Postmodernism in music video
7 years ago
Showing posts with label Year 13 Film - German Expressionism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Year 13 Film - German Expressionism. Show all posts
Monday, 21 November 2011
Allegory Explained
Really interesting article- Allegory, Rhythm and Metropolis
http://mcowan-research.mcgill.ca/wp-content/uploads/cowan-heart-machine-article-from-modernism-modernity.pdf
Religious Allegory in Metropolis:
Freder in Metropolis is one of the more overt examples. Freder's Father, Johann Fredersen, is the overlord of Metropolis. As Metropolis stretches for miles and includes good things (such as marvelous theatres and stadiums) and bad things (a red-light district) it can be seen to represent the World. Fredersen, as both ruler and builder of Metropolis symbolized God, and Freder, his son, would therefore be Jesus. Furthermore, when Johann Fredersen asks his son what he was doing in the machine halls, he says that he wants to see the little children who are his 'brothers and sisters'. He identifies with children, even though he is in his twenties, and this could be a reference to Jesus Christ's saying 'Suffer little children to come unto me' or a sign of Freder's inherent purity. His lover is named Maria, the German for 'Mary' as in 'Mary Magdalene' and Freder is 'crucified' as he works on a horrible machine that forces him into the position of jesus on the cross.
More RELIGIOUS ALLEGORY:http://www.blogger.com/goog_460110570
http://www.decentfilms.com/reviews/metropolis1927.html
Metropolis - Themes and Contexthttp://www.filmeducation.org/metropolis/pdf/Metropolis_Themes_and_context.pdf
Monday, 7 November 2011
Wednesday, 12 May 2010
Metropolis - Key Scenes and other stuff
Context:
Social change, destabilization, the rise of an authoritarianism that curtailed personal freedom and alternative thinking -- these were the conditions in Weimar Republic Germany during the heyday of the Expressionist movement in film. Spanning the years 1909-1924, theirs was a time of revolution (in Russia and Germany), war (World War I), and reaction (the rise of National Socialism in Germany). Anxious about the disintegration of their culture, filmmakers such as F.W. Murnau, Robert Wiene, and Ernst Lubitsch used cinema to create new forms of visual representation, exploring the possibility of reversing power relations through the look. The cinematic Expressionist movement in Germany is generally considered to be the classic period of German cinema; many Expressionist works are included in the canon of the world's greatest films. From Lubitsch's masterpieces 'Passion' (1919) and 'Deception' (1920), through Wiene's famous 'The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari' (1919), to Murnau's brilliant 'The Last Laugh' (1924) and 'Nosferatu' (1922), there has rarely been a movement of such consistent inspiration and achievement. Expressionism in cinema, as in the other arts, attempts to 'reappropriate an alienated universe by transforming it into a private, personal vision.' With that in mind, Expressionist cinema tried to deepen the audience's interaction with the film, combining technology and imaginative filming techniques in order to intensify the illusion of reality. The Expressionists practically reinvented the look of film with innovative and unusual editing rhythms, perspectivally distorted sets, exaggerated gestures, and the famous 'camera unchained' -- a new technique that allowed the camera to move within the scene, vastly increasing the accessibility of the character's subjective point of view. The Expressionists developed new habits of seeing, new ways to interpret the way people relate to social living and self-identification. The Expressionists supplanted reality with myth and fantasy in order to liberate visual perception from the other senses. Their goal: to liberate the mind of the individual from the oppression that rationalism imposed on an industrial society -- an oppression that became more and more powerful as the National Socialists grew in power.
In Part 2, Freder sees the horrendous working conditions of Metropolis, including the famous scene in which a gigantic machine seems to become Moloch, ancient demon-god of human sacrifice, and tries to tell his father, Master of the city, what he has seen. Contrasted with the underground factories is a Utopian vision of the aboveground City as Freder rushes to see this father. Music is by Alexander Nemtin, after Scriabin, for Preparation for the Final Mystery and Nuances. The 1917 revolution had already occurred in Russia, but Hitler and the National Socialists (Nazis) had not yet taken over Germany. The rulers and adherents of both these systems killed millions of human beings through an enforced way of doing things that was based on a rigid philosophy rather than one having an awareness of human aspirations and honoring individual merit and achievements.
