Dry your eyes, Baby…

Cinema verite originated in documentary filmmaking. This type of film is the “cinema of truth.” This is reality on the screen, also known as the “fly on the wall” technique. This style of filming grew in popularity with the dawn of the small, durable handheld camera. These cameras didn’t make much noise and allowed for the sound of the ‘actors’ and surroundings to be heard.

Following is a funny short film that mocks the difficulty with “realism” and this technique of filmmaking. Enjoy!

The Life of an Animator

Here is a newsreel from the March of Dimes – Elkhorn 1952. From what we see of documentaries today, we can see how they have been morphed from what we see filmed here in 1952. To tell the story, a voice over is used. As he tells the story, different locations are shown. It seems like a picture book read aloud. For example, the narrator explains, “there are such firms as the big united milk products plant, which handles ten million gallions a year, the modern…dye company…a brnach of the A.O. Smith Corporation…the Draper building material supply company and the Elkhorn chemical company.” As he is explaining these places, the film shows us one building, then cuts to the next, mainly focusing on a sign that holds the name of the building as the narrator states it. Interviewing is not being used greatly in the documentary at this time.

Documentary 1952 – Elkhorn

The word “documentary” first appeared in an article written by “The Moviegoer,” John Grierson, in the New York Sun, on February 8, 1926. Grierson was known by the film family through his articles on audience reception.  He used the word to describe the 1926 movie Moana, an attempt to capture the traditional life of Pacific islanders.  Grierson believed that film could zero in on the real world and shake people up a bit (info taken from the national film board of canada).

Before this, in 1877, sequential photographs of horses were taken.  In 1883, the photography of people in movement is experimented with.  In 1919, Dziga Vertov, a Russian film maker, calls for a new style of cinema that documents real life.  He believed that the future of cinema depends on giving the truth.  From 1930-1937, The Worker’s Film and Photo League is formed in the US.  Its purpose was to make independant documentaries with politically and socially progressive viewpoints.  The March of Time began in 1935, recounting wartime newsreels used to inform and dazzle audiences.  This series ran until 1951.  From 1942-1945, a propagana/documentary series entitled Why We Fight was made to explain the Government’s policy and wartime goals to America’s troops.  The 1950s and 60s saw a change in the documentary film due to the introduction of lightweight, hand-held cameras.  These are characterized by their use of unrehearsed situations.  Most films are shot on location without the use of voice over.  The intense atmosphere of the 1970s brought forth movements for women, people of color, gays and lesbians.  These movements saw a great chance for new documentaries.

This information has been compiled from UC Berkeley – Media Center.  To read more, visit www.lib.berkeley.edu/mrc/docexhibit/docuchron.htm

Okay, so I have been a little behind with my posting. Dr. Campbell please be gentle, I intend to fully make up for it this weekend!!!

But for now I had to share this video. Ever since last class I have been obsessed with the youtube videos we were dicussing. My new favorite, the show with zefrank.

So, for your start of the weekend enjoyment, please go watch this video – it’s a doozy.

http://www.zefrank.com/thewiki/the_show:_10-23-06

It’s always most difficult to be the first group to present to a class.  So, good job for toughing it out group one!  I enjoyed the content of your presentation.  I find it fascinating the way that music, dialogue, mise-en-scene, body movements, etc. can properly tell a story only when they are all correctly combined.  Adapting a novel to a screenplay is a tricky task.  Reading the article you presented made me think of this years’ Academy Awards.  I am assuming that most of you watched them, so sorry if you didn’t, this won’t interest you.  Anyway, when handing out the award for best screenplay, a section of it was read while the audience watched this particular scene from the film.  Reading the screenplay while seeing the background, the characters clothing and facial expressions, etc., etc., etc., can greatly help film students who don’t understand the concept of adaptation.  For me, every film is an adaption.  “Original” screenplays are simply adaptations of life – all the dirty details of a novel must be put into simple things like body movements, facial expressions, etc.  This is why everyone must work together on a film.  Those facial expressions must be caught at the perfect angle by the cameramen while the appropriate dialogue is being said, etc.  All this must be done in under 90 minutes because our generation has adapted well to an antsy lifestyle.  No one can pay attention for too long anymore.  There be the difficulty in adapting a 400 page novel into a 90 minute film (think all things Little Women that we have been discussing).

