1. INTRODUCTION TO FILM
Pre and Early Cinema

2. Key Terms:
Persistence of vision – a characteristic of human vision (first described scientifically by Peter Mark Roget in 1824) whereby the brain retains images cast upon the retina of the eye for approximately 1/20 to 1/5 of a second beyond their actual removal from the field of vision.
Emulsion – layers of gelatin containing light sensitive chemical, supported by an acetate base, that reacts to exposure to light to form tiny specks (grain) that corresponds to the light and dark areas in the scene filmed.

3. Diegesis (Greek word for recounted story) – the “world” of the film’s story, or the “total world of the story action”. The diegesis includes events that are presumed to have occurred and actions and spaces not shown on screen.
Form – a film has an overall organization, a pattern. Filmic conventions are established patterns. The style of a film = purposeful patterns.
Shot – one uninterrupted image taken by a static or mobile camera. The shot is the basic building block of modern continuity editing.

4. Long shot – a shot of landscape or setting.
Single shot – a shot containing one person.
Two shot – a shot containing two people.
Full shot – a shot of the full figure of a standing person or persons and about ¾ view of the set.  Also called medium long shot.

5. Three quarter shot – a shot of a person or persons from the shins up
Three quarter shot – a shot of a person or persons from the shins up.  Also called plan américain.
Medium shot – a shot in which the scale of the object shown is of moderate size; a human figure seen from the waist up would fill most of the screen.

6. Medium close up – a shot in which the scale of the object shown is fairly large; a human figure seen from the chest up would fill most of the screen.
Close up – a shot in which the scale of the object shown is relatively large; most commonly a person’s head seen from the neck up, or an object of a comparable size that fills most of the screen.

7. David Bordwell & Kristin Thompson

8. They are a married couple.
Bordwell spent nearly the entirety of his career as a professor of film at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where he is currently the Jacques Ledoux Professor of Film Studies, Emeritus in the Department of Communication Arts. 
Thompson has held teaching positions at the University of Wisconsin, the University of Iowa, Indiana University, the University of Amsterdam, and the University of Stockholm.

9. In addition to Film Art, which has ten editions and has been translated into seven languages, they also co-authored Minding Movies: Observations on the Art, Craft, and Business of Filmmaking (2011), as well as The Classical Hollywood Cinema: Film Style and Mode of Production to 1960 (1985) with Janet Staiger.
In addition to writing about film, Thompson has also written about television, Russian formalism, and the Lord of the Rings franchise. Her most recent book is Storytelling in Film and Television (2003).

10. Bordwell has published nineteen books to date, in addition to Classical Hollywood cinema, he has also written about Japanese, Hong Kong, and Russian cinema. He most recent book is Reinventing Hollywood: How 1940s Filmmakers Changed Movie Storytelling (2017)

11. Film Form

12. Film Form
All films have a form - the overall system of relations that can be perceived amongst the elements in the whole film.

13. Film Form
All films have a form - the overall system of relations that can be perceived amongst the elements in the whole film.
Perception and audience (perceivers)

14. Film Form
All films have a form - the overall system of relations that can be perceived amongst the elements in the whole film.
Perception and audience (perceivers)
Cueing / system

15. Film Form
All films have a form - the overall system of relations that can be perceived amongst the elements in the whole film.
Perception and audience (perceivers)
Cueing / system
Form and content (both function as part of the overall pattern)

16. Film Form
All films have a form - the overall system of relations that can be perceived amongst the elements in the whole film.
Perception and audience (perceivers)
Cueing / system
Form and content (both function as part of the overall pattern)
Expectations and conventions (genres)

17. Emotions

18. Form & Meaning

19. Form & Meaning Referential

20. Form & Meaning Referential Explicit

21. Form & Meaning Referential Explicit Implicit

22. Form & Meaning Referential Explicit Implicit Symptomatic

23. Criteria for evaluating film

24. Criteria for evaluating film
There is a difference between personal taste and evaluative judgment

25. Criteria for evaluating film
There is a difference between personal taste and evaluative judgment
Coherence / unity

26. Criteria for evaluating film
There is a difference between personal taste and evaluative judgment
Coherence / unity
Intensity of effect

27. Criteria for evaluating film
There is a difference between personal taste and evaluative judgment
Coherence / unity
Intensity of effect
Complexity

28. Criteria for evaluating film
There is a difference between personal taste and evaluative judgment
Coherence / unity
Intensity of effect
Complexity
Originality

29. Criteria for evaluating film
There is a difference between personal taste and evaluative judgment
Coherence / unity
Intensity of effect
Complexity
Originality
A matter of degree: “In applying the criteria, the analyst must often weigh one against another” (Film Art, p. 59)

