The Rise of Film Industries in the Developing World: A Historical Overview - Prof. 2812, Apuntes de Administración de Empresas

¡Descarga The Rise of Film Industries in the Developing World: A Historical Overview - Prof. 2812 y más Apuntes en PDF de Administración de Empresas solo en Docsity! Italian Neorealism The Italian neorealism is a past World War 2 movement. Its realism is linked to social and political goals and those goals are generally leftist. Bicycle thieves: Concerns plight of working class families struggling to survive. Stilling was sometimes the only way to survive. Social class issues are heighted and working class people are the main characters. Vitorio da sicca used nonprofessional actors in the movie. Everyday day life and locations. It’s the point of Neorealism. What is associated to neo is the dramatize, Antonio shows only anger, the movie avoids close ups. These films are opened, not everything is resolved at the end. It gives a more realistic approach, not everything is controlled. Neo is a more general idea or approach than a specific unified movement Holiwood after WW2 Eisenhower president (1953-61) “trouble with harry” Alfred Hitchcock. It was shot in Vermont and shows a beautiful, idyllic setting. It almost looks like postcard setting. Beautiful colors (enhanced in Technicolor and shot in paramount widescreen vista vision format) Boy played by Jerry Mathers who later becomes star of live it to beaver. The dead body is Harry. Despite the beautiful beginning of the film, the boy runs into a dead body. It symbolizes the social problem and issues of the time which is repressed by the happy time of that moment. These social problems are kind of hidden by prosperous image of the 1950’s. Those include an intense fear with communism and worries about nuclear radiation (Japan). There was a great struggle and strive racial segregation, the coming of civil rights. The movement of women right also begins at this time. If we look at the image of the “happy days” in the 1950’s were women are never working and that traditional image of woman placed at home, doesn’t resemble at all with the real image. In Hitchcock movies and in this case in “trouble with harry”, he always symbolizes all of this social problems. They are the inverse of this “happy image”. Hitch’s films fascinated by false appearance, innocent people accused of crimes, corruption ect.. Ex: shadow of a doubt (1943). Where small town family uncle is a serial keiller Rear window(1954). a murder in the midst of a middle class apartment There was a huge fear of communism in the US. Mao Sedong comes to power in china 1949, Cuban revolution 58-59, Korean War 1950 Red scare Joseph McCarthy, Richard Nixon. Very intense feeling of anticommunism. They took advantage of this to scare people. Macarthy was a senator. Better dead than red was the slogan. Blacklisted people couldn’t get a job. They have to use a false name or live the country. There where films that weren’t controversial such as “king salomon mines” or “around the world in 80 days” 1950 most successful film: Ben Hur 1959 (70 million at box office), the greatest show on earth 1952 Cinema after WW2 (the rest of the world) After ww2 Western Europe was devastated. The theater and cinemas were physically destroyed. In mead 1950’s, Hollywood and western Europe are making 35 % of world film. The soviet bloc is makin 5%. Only few films are send to other countrys from the soviet bloc. It means that 60 % of films are made in the third world. The stunning of film production in the developing countries is one of the major events in film history. “pather panchali” is one example of this. One of the reasons why there was a dominance of Hollywood cinema is because they made better movies. The U.S government wanted to fight communism by exporting their films to Western Europe. They wanted to show the American way of life through the movies. The paramount decision doesn’t affect the exported films. The U.S government helped the studios to exports their movies. The studios trought their export association (the motion picture export asosiacion MPAA. First called the motion picture producer and distributors of America MPPDA). They could fix prices and promote the movies in these countrese. They could undercut the foreign competitors. Hollywood had a huge backlog of movies they made during WW2. These movies weren’t exported to Europe because the countries were occupied. So after the war they started sending hundreds of movies to Europe at a low price because those movies where already shown in the us. MPAA president, Eric Johnston said that Hollywood films flooded in more than the countries could absorb. In order to protect the film industry, Europe established some fees on the imported films from the US. Also there was a restriction on how many weeks the films could be played on theater, also they established quotas. They restricted profits that could be taken out of the country. Many of the European countries were in debt with the us. So the U.S said they could forgive about those debts but instead they had to allow them to play American movies in the us. Market in france In 1946 Blum Byrne’s agreement: Us accepted to forgive about the debts but in exchange France had to allow them to play their movies without taxes, fees ext.. Angry protest among French actors, directors eventually made some changes in the Blum Byrne’s agreement. What the us did in order to bit restrictions is