MANHATTAN

(1979) Allen co-stars as a twice-divorced comedy writer who dates a 17-year-old girl before eventually falling in love with his best friend's mistress. The film was met with widespread critical acclaim and was nominated for two Academy Awards.

RAGING BULL

(1980) Based on Jake LaMotta's memoir Raging Bull: My Story, the film tells the story of Jake LaMotta, a middleweight boxer whose sadomasochistic rage, sexual jealousy, and animalistic appetite destroyed his relationship with his wife and family.

HANNAH AND HER SISTERS

(1986) A comedy-drama which tells the intertwined stories of an extended family over two years that begin and end with a family Thanksgiving dinner. Allen stars along with his then-wife Mia Farrow as Hannah. Mia's adoptive daughter Soon-Yi was an extra on the film and later became Allen's wife. The film won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay, Best Supporting Actor and Actress.

GOOD FELLAS

(1990) A film adaptation of the 1986 non-fiction book Wiseguy by Nicholas Pileggi (who co-wrote the screenplay with Scorsese), the film follows the rise and fall of Lucchese crime family associates Henry Hill and his friends over a period from 1955 to 1980.

JEAN-LUC GODARD

(b. 1930) French-Swiss film director, screenwriter and film critic. He is one of the founding members of the French New Wave movement. Many of Godard's films challenge the conventions of traditional filmmaking and he is often considered the most radical French filmmaker of the 1960s and 1970s. His films frequently express his political views and often cite existentialism. - BREATHLESS - MY LIFE TO LIVE - BAND OF OUTSIDERS

WOODY ALLEN

(b. 1935) Born Allan Stewart Konigsberg, Allen began as a comedy writer then as a stand-up comic. By the mid-1960s Allen was writing and directing films, first specializing in comedies before moving into more dramatic material influenced in the 1970s. His films are often autobiographical and are known for featuring fictionalized versions of himself in his films. - ANNIE HALL - MANHATTAN - HANNAH AND HER SISTERS

MARTIN SCORSESE

(b. 1942) A film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film historian. Regarded as one of the greatest directors of all time, he founded The Film Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to film preservation. He is a recipient of the AFI Life Achievement Award, an Academy Award, a Palme d'Or, Cannes Film Festival Best Director Award and numerous other awards. Scorsese's body of work addresses such themes as Italian American identity, Roman Catholic concepts of guilt and redemption, machismo, crime, and violence. - TAXI DRIVER - RAGING BULL - GOOD FELLAS

UNITED ARTISTS STUDIO

Charlie Chaplin along with Douglas Fairbanks Sr. D.W. Griffith and Mary Pickford, created the Company in 1919.

Kim Kardashian

Kardashian first gained major attention after an infamous sex tape (which is a movie) was released on the Internet and she parlayed that fame into her own reality show, Keeping up with the Kardashians (another movie). Over the last 10 years, she has become one of the most famous and successful celebrities on the planet, with a net worth of $150 million. - When it comes to making movie stars, audiences have always had power but because of the Internet, audiences have never had more power than we do now.

THE FRENCH NEW WAVE / late 1950s - early 1960s

La Nouvelle Vague is the innovative and highly self-conscious films by young French directors made in the late 1950's and early 1960's. In addition to having a focus on social and political issues, the French New Wave was known for its radical experiments with editing, visual style and narrative storytelling. Using portable equipment and requiring little or no set up time, the New Wave way of filmmaking presented a documentary style.

Independent Motion Picture Company (IMP)

Launched by Carl Laemmle. - Eventually, Lawrence launched her own production company in 1912, the Victor Film Company, which she sold to Laemmle when he founded Universal Pictures in 1913.

Florence Lawrence

Lawrence made films for D.W. Griffith's Biograph Studio and was well recognized by the film going public but no one knew her name. Laemmle enticed Lawrence away from Biograph by offering her more money as well as something no other studio was willing to offer: marquee billing. - Because the studios feared the power of a "star system," actors' names were not listed in film credits. Producers knew that once actors received on-screen credit, their salary demands would rise. - Lawrence gained a huge following and has the distinction of being the world's first movie star because her name and picture made audiences want to see her films. She is the first actor whose celebrity was an important feature of the movies she appeared in. Eventually, she launched her own production company in 1912, the Victor Film Company, which she sold to Laemmle when he founded Universal Pictures in 1913.

THE NEW HOLLYWOOD / late 1960s - early 1980s

Losing its audience to TV, foreign cinema and independent film, Hollywood granted a number of young filmmakers unprecedented freedom to make films in ways in hope that they would be able to reach younger viewers. The result was one of the largest creative explosions that the American film industry has ever seen. These filmmakers were the among the first film-school educated directors to take the helm of major Hollywood productions.

TWENTIETH CENTURY FOX

William Fox created the Fox Film Corporation in 1915 and it would later merge with Darryl Zanuck's Twentieth Century Pictures in 1935.

The De Havilland Decision

(1944) The U.S. Supreme Court handed down ruling that the standard seven-year contract could not be indefinitely lengthenedbecause an actor refused to appear in a particular film. Because of de Havilland, actors would know when their contracts were up and would no longer be indentured servants to the studios.