Wiki-link on Fritz Lang:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fritz_Lang
Representations of Women in the Film:
Women were represented in different ways throughout the movie Metropolis, but the underlying theme was women were seen as purely sexual. Maria was seen as the nurturer in the film, but also as a sexual object. She was the one who preached for peace and harmony down in the catacombs to the workers. Maria was also the nurturing maternal figure that was seen walking into the garden with all of the poor children. The vamp, on the other hand, was portrayed blatantly as a sexual object. This whole movie was seen through the eyes of the male perspective, which usually portrays women as sexual objects, and robs them of any identity. Lang shows Frederson as having fear of femininity which involves women's emotion and nurturing.
The robot was seen as a creation of technology and femininity and sexuality through the male imagination. This creation of the robot was to reflect the fear that men have of women and of technology. Women, machines, and nature raise fear in men because they threaten the male dominance and control. The female robot rose fear about threatening male control because of the idea that technology could become so large and advanced that it would go out of control of man and destroy humanity. Maria also posed as a threat to Frederson because of her emotions and nurturing. As seen in the movie, the scene where Rotwang leads Frederson down to the catacombs to watch Maria preach about peace is a direct depiction of the male fear of femininity. This fear comes from Frederson not having any control over this situation because he did not know about the catacombs, which scares him. Men need to control these women because of these insecurities about their own dominance.
Throughout the entire movie there is an underlying theme of men always controlling women. The world of technology has always been seen as being all men while the women were standing on the outside looking in. For example, Rotwang creates this vamp to satisfy his own sexual desires, and to be able to control and dominate her every move. Woman has been constructed by man to serve her master, be completely dependent, and meet his needs. Lang invents his females as technological objects that come to life at the hands, and visions of their male masters. This is clearly seen when the robot, disguised as Maria, is put on the stake to burn. Her clothes eventually begin to disappear to display her feminine body, while every mans eyes are glued to her.
Social change, destabilization, the rise of an authoritarianism that curtailed personal freedom and alternative thinking -- these were the conditions in Weimar Republic Germany during the heyday of the Expressionist movement in film. Spanning the years 1909-1924, theirs was a time of revolution (in Russia and Germany), war (World War I), and reaction (the rise of National Socialism in Germany). Anxious about the disintegration of their culture, filmmakers such as F.W. Murnau, Robert Wiene, and Ernst Lubitsch used cinema to create new forms of visual representation, exploring the possibility of reversing power relations through the look. The cinematic Expressionist movement in Germany is generally considered to be the classic period of German cinema; many Expressionist works are included in the canon of the world's greatest films. From Lubitsch's masterpieces 'Passion' (1919) and 'Deception' (1920), through Wiene's famous 'The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari' (1919), to Murnau's brilliant 'The Last Laugh' (1924) and 'Nosferatu' (1922), there has rarely been a movement of such consistent inspiration and achievement. Expressionism in cinema, as in the other arts, attempts to 'reappropriate an alienated universe by transforming it into a private, personal vision.' With that in mind, Expressionist cinema tried to deepen the audience's interaction with the film, combining technology and imaginative filming techniques in order to intensify the illusion of reality. The Expressionists practically reinvented the look of film with innovative and unusual editing rhythms, perspectivally distorted sets, exaggerated gestures, and the famous 'camera unchained' -- a new technique that allowed the camera to move within the scene, vastly increasing the accessibility of the character's subjective point of view. The Expressionists developed new habits of seeing, new ways to interpret the way people relate to social living and self-identification. The Expressionists supplanted reality with myth and fantasy in order to liberate visual perception from the other senses. Their goal: to liberate the mind of the individual from the oppression that rationalism imposed on an industrial society -- an oppression that became more and more powerful as the National Socialists grew in power.