that they started establishing studios in many European countries. They made film which many of them were imported back to the us. Italy: there was an average of 570 film distributed every year afte the war Hollywood had an economic advantage over the European countries. The U.S is a very large country. More population which can afford to go to movies. They have a bigger engine to invest in publicity. They could make back their investment domestically Many European producer didn’t want to make typical us films. A good example of this is the Italian neorealism. French films at this period are meant to be art films, prestige films. Jean Renoir and Jean Cocteau were ones of the best French directors. In England David Lean, Carol reed and team of Powel and Pressburger made artistic films. In the 1950´s many countries beyond Europe also contributed to the trend of “Art” cinema. It is very much an international tendency. There iare a number of productions that are coproduction between deffernt producers. There were a number of freench-Italin movies during this period. Tis was done in order to compete against quality Hollywood films. Mizoguchi used long takes and kept characters at distanmce from camera. He used little camera movements and used scroll shots. Deep focus,satistic camera, low and hi angles. He has a very different style non only from europen filmmakers but also from Japanese ones. Ozu style uses low camera shots designed clearly to work people that are sitting on the ground. He uses low camera shots for exterior too. Almost non camera movemnts. He doesn’t follow the 180 rule, instead uses 360. Cultural differences It is important while we see these movies that we understand the different cultures and way of living they have in other countries. Filmaking is a way in wich they could express their cultural traditions. Some of the countrys after their independency didn’t have filmmaking industry. Cinema in India They had a very large population that could support the cinema industrie. India followed a different economic model, with the exibitors that controlled the film industry. Indian cinema which is known as Bollywood. In India this is is a term wich are not very fun of. It ignores the indian culture and indian cinema. Lecture 5: Art Cinema and Auteurs Certain filmmakers were considered as to be authors. There are a lot of debates of films in France. On the cinema journals. Most prominent is the Cahier du cinema. Andre Bazin was the most famous critics wich worked at the Cahier. He was followed by Eric Rohmer, Claude Chabrol or Francois Truffaut. Most of these critics would become few years later the most important film directors of the French new wave. What makes someone an Auteur?? Normally it should be someone that both writes and directs theirn own scripts. But number of directors which were considered as Auteur did not write their own script. Such as Hitchcock, John Ford or Howard Hawks. A partial answer to this question could be answered in Truffau’s famous essay “A certain tendency of the French cinema”, Where he attacks the French “tradition of quality” films. Truffau saw these tradition quality films as uncinematic. They are little stagy. He said that they treated cinema as secondary script. Truffaut dimissively calls directors of this kind: metteurs en scene (stagers). They stage a film much like a play. The Auteurs are the opposite of that. They think cinematically, write cinematically. They uses all the source of cinema. They use cinematic forms and style from the beginning, its part of the conception of the film. As opposed to screenwriters that don’t think cinematically. For him that is the problem with tradition of quality films. For someone to be an Auteur they need to take cinematic forms seriously. The editing need to be part of the auteur approach of filmmaking. Is not just writing the script, it’s how to create the film. The main distinction that defines what an Auteur is someone how is able to think and write cinematically. Thompson and Bordwell clearly links art cinema an auteurism. But for younger Cahiers critics the policy of authors was not limited to art cinema. They admired many art cinema directors such as Robert Bresson, Luis Buñel, Kenji Mizoguchi… But at the same time they admired Hollywood directors such as Hitchcock and also many low budget films as well, not just art films. Antonioni: Long takes, distances from the camera, deep focus shots. Bresson: pared down style, almost no dialogue, very restricting from his actors. Buñuel: Surrealist critique of bourgeois values. Tati: Long takes. Fellini’s 8 ½ Lecture 6: The new wave Many of the people worked at the cahiers du cinema became directors themselves. They created the movement la nouvelle vague. One of the most famous new wave film is François Truffaut “the 400 blows”. The ending of the film is open, nothing is settled. The film doesn’t follow the patterns of title piloted, many things happen in this film. Jean Pierre Leaud is the actor of this film as Antoine Doinel. He is one of the most famous actors. He appeared in 5 more Truffaut films. Also in Masculine feminie. During the the late 50’s until 60’s the new wave movement appeared. They wanted to break with the old traditions. This movement iwas also called the young cinema. The rise of young cinema develops youth culture in many other countries. This is the baby boom generation that are now teenegers. The young generation of the 1960 wanted to