Realism in Popular Cinema Real-ization of True Stories

Realism and Popular Film Genres Realist filming strategies used in various cinematic genres. Techniques and styles associated with film realism -- natural ingredients of certain genres: Historical drama, biographical film, political thriller; Films which are based entirely or partly on real events and about real people

Realism and Popular Film Genres Realist techniques and styles are also employed in other genres: Melodrama, gangster film, and Western When a film has a special need of making its story plausible and convincing Especially when they are in need of renovation and rejuvenation.

Realism and Popular Film Genres Revisionist Westerns Sam Pekinpah’s Patt Garrett and Billy the Kid (1973) Graphic reality Arthur Penn’s Missouri Breaks (1976) All (cowboy/ sheriff) mannerisms are stripped off in characterization.

Realism and Popular Film Genres Kevin Costner’s Dances with Wolves (1990) Better understanding of Indians, the Sioux tribe, and diatribe against the white self-righteousness. Clint Eastwood’s Unforgiven (1992) Retired ‘killer’ fails to reform himself. Blurring the lines between heroism and villainy, and good and evil.

Realism and Popular Film Genres To regenerate the cultural status of the genre in their realistic treatment of the subject in their own way Pat Garrett and Missouri Breaks draw on realist techniques associated with European art cinema. Dances with Wolves and Unforgiven refer to the aspects of the historical past that the genre ignored or distorted.

Film Real-ization Real-ization of a true story, a past event, and a historical fact. Realist filming techniques and realist narrative techniques are the most often used for such real-ization films. Historical drama, bio-pic (biographical pictures), political thrillers REALIST AND TRUTH EFFECTS THAT THEY ACHIEVE VARY A GREAT DEAL from film to film.

Film Real-lization Spectacular real-ization in James Cameron’s Titanic (1998) An ‘authentic’ mise-en- scène based on contemporary and historical verisimilitude. The credit scene is the restaging of the departure of Titanic in sepia-colour as if it were a historical newsreel. opening

Film Real-ization The opening sequence of the film has the appearance of a glossy documentary until flashback sequences The story of this epic disaster is retold using the ostensibly ‘true’ story of a (fictionalized) survivor. It is dissolved into a conventional narrative of disruption, heroic action and resolution.

Film Real-ization The story which turned a historical event into a fiction – fictionalization of a true event – Frederick Forsyth’s The Day of the Jackal Real-ization of a fiction in Fred Zinneman’s The Day of the Jackal (1973) A British assassin hired to kill President Charles De Gaulle. High historical accuracy

Film Real-ization Highly convincing recreation of France in the 1960s and the military parade of President Charles de Gaulle, combining actual newsreels and restaged images. Documentary-like observation of the assassin and the assassination attempt in grainy photography.

Film Real-ization The film is adapted from Frederic Forsyth thriller fiction based on a thorough research on the political situation in France in the 1960s. The film managed to make a fiction look as if it were a historical event.

Film Real-ization Timely and topical real- ization in Alan J. Pakura’s All the President’s Men (1976) The most meticulous re- enacting of the Watergate investigation by the two Washington Post journalists.

Film Real-ization The film focuses not on the scandal itself but the two journalists, Carl Berstein and Bob Woodward, with many omissions. Played by Dustin Hoffman and Robert Woodford Costumes, hairstyles, mannerism Interior designs of the company

Film Real-ization The newsroom of Washington Post was constructed in Waner Bros. studios in Burbank Being unable to shoot in the Post newsroom, Pakura emulated it entirely even borrowing trash.

Film Rea-lization Oliver Stone’s JFK (1991) The film recreates the investigation of the assassination of JFK and the court case by the officially discredited New Orleans district attorney Jim Garrison.

Film Real-ization A range of realist forms of depiction News footage and photographs culled from newspaper and TV reports Court sequences are presented in the manners of documentary presentation

Film Real-ization Both real and recreated TV news and documentary footage shot on 16 mm, home movies shot on 8 mm., models, diagrams, press photos, and reconstructed photos woven together. They are displayed in a courtroom.

Film Real-ization Controversies Fictionalization rather than real-ization of history Distortion of the past Mixing of factual materials with re- enactment sequences Rapid editing style Aggressive delivering of messages → MANIPULATION OF SPECTATORS