Reading time: 3 – 4 minutes

Can a movie really tell you what you want to know?

Citizen Kane was co-written, directed, and starred Orson Welles. Before entering the movie business, Welles had come from a radio and broadway background. Got his initial fame from the radio spoof of “The War of the Worlds” based on H. G. Wells book.

Welles was 25 years old when he made Citizen Kane. When he came to Hollywood, he was already well known because of his radio career. He was given a choice of contracts and could make what ever movie he wanted to. He was known as playful spirit. He stated that Hollywood is the biggest toy train set ever.

You can just imagine him coming to the studios and thinking “How can I have fun with this?”

Citizen Kane is about the psychological life of an individual. The movie some say is was based on the life of William Randolf Hearst. Hearst certainly thought so and banned his newspaper conglomerate from writing any reviews or responses to it. Although Welles was known as one of the best directors of all time, and Citizen Kane was known as one of the best movies of all time, it was a box office failure. Perhaps this is due to Hearst’s response…perhaps not.

Welles turned classical filmmaking upside down with this film. Broke away from D. W. Griffith’s tradition of analytical editing. His film was nonlinear in terms of chronology, made up of flashbacks from many different points of view. He used a lot of expressionist devices, and itself was in a way a reflexive film.

If you learn about Orson Welles you will notice that the character Charles Foster Kane in a way mirrors his own life in a way. He probably saw himself in the character. Read about Welles and Citizen Kain in Wikipedia (links above) to see what I mean.

Gregg Toland worked with Welles as his cinematographer on this film. One thing that was different and innovative in a way was the depth of field style. The focus of the background, foreground, middle ground is the same. Welles (unlike Hitchcock) did not use editing as primary means of style. He puts most of his attention on the camera movement and placement. Take the opening sequence of Touch of Evil for example. With Welles the camera seems to have a mind of its own. It doesn’t necessarily follow the characters. People enter a room via a door. The camera enters the room via a window or skylight.

If you pay attention to the opening sequence of the movie you will notice a few things. One is that the people are all dark, making them appear shady and mysterious. They show a film reel about Kane and then say, “This tells us what he did, but not what we want to know. Who is Charles foster Kane?” What do they want to know? Then a discussion starts about Kane’s last words before death, and it appears as though they are looking for some sort of scandal. This makes you question the ethics of those people.

One final thing comes up for me is the whole argument in filming: editing vs. camera. Hitchcock was all about editing. Welles is all about camera. Which one to master? I guess it depends on what one is most comfortable with.

Reading time: 1 – 2 minutes

This past Saturday my friends and I went to Cinema Village (New York) to see a theater release of a documentary called Iraq in Fragments. The film was more than what I had expected. It follows the story of three people, A eleven year old fatherless sunni Muslim, A Shia Muslim leader, and a young Kurdish Sunni Muslim boy.

Check out the trailer for the film on Apple Trailers.

The Style of story telling was the most unique to what I have seen. It seemed like a real film as opposed to a documentary. They way the film footage cuts from one type of movement to another shot or object that is doing the same movement, keeping the flow of the film very smooth and poetic.

Some things that I want to discuss in this post are: The camera, editing, footage shot, people in the film, as well as other things so that the stuff can be used to our benefit when we make some films.

Let the responses begin

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Alternatives to Classical American Filmmaking

Hitchcock was influences by German and Russian filmmaking. Some of the alternatives filmmaking that existed were Soviet Expression, German Expression and French Avant Garde.

Soviet Expression films were known to express the internal and subjective nature of reality. Basically expressing what is going on in the character’s mind. One of the way’s they would do that visually was to show bar-like shadows on the character’s face to show that he feels like he’s in prison.

German Expression films were known for displaying the psychological life of characters.

Frech Avant Garde (aka French Experimental) films hit on things such as art, culture, and politics.

In contemporary films you will see moments of expressionism. In Martin Scorsese’s “Taxi Driver” with Robert Dinero, there is a scene where hes driving, but everything has a red haze, as if hes driving through hell. This is to show that is how the character feels. Departed is also known for this, where Jack Nicholson’s face is almost always half in shadow to signify that he is two charactered.

Reading time: 2 – 2 minutes

Alfred Hitchcock is one of film history’s most acclaimed directors. He was popular and commercially successful. He was known as the “Master of Suspense”. He stated that, “Films should offer the highs and lows of a roller coaster. They should shriek with delight.” When making his films he was very much like a craftsman. He would carefully plan each of his shots.

He started in England during the silent film period. He believed that the most important means of telling a story was the joining of shots (editing).

In the 1950s French film critics started to evaluate Hitchcock’s work. These guys were auteur critics (as opposed to genre critics). They would compare his films to his other films. He was a strong personality and was able to transcend the whole assembly line thinking. His films had a lot of recurring elements, as well as a personal style. One thing he used a lot in some of his popular films was POV editing. He was able to make the audience identify or at least sympathize with the main character. Even if the character was a killed like in the movie “Psycho”

One of his movies that used POV editing a lot is a 1954 film “Rear Window“. Its about the nature of watching. Its a “reflexive” film because as an audience we tend to make assumptions, and thus we feel involved. We project our own fears and desires onto the screen. If you wish to watch the movie “Rear Window”, search for it on Google Video. You will find it in segments.

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Hollywood Studio Era (1930-1945)

This is the time when American films and Hollywood became globally known as entertainment film producers. Around this time filmmaking popped up all around the wolf as well. Its during this era that the international identity came about.

In Hollywood studio movies were made like cars…on an assembly line. It went from idea >> producer >> designer >> director >> editing department, etc. Studios were made so they can have productions in quantity. 65% of the American nation was going to the movies every week at this time. Why? It was the great depression. People didn’t have jobs, and life was tough. To get away from all that, they went to the movies. The movie industry was booming.

Around this time of Hollywood boom, a group of people came out with the Production Code of Ethics. The Production Code spelled out what was and was not considered morally acceptable in the production of motion pictures for a public audience. This was the precursor of the MPAA rating system, which came about as a means of self regulation so that others don’t regulate their films. The production code itself fell apart by the 1905s when filmmakers realized that people would see their films regardless of whether or not they followed the code.

It was also during this time that the Griffith style of filming was extended even further. Movies became to have sound, thus sound departments developed in the Hollywood studio. Sound such as effects, dialog, diegetic and background music.

What was the function of music in films? Transitions, set mood, add suspense, imitate character movements (mickey mousing). One thing to note is the difference between background and diegetic music. Background music is the sound is heard by the audience, but not by the characters, while deigetic sound is music from the character’s world.

A movie that demonstrates the type of films, the technology they were using is “His Girl Friday“. Enjoy…

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