rebel against their parents generation. Many of the attitudes in these films was towards new attitude of sexuality, new fashions exlusively for young people ect… These films are part of this culture. The film attendance declines with rise of tv and of multiple leisure activities. So with this decline, directors stated to target films to young urban audiences. Youth is a target market. It is important to know that there were many other movements apart from the new wave around the world. The French new wave was very influential and copied around the world. Thomson and Bordwell makes distinction between new wave and the left bank. There is a distinction but both makes part of the same. The most two influential directors of the movement were Francoit Truffaut and Jean luc Godard, both former cahier critics. Also Alain Resnais (left bank)was considered very important. The most commonly film is “400 blows”, “Breathless”, “Hiroshima mon amour”. The French new wave also brought new ideas about film style. Masculine Feminine “masculine Feminine” is a later film that also illustrates growing shift during 1960 from art cinema to political cinema. The film is aim to young people. Lecture 7 New political Cinemas During the 60’s there was a growing political activism in many countries and in film as well. There is a shift away from auteurist ideas of filmmaking with the individual artist, director considered as the main force in filmmaking. They don’t focus on social and political issues. They focus on the individual. It emphasizes individual, personal concerns of director over social or political concerns. Auteur theory emphasizes with the personel concern of the the director rather than social or political concerns. During the 60’s and 70’s there was a more political ideas about filmmaking began to challenge that emphasis on individual. These social political concerns like poverty, racism, oppression are especially important for filmmakers in those parts of the world that had previously been caused; Largely by European powers (Latin America or Africa). Many of these countries didn’t become independent countries until in many cases the 1960’s. The third world One of the terms for these parts of the world ( Latin America, Africa, some parts of Asia) has been the third world. It was used to distinguish themselves from the first world (U.S. Europe) and the second world (Soviet Union). The third world was an attempt to articulate a sense of countries that wanted to be seen and called themselves nonaligned nations. Nonaligned with the first or second world. This will apply to cinema. Many countries of the third world only achieved independence from colonial powers only after 1950’s. Even if they achieved their independence they were still economically and culturally dependent of the colonizing countries. This is called neocolonial. Third world, Third cinema Many of these countries are immerse in a huge poverty and all kinds of problems. Some of them are caused by the structures that were set up under colonialism. Third world filmmakers’ where not happy with this situation. They wanted to address these kinds of social and political issues in their films. But they didn’t have huge budgets to make films so they couldn’t make films in the same way they did in Hollywood or Europe. So they were looking for something that could match their situation. They came up with an idea of third cinema. This idea should address social and political issues specific to the third world. This cinema is independently made and explicitly social political in their aims. Third cinema films are made in a different way. They try to match the social conditions that they are dealing in their own countries. They try to explore different approaches to filmmaking. In many cases they draw on local and folk traditions rather than just European aesthetics. Third cinema tries to explore these ideas of “imperfect cinema” and “cinema of Hunger”. The idea is that Hollywood films and European art films have a tendency to “glamourize” when they treat Most importantly was the invention of the nagra tape recording and especialyy the crystal sync Nagra. You didn’t have to have a cord in between the camera and the tape recorder. Auteurist Documentary The auterist tendency appears in different countries. In Britain for example, the tendency towards this more personal style in documentary filmmaking was called “free cinema”. Many important British filmmakers made feature fiction films in the 60’s and later. Same thing happened in France; Many documentary directors will later direct feature films. One of the most important was alain Resnais who first started in documentaries. He makes documentaries “van Gogh” or “Guernica”. Resnai’s Night and Fog But the most important one is his moving portrayal of Nazi concentration camps in “Night and Fog”. The documentary intercuts between contemporary color footage of deserted camp and newsreel footage of camps in operation. The film is not only about the camp, its also about the difficulty of truly representing the horror of the camps. Chris Marker He was one the most important French auteur documentarist. He made early documentary with his friend Resnais. Marker’s films are different, they are generally essay films, they use a lot of humor. He is seen as a link to the new wave. One of his most important films was “letter from Siberia” and the influential “le Joli Mai” which is a month was a lot of political events