30. 5 Principles of Film Form

31. 5 Principles of Film Form
“There are no absolute principles of form that all artists must follow. Artworks are products of culture. Thus many of the principles of artistic form are matters of convention.” (Film Art, p. 59)

32. 5 Principles of Film Form
“There are no absolute principles of form that all artists must follow. Artworks are products of culture. Thus many of the principles of artistic form are matters of convention.” (Film Art, p. 59)
Function

33. 5 Principles of Film Form
“There are no absolute principles of form that all artists must follow. Artworks are products of culture. Thus many of the principles of artistic form are matters of convention.” (Film Art, p. 59)
Function
Similarity and repetition (motif)

34. 5 Principles of Film Form
“There are no absolute principles of form that all artists must follow. Artworks are products of culture. Thus many of the principles of artistic form are matters of convention.” (Film Art, p. 59)
Function
Similarity and repetition (motif)
Difference and variation (parallelism)

35. Development (process)

36. Development (process) Unity / disunity

37. A set of questions that you can ask about any film (Film Art, p. 66):

38. A set of questions that you can ask about any film (Film Art, p. 66):
1. Of any element in the film, you can ask: What are its functions in the overall form? How is it motivated?

39. A set of questions that you can ask about any film (Film Art, p. 66):
2. Are elements or patterns repeated throughout the film? If so, how and at what points? Are motifs and parallelism asking us to compare elements?

40. A set of questions that you can ask about any film (Film Art, p. 66):
3. How are elements contrasted and differentiated from one another? How are different elements opposed to one another?

41. A set of questions that you can ask about any film (Film Art, p. 66):
4. What principles of progression or development are at work throughout the form of the film? More specifically, how does a comparison of the beginning and ending reveal the overall form of the film?

42. A set of questions that you can ask about any film (Film Art, p. 66):
5. What degree of unity is present in the film’s overall form? Is disunity subordinate to the overall unity, or does disunity dominate?

43. The Development of Feature Film as Industry
The founding of the MPPC (The Motion Picture Patents Company) in 1908 under the Edison / Biograph leadership
A protective trade association – resisted by independents
One reelers – released multi-reel films as serials

44. Feature = a multi-reel film
High priced admission
Longer runs
Cheaper and easier publicity
Higher volume sales to distributors
Longer formats, more complex narrative
New theaters (“Dream Palaces”)

45. 1907-1913: massive migration west to Hollywood

46. 1907-1913: massive migration west to Hollywood Climate

47. 1907-1913: massive migration west to Hollywood
Climate
Access to theatrical talent

48. 1907-1913: massive migration west to Hollywood
Climate
Access to theatrical talent
Variety of scenery / locations

49. 1907-1913: massive migration west to Hollywood
Climate
Access to theatrical talent
Variety of scenery / locations
Far from MPCC headquarters in NYC

50. By 1915, there were 15,000 workers employed by the motion picture industry in Hollywood
Over 60% of American production was centered there.
Investments exceeded $500 million.
The independent studios include Paramount Pictures, Universal, Fox, and Goldwyn Pictures

51. By 1915, there were 15,000 workers employed by the motion picture industry in Hollywood
Over 60% of American production was centered there.
Investments exceeded $500 million.
The independent studios include Paramount Pictures, Universal, Fox, and Goldwyn Pictures

52. Tom Gunning
Gunning is the Edwin A. and Betty L. Bergman Distinguished Service Professor in Cinema and Media Studies, and Art History at University of Chicago.
His scholarship focuses on problems of film style and interpretation, film history and film culture. He has approximately one hundred publications concentrating on early cinema as well as on the culture of modernity from which cinema arose.

53. Gunning’s concept of the "cinema of attractions" has tried to relate the development of cinema to other forces than storytelling, such as new experiences of space and time in modernity, and an emerging modern visual culture.
His books include D.W. Griffith and the Origins of American Narrative Film (1993) and The Films of Fritz Lang: Allegories of Vision and Modernity (2000)

54. Gunning is challenging the “pejorative connotations of describing early film as ‘primitive’, maintaining that this era possessed a different approach to filmmaking than that of later cinema, so often considered the norm.” (OGFS, p. 255)
Noël Burch - IMR (institutional mode of representation) vs. PMR (primitive mode of representation
Narrators (cinematic devices which narrate a story) vs. monstrators (display or showed things)

55. Gunning is challenging the “pejorative connotations of describing early film as ‘primitive’, maintaining that this era possessed a different approach to filmmaking than that of later cinema, so often considered the norm.” (OGFS, p. 255)
Noël Burch - IMR (institutional mode of representation) vs. PMR (primitive mode of representation
Narrators (cinematic devices which narrate a story) vs. monstrators (display or showed things)

