Welcome to Unit 8

Cinema

HU300 Art and Humanities: Twentieth Century and Beyond!

Why film?

• What do you think the purpose of film is? Should it communicate a moral lesson? Should it merely entertain?

Who Invented Film?

The Lumière Brothers, c.1896

Soviet Montage Theory

The Kuleshov Experiment

The Battleship Potempkin (1905): Odessa steps scene

Sergei Eisenstein

Which film genres do you enjoy?

Genres

• Which genres appeal most to you? Are there some film genres that you have not seen? Why do some genres appeal while others do not?

What is genre?

The Word “Genre” kind or type

Film genre: Various types of films that audiences and filmmakers

recognize by their familiar narrative conventions. Common genres are musical, gangster, and science

fiction film.

Sub-Genre

What is genre?

Problems of definition

Who needs Genres?Filmmakers, producers, audiences, and critics.

Commercial and industrial nature

Mise-en-Scène :

“putting into the scene”

Aspects of Mise-en-Scène

1. Setting2. Costume and Makeup

3. Lighting 4. Staging: Movement and performance

Set vs. Location - Realistic Setting vs. Unrealistic Setting

Realistic Setting ExampleThe Terminal (2004)

Unrealistic Setting Example

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005)

2. Costume and Makeup

Costume in Amadeus (1984)

2. Costume and Makeup

Makeup in The Hours (2002)Yes! This is Nicole Kidman

3. Lighting

Low-key lighting: Lighting that is dark and shadowy

3. Lighting

High-key lighting: Lighting that is generally bright and even

Production Designer:

The person responsible for the appearance of much of what is photographed in a film, including architecture, locations, sets, costumes, makeup and hairstyle, etc.

Special Effects

• What impact do special effects have on a film? Do you need a strong plot and characters, or can special effects be sufficient?

Auteur Theory: Director's personal creative vision

Origin: Cahiers du Cinémathe French New Wave

Auteurs: Ingmar Bergman, Federico Fellini, Alfred Hitchcock, Akira Kurosawa, Stanley Kubric, Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese, Pedro Almodóvar, etc.

Film editing:How shots are put together

to make up a film.

Transitions:

1) Fade-Out: gradually darken the end of a shot to black.

2) Fade-In: lighten a shot from a black.

3) Dissolve: briefly superimposes the end of shotA with the beginning of shotB

4) Wipe: shotB replaces shot A by means of a boundary line moving across the screen.

5) Cut: an instantaneous change from one shot to the next

Sound in the Film

1. The human voice

2. Sound effects synchronous sound asynchronous sound

3. Music