took place in France. His most famous film is not a documentary: La jetée (1962) is a haunting, futuristic story that uses only still photos, with one moving shot. Is a kind of science fiction film set in the future. But what most critics regard as his masterpiece is “Sans Soleil”. An essay films that talk about Japanese culture to Africa, from ideas about memory to computer images. He moves back and forward to different culture. Its kind of a time travel film. Direct Cinema If the auterist trend begins in the 50’s, the direct cinema begins in the 60’s when new film technologies have been established. There are two main tendencies of direct cinema: In the U.S a large number of filmmakers takes observational approach. In these films, the filmmakers are simply observers, they usually don’t appear in the films. An early example of a direct film in the U.S is “primary”. It’s about a primary election directed by Robert Drew in 1960. People who were hired in doing this film, became important documentary filmmakers. One of the most important documentary filmmakers in the U.S. is Frederick Wiseman. In france there is also a similar style of documentary films. It is called cinema verite. One of the figures of this cinema is Jean Rouch. He began making films of other cultures. He made many ethnographic documentaries in Africa. “les maîtres du fou” made in 1957 is probably the most famous. He made a very unusual and at the same time influential movies called “moi, un noir”. One last trend of documentary is meta documentary. Meta means about. Documentary about making documentary, films. In some way they are self reflexive. Chris Marker’s “sans soleil” is a good example. Lecture 10: Experimental films Like documentaries films, experimental films are presented as a different category from narrative features films. One of the differences is that experimental films are not conventional narrative. They are independent film because many times yu have a single person who does everything. When talking about independent and auteur films, they do’t mention experimental film. This is because a historical question. We should ask ourselves why haven’t shorter films or non-fictional films been what most people watch. Why not docs or films that are more experimental. In early cinema this wasn’t the case. Narrative films were not the standard, it was only later when this type of cinema became dominant. Only after a decade fictional features become standards. Fictions films became the standards because they basicly fit the taste of the middle and upper class people of the time. Unlike most narrative feature fils, experimental films are less concerned with conventional storytelling. tHe primary purpose of Experimental films are to challenge conventional ideas, assumption. Type of experimental films Thompson and bordwell try to lay out 4 categories. The first is experimental narrative. Then abstract. The third is lyrical and last is an experimental compilation. The historical terms that have been used to describe experimental films come from different places. For example underground films or structural films are some of the terms. Many experimental films fit within more than one of Tompson and bordwell four types. The best way to categorize these films in different types: Lyrics (idea of a personnel expression) Abstract Narrative Compilation (Since it reuses existing materials Have much less kind of personnel in the imagery) 1/ Experimental Narrative We are talking about unconventional, often very ambiguous narrative. Naratives that have things that kind are left out. The models are surrealist novels and films. One set of examples of experimental narratives are the so called “psychodramas” of Manya Deren and Gregory Markopoulus. These are phycological dramas. Later we have “new” narratives like Yvonne Rainer wich is a feminist descontructive fimaker. Many feminist and gay filmmaker play with narrative in a very unconventional way. In England Derek Jarman, guy Maddin are great examples of gay filmmakers who used narrative in this very unconventional way. Deren’s Film: “meshes of the afternoon” (1943) This a good example of an unconventional narrative. It’s never entirely clear what is going on in the story, very umbigious. Obvisly surrealism has a graert influence on Deren. Despite this is very similar in some ways to conventional that deal with woman, kind of a melodrama with suicide that’s implied in the film. We see a lot of repetitions of certain actions, like the figure of the black rope with the mirror face. There is a number of things going on in term of image that is related to mirrors. It has been a very influencial film on many filmmakers. 