In Part 2, Freder sees the horrendous working conditions of Metropolis, including the famous scene in which a gigantic machine seems to become Moloch, ancient demon-god of human sacrifice, and tries to tell his father, Master of the city, what he has seen. Contrasted with the underground factories is a Utopian vision of the aboveground City as Freder rushes to see this father. Music is by Alexander Nemtin, after Scriabin, for Preparation for the Final Mystery and Nuances. The 1917 revolution had already occurred in Russia, but Hitler and the National Socialists (Nazis) had not yet taken over Germany. The rulers and adherents of both these systems killed millions of human beings through an enforced way of doing things that was based on a rigid philosophy rather than one having an awareness of human aspirations and honoring individual merit and achievements.
Wiki-link on Fritz Lang:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fritz_Lang
Representations of Women in the Film:
Women were represented in different ways throughout the movie Metropolis, but the underlying theme was women were seen as purely sexual. Maria was seen as the nurturer in the film, but also as a sexual object. She was the one who preached for peace and harmony down in the catacombs to the workers. Maria was also the nurturing maternal figure that was seen walking into the garden with all of the poor children. The vamp, on the other hand, was portrayed blatantly as a sexual object. This whole movie was seen through the eyes of the male perspective, which usually portrays women as sexual objects, and robs them of any identity. Lang shows Frederson as having fear of femininity which involves women's emotion and nurturing.
The robot was seen as a creation of technology and femininity and sexuality through the male imagination. This creation of the robot was to reflect the fear that men have of women and of technology. Women, machines, and nature raise fear in men because they threaten the male dominance and control. The female robot rose fear about threatening male control because of the idea that technology could become so large and advanced that it would go out of control of man and destroy humanity. Maria also posed as a threat to Frederson because of her emotions and nurturing. As seen in the movie, the scene where Rotwang leads Frederson down to the catacombs to watch Maria preach about peace is a direct depiction of the male fear of femininity. This fear comes from Frederson not having any control over this situation because he did not know about the catacombs, which scares him. Men need to control these women because of these insecurities about their own dominance.
Throughout the entire movie there is an underlying theme of men always controlling women. The world of technology has always been seen as being all men while the women were standing on the outside looking in. For example, Rotwang creates this vamp to satisfy his own sexual desires, and to be able to control and dominate her every move. Woman has been constructed by man to serve her master, be completely dependent, and meet his needs. Lang invents his females as technological objects that come to life at the hands, and visions of their male masters. This is clearly seen when the robot, disguised as Maria, is put on the stake to burn. Her clothes eventually begin to disappear to display her feminine body, while every mans eyes are glued to her.
Wednesday, 5 May 2010
Adorno and The Frankfurt School
Theodor Adorno
Adorno (1903-69) argued that capitalism fed people with the products of a 'culture industry' - the opposite of 'true' art - to keep them passively satisfied and politically apathetic.
Adorno saw that capitalism had not become more precarious or close to collapse, as Marx had predicted. Instead, it had seemingly become more entrenched. Where Marx had focussed on economics, Adorno placed emphasis on the role of culture in securing the status quo.
Popular culture was identified as the reason for people's passive satisfaction and lack of interest in overthrowing the capitalist system.
Adorno suggested that culture industries churn out a debased mass of unsophisticated, sentimental products which have replaced the more 'difficult' and critical art forms which might lead people to actually question social life.
False needs are cultivated in people by the culture industries. These are needs which can be both created and satisfied by the capitalist system, and which replace people's 'true' needs - freedom, full expression of human potential and creativity, genuine creative happiness.
Commodity fetishism (promoted by the marketing, advertising and media industries) means that social relations and cultural experiences are objectified in terms of money. We are delighted by something because of how much it cost.
Popular media and music products are characterised by standardisation (they are basically formulaic and similar) and pseudo-individualisation (incidental differences make them seem distinctive, but they're not).
Products of the culture industry may be emotional or apparently moving, but Adorno sees this as cathartic - we might seek some comfort in a sad film or song, have a bit of a cry, and then feel restored again.