56. Editing sequence (narrators) vs. single shot (monstrators)

57. Cinema of Attractions

58. “Rather than narrative development based on active characters within detailed fictional environments, the cinema of attractions presented a series of curious or novel views to a spectator.” (OGFS, p. 258)

59. Non-fictional actualities
Vaudeville acts
Famous fragments (well-known scenes or moments in plays or paintings)
Trick films (e.g. Melies)

60. “In this cinema, characterization was unimportant and the spatial and temporal relations essential to narrative development were basically irrelevant.”
“Like all binary oppositions, the contrast between attractions and narrative can lead to unfortunate simplification. These aspects should never be seen as mutually exclusive, but need to be dialectically interrelated.” (OGFS, p. 263)

61. “In this cinema, characterization was unimportant and the spatial and temporal relations essential to narrative development were basically irrelevant.”
“Like all binary oppositions, the contrast between attractions and narrative can lead to unfortunate simplification. These aspects should never be seen as mutually exclusive, but need to be dialectically interrelated.” (OGFS, p. 263)

62. Reflexivity – reference, commentary, or analysis of a system that points back to, or lead to changes within the same system. In cinematic terms, films that point back to themselves as films, or to the history of cinema.
Editing – the selection, splicing or cutting together of the shots in a film to create a meaningful relationship between them. 
Narrative film – a film whose structure follows a story line. The dominant cinematic form.
Inter-title – printed titles that appear within the main body of a film to convey dialogue or other narrative information.

63. Point-of-view shot – a shot taken in the position from which a character is looking, showing what the character would see.  It is usually preceded or followed by a shot of the character.
Reaction shot – a shot that shows a character’s reaction to the events within a previous shot they have been witness to.
Crosscutting – editing that alternates shots of two or more lines of action occurring in different places, usually simultaneously.
Parallel action – two scenes occurring in different places showing one after another or crosscut together to create the illusion of simultaneity.

64. Directed by D.W. Griffith
The Birth of A Nation (1915)
Directed by D.W. Griffith

65. The Birth of A Nation – The Film
Opened as The Clansman in Los Angeles’ Clune Auditorium in Feb. 8, 1915 for a 22 week run
On March 8, open in NYC’s Liberty Theatre with a new title THE BIRTH OF A NATION
Screened at the Liberty till the end of 1915 – set a record – tickets cost $2
Boycotted by the NAACP

66. Multi-Perspectival Analysis of The Birth of A Nation
Its visual language and narrative structure

67. 1. Visual Language and Narrative Structure

68. 1. Visual Language and Narrative Structure
What do you see when you watch the film?

69. 1. Visual Language and Narrative Structure
What do you see when you watch the film?
What kind of shots?

70. 1. Visual Language and Narrative Structure
What do you see when you watch the film?
What kind of shots?
How are the different shots connected through editing?

71. 1. Visual Language and Narrative Structure
What do you see when you watch the film?
What kind of shots?
How are the different shots connected through editing?
Do you see anything else?

72. 1. Visual Language and Narrative Structure
What do you see when you watch the film?
What kind of shots?
How are the different shots connected through editing?
Do you see anything else?
How does its filmic language support or determine its narrative structure?

73. Griffith’s use of historical “facsimile”
Press image
Film image

74. Directed by Oscar Micheaux
Within Our Gates (1920)
Directed by Oscar Micheaux

75. Multi-Perspectival Analysis of The Birth of A Nation
Its visual language and narrative structure
Race, gender, stereotypes, ideology

76. Robyn Wiegman
Wiegman is Professor of Literature and Women's Studies and formerly the Margaret Taylor Smith Director of Women's Studies at Duke, from  
Her research interests include feminist theory, queer theory, American Studies, critical race theory, and film and media studies.

77. Wiegman’s publications include Object Lessons (2012) and American Anatomies: Theorizing Race and Gender (1995)

78. 2. Stereotypes and Ideology

79. 2. Stereotypes and Ideology
What are stereotypes? Do you see any in the film?

80. 2. Stereotypes and Ideology
What are stereotypes? Do you see any in the film?
How do stereotypes contribute to the film’s narrative structure, its ideology?

81. 2. Stereotypes and Ideology
What are stereotypes? Do you see any in the film?
How do stereotypes contribute to the film’s narrative structure, its ideology?
According to Wiegman, what are some of the problems with stereotype analysis?