2/ Abtraction The opposite of narrative is abstraction. Using abstract forms abstract shapes. Using different kind of movements of techniques. The model here is abstract painting, modern painting. Often abstract film can range from more personal to more formalist exploration of geometry, colours, or of the medium possibilities. Abstraction can sometimes also include animation. For example as we can see in the Canadian Norman Mclaren’s work, he employs painting and scratching directly into the filmstrip. Mclaren’s animated film “begone Dull Care” (1949): What this film wants to do is clearly very different from what a narrative film wants. Here there is no plot of the story. There is no representation. Much of the imagery is abstract. It’s a film that wants to change the way we look at film and what film can do. So we can look at this colours and images in a different way. There is something hypnotic about it. It matches the jazz music that is playing with it. Abstraction: structural films There are also other kinds of abstract films, particularly the so called structural films. This is the extreme of formal abstraction. It seems that they are scientific experiments with film techniques. There is many famous examples. Micheal Snow’a “wavelength” (1967). Starts with a static shot of a room but then zooms in at intervals over 45 min. Another example that kinds of demonstrates this new sexual openness is Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice (1969). The new wave and its techniques showed up in many other places, certainly in a number of independent films. Such as Haskell Wexler’s Medium Cool (1969). It’s a critical view of the media in theU.S. Another example is Melvin Van Peeble’s Sweet Sweetbak’s Baaadassss Song (1971). New wave techniques even appered in teenpics such as Bikini Beach (1964). The new Holywood auteurs. One of the most important stories of this period is the rise of auteurism in Hollywood. Because Hollywood was willing to try new things it allowed a new generation of talent to emerge. Many of the new directors, screenwriters and producers were trained in film schools. They were very familiar with film history and film movements and specially with auteur theory. Most of them saw themselves as auteurs. These “New Hollywood” directors included the “Big Three” of the 1970’s; that was Coppola, Lucas and Spielberg. There were called the big three because of their tremendous success. But this generation of directors also included Martin Scorsese, Terence Malick, John Carpenter, Brian de Palma and others. All of them were very knowledgeable about film history. There is a wide difference among this generation of directors. Some were more experimental, art oriented. Some were oriented more towards Hollywood styles and commercially successful genre films. Some like Copola who swings between studio style commercial films and art films. And Scorsese is a very interesting example because he synthesis some of the Hollywood traditional filmmaking approaches with art cinema experimentation. Certainly Taxi driver combines Hollywood genre elements with New wave and Art Cinema techniques. Taxi driver…… In the 1970, the “big three” really transformed Hollywood because they achieved really unprecedented commercial box office success. Among their hit films the godfather I and II, American Grafitti or Star wars. There is kind of a new type of blockbuster directed by auteur oriented fillmmakrs, which established Hollywood financially. What stars to happen after this massive success of the 70’s is that the studios and producers start to be less willing to experiment. Everyone wanted a huge hit film. Sequels become common. “franchises” beginning in 1962 with first James Bond Film. Consequences of sucess Success also leads to kind of downfall. The consequences are that there are studios were looking to have this massive hits with huge budget films. The bigger the budget the bigger the risk. A good example of this is Micheal Cimino’s western Heaven’s Gate (1980), which cost 40 million and brought less than 2 million. Independents Independents have an incressing prominence in a certain way. They made a number of successful low budget films. One of the most prominent studios was the American International Pictures (AIP). They specialized in low budget explotation films wher producer Roger Corman gave work in late 1960’s to many directors and actors who would later be successful in bigger films. Lecture 12: European film since the 1970’s; return to the image During the period of the 70’s and 80’s there wasn’t a movement or trend in contrast to new wave in the 60’s. As in the US there was a lack of movie attendance partly as a result of intro of colour television and eventually after the late 1970’s home video. The European film industry had other problems. First of all they weren’t vertically integrated, they didn’t control theatres distribution. Any of the EU countries had a population as large as the US. Hollywood films were very successful during this period and dominated western European countries. By 1980 Hollywood films had 50% of attendance in Belgium, France and West Germany. Under these circumstances is very difficult for European films to compete. They had to find different options and alternatives to survive. They didn’t have enough money to build those kinds of films and also they had to find the way to finance these films. One way they found to finance their films was coproduction. This meant to share cost between several countries. They used stars from various countries which helped international sales. But very often those films weren’t good enough. Another approach to financing is public financing. The advance on receipts was basically a loan which was given to filmmaker in order to finance the film. In the 70 and 80’s many films were financed by television. In France canal + financed many films in France. During this period there were many kinds of films made. Probably the most successful movement of this period was the new German cinema which blends experimentation, popular genres and strong interest in striking images and cinematography that kind of looks very gorgeous. The major figures of the NGC in the 70’s and 80’s were Werner Herzog, Wim