Boiled down to its most obvious modern-day application, the argument would be that television leads people away from talking to each other or questioning the oppression in their lives. Instead they get up and go to work (if they are employed), come home and switch on TV, absorb TV's nonsense until bedtime, and then the daily cycle starts again.
German Expressionism and Weimar Cinema - Placing the films in context (Macro) Lesson Resources
http://korotonomedya.net/theoria/weimar.html
Cabaret
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxmz3RcNNBE&feature=related
Exam Questions
International Film Styles
Your answer should be based on a minimum of two films appropriate to one of the following topics:
• German and/or Soviet Film of the 1920s
• Surrealism
• Neo-Realism
• New Waves
Either
3. Discuss characteristic features of casting and/or performance, exploring how far these features contribute the overall effect of the films you have studied. [35]
or
4. What is the relationship between visual style and the subject matter of the films you have studied? [35]
http://www.wjec.co.uk/uploads/publications/5797.pdf
Weimar Republic Culture Brown
View more presentations from cinbarnsley.
The Weimar Republic
View more presentations from avsalvatore.
Cabaret
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxmz3RcNNBE&feature=related
Exam Questions
International Film Styles
Your answer should be based on a minimum of two films appropriate to one of the following topics:
• German and/or Soviet Film of the 1920s
• Surrealism
• Neo-Realism
• New Waves
Either
3. Discuss characteristic features of casting and/or performance, exploring how far these features contribute the overall effect of the films you have studied. [35]
or
4. What is the relationship between visual style and the subject matter of the films you have studied? [35]
http://www.wjec.co.uk/uploads/publications/5797.pdf
Wednesday, 28 April 2010
German Expressionism - Whole Movies and Inspired Contemporary Work
Persepolis and How director drew inspiration from Expressionist Film
http://www.filmeducation.org/persepolis/prod-notes.pdf
Useful Links
http://faculty.cua.edu/johnsong/hitchcock/pages/expressionism/expressionism-film.html
German Expressionism - Film Noir and the relationship with Expressionist Movement
From German Expressionism to Film Noir
The term Expressionism has a deep resonance in the history of the cinema. As Thomas Elsaesser explains in ‘Weimar Cinema and After’, it is not just a stylistic term for some of the films from the early 1920s, but “a generic term for most of the art cinema of the Weimar Republic in Germany, and beyond Germany, echoing down film history across the periods and genres, turning up in the description of Universal horror films of the 1930s and film noir of the1940s.”
Clips mentioned in this section are not available to view on the website but are readily available to buy or rent from the usual outlets or from other mentioned sources. The journey of German Expressionism from art cinema to the Hollywood mainstream began with the exile and expulsion of many film producers, directors, writers, actors, and music composers from Germany after Hitler came to power in January 1933. Settling in California, these German emigres had a significant artistic influence on Hollywood filmmaking. This influence was most clearly felt, Thomas Elsaesser writes, “in the existence of that famous 'Expressionist' genre, the film noir, combining the haunted screen of the early 1920s with the lure of the sinful metropolis Berlin of the
late 1920s (the femme fatales, Louise Brooks and Marlene Dietrich) mixed with the angst of German
emigres during the 1930s and 40s as they contemplated personal tragedies and national disaster.”
The term film noir was first coined by French film critics in August 1946 to describe a daring and
stylish new type of Hollywood crime thriller, films such as The Maltese Falcon, Double Indemnity,
Laura and Murder, My Sweet. Standard histories describe film noir as a synthesis of hardboiled
crime fiction and German expressionism. The term is also associated, James Naremore writes in
‘More Than Night: Film Noir and its contexts’, “with certain visual and narrative traits, including lowkey
photography, images of wet city streets and romantic fascination with femme fatales.” Most
commentators locate the period of film noir as beginning in 1941 with The Maltese Falcon and
culminating in 1958 with Orson Welles’ Touch of Evil. Some commentators believe that noir began
much earlier and that it has never gone away.