82. Racial stereotypes show us the pervasiveness of racism as an institutionalized element in Hollywood film, which have been present since its beginning:
“In filmic structure and forms of visual pleasure (narrative, setting, cosmetology, and camera technique) as well as industry labor practices and ‘morality’ codes, we witness the full arsenal of the stereotype’s production.” (OGFS, p. 164)

83. Rick Altman
Professor in Cinema and Comparative literature at University of Iowa
Also written books on the musical film genre, and edited a book on sound theory and practice that we will read from later this semester.

84. Kinetoscope

85. Edison Kinetophone

86. Sound in Early Cinema

87. What sounds were heard in relationship to early films?
Sound in Early Cinema
What sounds were heard in relationship to early films?

88. Sound in Early Cinema
What sounds were heard in relationship to early films?
Music (live or recorded, orchestral to popular)

89. Sound in Early Cinema
What sounds were heard in relationship to early films?
Music (live or recorded, orchestral to popular)
Human voice (lecturers, actors, audience)

90. Sound in Early Cinema
What sounds were heard in relationship to early films?
Music (live or recorded, orchestral to popular)
Human voice (lecturers, actors, audience)
Sound effects (performative)

91. Sound in Early Cinema
What sounds were heard in relationship to early films?
Music (live or recorded, orchestral to popular)
Human voice (lecturers, actors, audience)
Sound effects (performative)
Silence

92. Sound in Early Cinema
What sounds were heard in relationship to early films?
Music (live or recorded, orchestral to popular)
Human voice (lecturers, actors, audience)
Sound effects (performative)
Silence
Machines (vitascope vs. cinematographe)

93. Sound in Early Cinema
What sounds were heard in relationship to early films?
Music (live or recorded, orchestral to popular)
Human voice (lecturers, actors, audience)
Sound effects (performative)
Silence
Machines (vitascope vs. cinematographe)
Other forms of entertainment

94. The Kinetophone – combining Kinetoscope with phonogram

95. The Kinetophone – combining Kinetoscope with phonogram
Semi-synchronization 

96. The Kinetophone – combining Kinetoscope with phonogram
Semi-synchronization 
Cue-sound aesthetic: “instead of people making sounds, dance and band films portray people keeping time to sounds.” (Altman, p. 81)

97. The Kinetophone – combining Kinetoscope with phonogram
Semi-synchronization 
Cue-sound aesthetic: “instead of people making sounds, dance and band films portray people keeping time to sounds.” (Altman, p. 81)

98. The Kinetophone – combining Kinetoscope with phonogram
Semi-synchronization 
Cue-sound aesthetic: “instead of people making sounds, dance and band films portray people keeping time to sounds.” (Altman, p. 81)
Based on the presence of sound cues within the image

99. Multi-Perspectival Analysis of The Birth of A Nation
Its visual language and narrative structure
Race, gender, stereotypes, ideology
Its musical score as representative of the “golden era of silent film music”

100. Silent Film Music
Film programs before several short films, illustrated songs, and vaudeville acts
Early teens (“golden era” of silent film music) – explosion of theater construction; picture palaces; blockbuster films of season
: expected number of musicians went from 16 to over 70 concert-level musicians

101. By 1922: 500 theater orchestras of 30+ musicians out of about 15,000 theaters in the U.S % of theaters employ an orchestra, most commonly 5-10 musicians

102. Film Music for The Birth of A Nation
The Clune orchestra featured 40 instrumentalists, several vocalists, and a chorus of 12
Score by Carli Elinor, with compositions by Mozart, Wagner, Rossini, Suppé, Bizet, Wagner, Massenet, Offenbach, and Beethoven
The Liberty orchestra featured 50 instrumentalist

103. New score by Joseph Carl Breil, incorporating compositions by Grieg, Wagner, Bellini, Suppé, Tchaikovsky, Wagner, Massenet, Offenbach, and Beethoven. Also folk favorites, including everything from “Auld Lang Syne” to “My Old Kentucky Home,” are joined by marches and patriotic numbers like “The Bonnie Blue Flag,” “Dixie,” Hail Columbia,” and “Marching Through Georgia,” as well as popular tunes including “Where Did You Get That Hat” and “Zip Coon.”

104. Breil’s original composition – love theme for Elsie Stoneman and Ben Cameron – marketed as “The Perfect Song” (sheet music)
“The Birth of A Nation proved that motion pictures could serve as prestige vehicles. In order to fulfill this promise, however, a film had to be accompanied by an orchestra of unprecedented size.” (Altman, p. 294)

105. What are the role(s) of music in film form, narrative, and ideology?

106. DJ Spooky performing Rebirth of a Nation (2005-8) at Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art November 2004

107. “Funning” – satirizes scenes or entire films through musical puns, comments on the picture through the title, lyrics, or melody of the accompanying music. (James Lastra)