Wenders, Rainer Werner Fassbinder and Volker Schlondorff and his director wife Margarette von Trotta. The best known and most successful was Fassbinder. He was known for mixing melodrama with more experimental style and social critiques. Herzog and Wenders are both known as “sensibiliost” directors. It means that they are interested in the power of the image. Ali: Fear eats the soul Fassbinder was very intrested in melodrama. The film is a remake of Douglas Sirk film “All that heaven allows”. He remakes it in a kind of german context. Racism is a major topic in this film. Fassbinder puts a lot of importance on the looking and staring at other people. He uses a lot of frames with in frames which kind of separetes them; makes it the object of people looks. This kind of distancing is constant throughout the film. Both characters are been evaluated during the movie. Werner Herzog is a very different director from Fassbinder. He is intrested in extremes. Particularly in his fiction films, about vampires, madmen, conquistador ect … this are the topic that he loved. In his films, visual and emotional impact is much more important to him than story. Win Wenders is perhaps the most commercially successful director of the NGC and his films are filled with references to other films, famous directors and actors. He attended film school in Munich. His films are filed with references to other films and he often cast famous directors and actors in his films. He made a lot of documentaries. State of things is a film about a German filmmaker trying to finish a film. It is financed by an American producer. It’s shot in Portugal. The most famous director that used these haunting visual images was Andrei Tarkovsky. Pedro Almodovar film’s also puts a lot of importance on visuality and mise en scene. There is a really emphasis on images. The films are strongly narrative in construction; he draws on the tradition of melodramas and women’s films. The return to the image One of the big trends that we can see happening is the return to the image. These beautiful images that king got out of the picture in the 60’s. This “sensibilist” emphasis on using arresting images, on the visual look or style. Lecture 13: Beyond the west I Changing cinema in the third world In the aftermath of the 60’s and 70’s, the revolutionary tendencies of third cinema tended to diminish. This is not to say that films from the developing world simply becamame non political. In fact many of the filmmakers conyiniued the heritage of politicize third cinema and a lot of these films continued to critize poverty, government corruption, cultural imperialism. Early films of Kiarostami and Makhmalbaf aided by some government help, but eventually their international reputation allowed them to gain foreign finacing. An intresting example which tells us about importance of cinema in Iran is Close Up (1990). South American and Mexican cinema. In Brazil, cinema Novo veterans continued making films through embrafilme. Some of the key film’s made by Cinema Novo included Hector Babenco’s Pixote and Carlos Diegues’s Buy buy Brazil (1980). Embrafilme went eventually bankrupt and once that happened U.S. films began to win majority of box office in the most populous country of South America. In respond to that situation it became kind of crucial to Brazilian to rely on some degree on co production and export. They had remarkable sucesess, among them Walter Salle’s Central Station (1998) and Fernando Meirelles City of God (2002). Argentina struggled with similar economic problems. Some of their veterans of 1960’s third cinema, continued to make films critical of the government. Since the 2000’s, SArgentine filmmakers gained international prominence at film festivals largely using “slow cinema” style. In mexico the film industry has always had a pretty strong tradition. But the serious economic prblems has cause production of films to fluctuate. Since the 1990’s, co production has ebnable some Mexican filmmakers to gain prominence with many of them going to holywwood to direct films. Indian Cinema Indian cinema is arguably the most popular cienamin the world, with the most films made and the largest attendace. U.S. films have made very few inroads as audiences prefer local films. Not all cinema in India is made in Mumbai nor in Hindi. Film Khuda Gawah In india an art cinema exits in parallel to mass entertainment cinema. But economic pressures forced most art cinema directors in India either to rely on government grants or to adopt more popular forms. At the same time, popular cinema has adopted more violent and darker themes and fewer musical numbers, so to some degree, the two types of cinema have moved closer. I normally dot judge film for it success on the box office. It is true that nowadays I have to watch at least 5 movies at the theatres and expect only one to be good. It is true that when a big budget films has cost 200 million dollars, one get quiet curious about how to movie is going to look like. My tastes towards movies don’t rely on just one type. I have recently watched Cinema Paradiso directed by Giuseppe Tornatore. It’s a low budget film which I have seen at least five times. In contrast I have also recently watched Avatar. Each of this movies has a huge difference on their budget. Cinema Paradiso with 5 million dollars budget against Avatar with more than 2000 million. All to say that my taste on movies don’t rely on their budget. Professor