Carl Laemmle

Arrived in America from Germany in 1906. He pooled his family's resources to purchase nickelodeons. When a film distributor failed to deliver the films for his nickelodeons, he decided to produced his own films, eventually launching the Independent Motion Picture Company (IMP).

Thomas Edison

(1847-1931) was an prolific inventor and businessman. He invented or help develop devices that impacted life around the world, including the phonograph, the lightbulb and the motion picture camera. - The first commercially exhibited motion pictures in the United States were from Edison, and premiered at a Kinetoscope parlor in New York City in 1894. The Kinetoscope was designed for films to be viewed by one individual at a time through a peephole viewer window at the top of the device. - Because the single-viewer Kinetoscopes were profitable, Edison was slow to develop a projection system. However, other film producers began developing projection systems because projected films were potentially even more profitable than Kinetoscopes because a single projector could accommodate larger audiences. - Edison's studio successfully produced films and sold equipment to make and project these films. Because of competition from other companies, Edison's lawyers began suing anyone who used a film technology, claiming that it was based on a device he had patented. Edison planned to single-handedly control the film business by suing competitors every time they made or tried to distribute a movie. Unfortunately for Edison, suing his competitors out of business proved impossible to enforce.

CHARLIE CHAPLIN

(1889 - 1977) An English comic actor and filmmaker who rose to fame in the silent film era. Chaplin became a worldwide icon through his screen persona the Tramp and is considered one of the most important figures of the film industry. Raised in London, Chaplin's childhood was defined by poverty and hardship. In 1919, Chaplin co-founded the distribution company United Artists, giving him complete control over his films. Primarily through his character the Tramp, Chaplin's films frequently showed an underdog facing insurmountable odds in an unjust world. - City Lights - Modern Times - THE GREAT DICTATOR POSTER

Harry Davis

(1906) Opened a movie theater in Pittsburgh, first popularizing the name Nickelodeon because it cost a nickel. Although it was not the first theater to show films, Davis' Nickelodeon was the first theater in the world devoted exclusively to exhibiting moving pictures. By the end of 1906, there were 2,500 nickelodeons nationwide. By 1911, there were 14,000.

Motion Picture Patents Company (MPPC - also known as the Edison Trust)

(1908) Edison assembled his rival movie companies and proposed that they join his Motion Picture Patents Company (MPPC - also known as the Edison Trust). The MPPC included Edison, W.K.L. Dickson's Biograph, Georges Meiles' Star Film, Vitagraph and American Pathe among others. - The MPPC was a holding company for the organization's collective patents, covering projectors, cameras, and film stock. MPPC would issue licenses and collect royalties from anyone wishing to produce, distribute or exhibit motion pictures. The MPPC tried to monopolize the industry by controlling the equipment and materials of filmmaking. To escape the MPPC, independent film companies moved their operations away from the east coast to California.

Motion Picture Magazine

(1911) The first fan magazine. Originally called The Motion Picture Story Magazine, it was renamed in 1914 and shifted from being a fiction publication to one focused on celebrities and aimed at a female readership. It was very successful and was published until 1977.

UNIVERSAL PICTURES

(1912) Laemmle joined his IMP with other small studios to create the Company.

ORSON WELLS

(1915-1985) Began his career as a stage actor before going on to radio, creating his unforgettable version of H.G. Well's War of the Worlds. The broadcast cemented Welles's status as a genius, and he signed a contract with RKO to write, direct and produce two films. The deal gave him total creative control, as well as a percentage of the profits. At the time, it was the most lucrative deal ever made with an unproven filmmaker. Welles was just 24 years old and his first film was Citizen Kane. Welles's dramatic visuals, deep space compositions, camera movements, and high-contrast lighting compliment his fascination with corruption, isolation, and the downfall of powerful men. - CITIZEN KANE - TOUCH OF EVIL - IMAGES: CHIMES AT MIDNIGHT

PARAMOUNT PICTURES

(1916) Adolph Zukor's Famous Players merged with Jesse Lasky's Feature Play Company.

METRO GOLDWYN MAYER (MGM)

(1924) Formed by Samuel Goldwyn, Marcus Loew, Louis Mayer and Nicholas Schenck.

THE PANTHEON DIRECTORS

(1929-1968) These are, according to Andrew Sarris, the 14 most important American film directors who have created important work in the first 40 years of the film industry; have successful film careers; and have shown a clear, personal vision of the world through their work. Charles Chaplin Robert Flaherty John Ford D.W. Griffith Howard Hawks Alfred Hitchcock Buster Keaton Fritz Lang Ernst Lubitsch F.W. Murnau Max Ophuls Jean Renoir Josef Von Sternberg Orson Welles

CITY LIGHTS

(1931) Although "talking" pictures were on the rise since 1928, City Lights was popular despite being silent. Today, it is thought of as one of the highest accomplishments of Chaplin's prolific career. City Lights tells the story of the homeless Tramp who meets a blind flower girl who mistakes him for a wealthy man.

