“What is drama but life with the dull bits cut out “What is drama but life with the dull bits cut out.” – Alfred Hitchcock, Director

The Rise of Television With the development of the television and it becoming more affordable, audiences began to abandon the movie theaters To bolster sagging theater attendance, Hollywood used its best weapon: SPECTACLE!!

The Introduction of Wide Screen Studios wanted to increase the size of the screen and the image Cinerama developed by Paramount – uses three projectors / three cameras to create the larger image The History of Aspect Ratio CinemaScope developed by 20th Century Fox CinemaScope required a special lens which would “squeeze” the image during filming. Then during projection, a lens would “unsqueeze” the image to make it larger The CinemaScope Story The Robe – First CinemaScope film

Color film Technicolor was deemed a monopoly In 1947, the government stepped in to break Technicolor’s hold on the film industry One in ten films were in color Technicolor was making 10 million a year Eastman Kodak wanted to create their own color film system – did not rely on the camera, but the film itself Using the new color film developed by Eastman color, during the 1950s approximately 50% of the films were now shot in color

Attracting the New Audience The studios needed to attract a new audience and focused on a specific demographic 3D – House of Wax (1953) the first commercially successful 3D film – Paddleball sequence The History of Stereoscopic 3-D The Drive-In – created in the 1930s, but boomed in the 1950’s Smell-O-Vision – created by Hans Laube – Scent of Mystery (Later – Holiday In Spain) Teen Rebellion movies – Rebel Without A Cause The Wild One

The Genres of the 1950s Musicals were still around – but what was changing Blackboard Jungle Rock Around The Clock Fifties Fatalism – an extension of Film Noir and “Social Problem” films - House by The River The Big Heat Science Fiction – reflected the fears in society Invasion of The Body Snatchers – When Worlds Collide – Can we live in peace? Godzilla -

The Auteur Theory Cahiers du Cinema – a French magazine – promoted the AUTEUR THEORY It held that the DIRECTOR was the most important person involved in the creation of the film Stated that certain directors had a distinctive visual signature and a range of thematic interests or motifs that made a director a recognizable individual with a set of values, levels of social engagement, and visual style Began to compare these commercial films to personal works of art

Alfred Hitchcock “The Master of Suspense” – originally from England First American Film – Rebecca (1940) One of the first directors whose name was used to sell the movie Thoughts on actors Directed Psycho (1960) – (We’ll talk about this film later) Hitchcock on Editing Rumored obsession -