The hardboiled private eye stories of authors Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, James M. Cain
and Cornell Woolrich provided the narrative source for many classic film noirs. John Huston began
the trend of crime novel adaptations with his 1941 version of The Maltese Falcon. This was quickly
followed by Double Indemnity (directed by German émigré, Billy Wilder who went on to write and
direct Sunset Boulevard), The Postman Always Rings Twice, Mildred Pierce and the Raymond
Chandler adaptations, The Big Sleep and Murder, My Sweet. Other classic film noirs that feature an
investigative narrative structure include The Killers, Out of the Past, The Big Heat, Kiss Me Deadly
and the Big Combo. A direct connection between the crime films of the German Expressionist cinema and the Americanprivate eye movie is made in the work of Fritz Lang, the German émigré director who fled into exilein 1933. Lang brought the dark vision of criminality of his Expressionistic classics, Dr Mabuse, the
Gambler and M to Hollywood and became one of the most prolific directors of the noir genre. His
films include The Woman in the Window, Scarlet Street, The Big Heat, The Blue Gardenia, The Secret
Beyond the Door, While the City Sleeps and Beyond a Reasonable Doubt. Lang’s special subject was
the paranoid mentality. According to Martin Rubin, “No filmmaker has conveyed more powerfully
than Lang a sense of overwhelming entrapment, of a world whose every circumstance, every twist
and turning, every corner and corridor, seem to conspire against the individual and draw him or her
more deeply into a spider’s web.”
It is the visual style of film noir, rather than story or character type, that is seen as its defining
characteristic. The noir look was created by cinematographers, costume designers, art directors and
production designers. Its enduring influence on all genres of Hollywood filmmaking can be seen
today in films as diverse as Bladerunner, Seven, Barton Fink and Sin City.
The visual style of film noir, James Naremore writes, “is characterised by unbalanced and disturbing
frame compositions, strong contrasts of light and dark, the prevalence of shadows and areas of
darkness within the frame, the visual tension created by curious camera angles and so forth.
Moreover, in film noir, these strained compositions and angles are not merely embellishments or
rhetorical flourishes, but form the very substance of the film.”
The noir world is corrupt, threatening and violent. French film critics saw the typical noir narrative as
an existential nightmare from which the protagonist can never awaken. He is a doomed figure
journeying through an underworld of crime and deception until the final betrayal by the femme
fatale that he has fallen for. Expressionist lighting schemes and camera angles convey a sense of
entrapment as the hero makes his way through an often labyrinthine plot. In film noir, Expressionism found a worthy subject in the archetypal American antihero as film scholar Janey Place explains: "The visual style of film noir conveys the dominant mood (male psychological instability and moral uncertainty, paranoia, claustrophobia, a sense of doom and hopelessness, etc) through expressive use of darknesss: both real, in predominantly underlit and nighttime scenes, and psychologically through shadows and claustrophobic compositions which overwhelm the character in exterior as well as interior settings. Characters (and we in the audience) are given little opportunity to orientate themselves to the threatening and shifting shadowy
environment. Silhouettes, shadows, mirrors and reflections (generally darker than the reflected
person) indicate his lack of both unity and control. They suggest a doppelganger, a dark ghost, alter
ego or distorted side of man's personality that will emerge in the dark street at night to destroy him.
The sexual, dangerous woman lives in this darkness, and is the psychological expression of his own
internal fears of sexuality, and his need to control and repress it.”
A Personal Journey through American Movies: (02:06:36 02:28:00)
The BFI DVD ‘A Personal Journey through American Movies’, contains a 22 minute dedicated to film
noir. Martin Scorsese discusses the work of key émigré directors such Fritz Lang The American Cinema television series (available on video) The second volume in this series contains a 50 minute programme on film noir. A dedicated section of the programme explores noir lighting techniques.
A Brilliant Noir Site with a super section on Expressionism if you click on the shadow in the picture:
http://cinepad.com/filmnoir/dark_room.htm
Wednesday, 10 February 2010
German Expressionist Inspired Film
Vincent by Tim Burton - What comparisons can you draw between Vincent and Nosferatu?
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