MODERN TIMES

(1936) Modern Times marked the last screen appearance of the Tramp. The film is a comment on the desperate employment and fiscal conditions people faced during the Great Depression. In the film, the Tramp is a factory worker who suffers a mental breakdown that eventually causes him to be arrested when he's mistaken for a Communist agitator.

THE GREAT DICTATOR POSTER

(1940) With this film, Chaplin made a personal statement against Hitler. The film enraged German and British diplomats and was harassed by the House Un-American Activities. The film follows a private, from the fictitious country of Tomania who loses his memory and is mistaken for the missing dictator, Hynkel.

CITIZEN KANE

(1941) Modeled after the life and work of publishing magnate William Randolph Hearst, the film tells the story of newspaperman Charles Foster Kane (played by Welles), tracing his rise to power and his eventual corruption from that power. The film outraged Hearst, who refused to allow mention of the movie in any of his newspapers, and helped drive down the film's disappointing box-office numbers. Citizen Kane was nominated for nine Academy Awards (winning for best screenplay). Welles deployed a number of pioneering techniques, including the use of deep-focus cinematography to present all objects in a shot in sharp detail. Welles also anchored the film's look with low-angle shots and told its story with multiple points of view.

Olivia de Havilland

- Studios kept performers on a seven year contract which was very one-sided. The performers could not end the contract but the studios could end or extend it whenever they liked. Best known for her roles in Gone with the Wind and the Adventures of Robin Hood, brought suit against Warner Bros. She turned down a role Warner Bros. offered her so Jack Warner sent 150 telegrams to other studios telling them not to hire her. De Havilland sued.

Cahiers du Cinema

Called "la politque des auteurs," the auteur theory was first proposed in the French journal Cahiers du Cinema in the mid-1950's to identify filmmakers whose consistency of theme and visual style made them the "authors" of their films. The idea is that the director uses the camera in the same way the writer uses a pen. Also hidden in the idea of auteurism is the idea that there are directors who are artists and directors who are decidedly not.

SARRIS' CRITERIA FOR AUTEURS

1. Technical competence and flair for the cinema 2. The director must exhibit certain recurrent characteristics of style, which serves as his signature. 3. The filmmakers work must be concerned with interior meaning. "How do you tell the genuine director from the quasi-chimpanzee? After a given number of films, a pattern is established." - Andrew Sarris, American Cinema, 1968 The auteur theory proposes that the meaning of a film is seen most clearly by looking at a filmmaker's body of work. If an esthetic is discernible - an esthetic that points to themes and concerns larger than the content of a single film - that would argue that the creator is an auteur. From the mid 1950's to the late 60's, young filmmakers began asking for the credit "a film by" which implied that they were auteurs and their films were art.

Vitascope

After competitors began exhibiting films on screens, Edison was approached by the inventors of a film projector. Edison agreed to manufacture the projector on the condition that it would be called the Vitascope and would be advertised as an Edison invention. They agreed and the Vitascope was released in1896.

The Broken Oath

After signing Lawrence, Laemmle told the press that his competitors kidnapped Lawrence. When he was ready to release her film, The Broken Oath, Laemmle bought ads in the leading newspapers nationwide, stating that Lawrence was safe and working for the IMP Company.

James Stewart

Became the first actor to demand a percentage of a film's gross with Anthony Mann's 1950 Western, Winchester '73. Stewart set the stage for other stars to leave the contract system.

Leading celebrity/fan programs include the syndicated series:

Entertainment Tonight (premiered in 1981) and Access Hollywood (premiered in 1996). The celebrity news website TMZ premiered in 2005 and launched as a television program in 2007.

RKO (Radio-Keith-Orpheum) Pictures

Formed after the Keith-Albee-Orpheum (KAO) theater chains and Joseph Kennedy's Film Booking Offices of America (FBO) studio were brought together under the control of the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) in 1928.

COLUMBIA PICTURES

Founded in 1918 as Cohn-Brandt-Cohn Film Sales by Jack and Harry Cohn and Joe Brandt. It adopted the name Columbia in 1924.

Francois Truffaut

French filmmaker, published an article in 1954 called "A Certain Tendency of the French Cinema" in which he argued against the old fashioned filmmakers who devoted more time to the script and actors than they did to the visual aspect of their work.

Paramount created a practice known as block booking

In which they forced theaters to show their blocks of films.

The Sherman Antitrust Act

Is a federal anti-monopoly statute, passed in 1890, which prohibits activities that restrict interstate commerce and competition in the marketplace. - In 1915, the courts ruled that the Edison Trust was a monopoly under the Sherman Anti-Trust Act, "terrorizing exchanges and exhibitors" and driving away competitors by "arbitrary, oppressive, and high-handed methods." Independent studios such as Laemmle's IMP were suddenly in a position of power. The end of the Edison monopoly gave birth to the the Studio System and made giants out of the formerly independent film studios.

WARNER BROS.

Jack, Sam, Albert and Harry Warner formed the Company in 1923.