Comparing the 1933 opening scene to the 1949 version, I’d have to say that I very much prefer the 1949 version, with the actors, director, etc. all being named on the brightly colored cross-stitchings, and then revealing the bright snow that captures the entire screen.  This movie came out towards the end of war and extreme hardship.  Technicolor films were becoming popular, and it was a good time to put out a film that speaks of family values and sticking together through the good times and the bad.  What better way to do this than re-make a familiar story and brighten it up a bit?  Lots and lots of snow helped to achieve this.

The best film adaptation of the relationship between Amy and Laurie is the 1994 adaptation.I think the growing relationship between these two in the novel is a wonderful story – the way she straightens him out and her path to maturity.  The 1949 version makes Amy look like a 12-year-old girl throughout her entire life – no maturing is seen, and she comes back from Europe worse off than when she left (best example: the ridiculously elabortae dress).  It also seems like Laurie is still deeply infayuated with Jo, but Jo will not let this be.

The 1994 version does a great job maturing Amy, explaining her relationship with Laurie and showing that Laurie indeed loved Amy and wasn’t still aching for Jo.  The relationship between Amy and Laurie was wonderfully foreshadowed throughout the film, a great help to those viewers who never read the novel.  At the beginning of the film, we see all of the sisters in the attic performing Jo’s stories.  They all speak of what their dreams are, etc., and then notice the Lawrence boy watching them.  They begin to discuss him and all look out the window to catch a glimpse.  As they finish their conversation, all sisters have been seated except for Amy – she stays at the window, still looking toward the Lawrence house.  She says, “We all grow up someday Meg, we might as well know what we want.”

Laurie’s confusion between Amy and Jo can be seen when the movie fast forwards four years.  He goes off to find Jo in the forest, but as he walks away from the house he stares fixedly at Amy.  With one glance, his interest in both sisters is foreshadowed – one he realizes in time was his childhood sweetheart, and the other turned out to show him what true love was.

The section in the novel between Laurie, Amy and their budding love abroad is a key part to the novel, but sadly left out of some adaptations.  However, their maturity, both on the outside and inside, was wonderfully captured in 1994.  Christian Bale’s disheveled long hair and mustache showed his great confusion with his life.  His look upon first viewing Amy said a lot – she’s the one.  Amy, now played by a older, blonder, more physically mature Samantha Mathis has obviously transformed herself.  Her last bit of immaturity that must be lost, still wanting to marry for money.  Laurie helps Amy realise that what she’s wanted all along is right in front of her, and her want to marry strictly for money is preposterous.  Amy helps Laurie realize that he has been a lazy fool.  They slap eachother in the face, but it was sort of a Cher slapping Nicholas Cage in Moonstruck, “Snap out of it!”

Also, their homecoming to the rest of the March family is handled in a way that doesn’t allow the audience to see any feelings coming from Laurie to Jo.  Although it was very different from the book, this version served a visual audience very well.  Instead of allowing screen time for Jo and Laurie and give the audience false hope (or perhaps allow them to be bitter), Laurie immediately, and very proudly, introduces Amy to Jo as “his wife.”  Amy and Jo handle it very well, the once loved and the now loved.  Amy’s ability to have faith in her Laurie is wonderful.

Obviously, the 1994 is my favorite version.  More to come on the filming and certain shots in the film.

The theory of a companionate marriage has been on my mind ever since last class.  Growing up, a lot of kids have that best friend – the one you used to catch lightning bugs with when you were six, played red rover with at school when you were ten, went to high school football games with, etc.  Then there comes that time when both of you are sexually developed and the prospect of being more than friends comes into view.  Here we see the story of Jo and Laurie.  Would Jo have been able to care for Laurie the traditional way a wife was supposed to care for their husband during this time period?  Wouldn’t her hunger for knowledge and thirst for adventure keep her from the home she would’ve had to tend to if she had married Laurie?  The boat that Laurie and Amy sit in on pages 402-403 never could’ve been rowed with these two characters.  Jo would’ve rowed with a fire behind her, rushing her through life for each new adventure while Laurie would’ve wanted to take his time and cherish every second with his dear Jo.

Companionate marriage at this time was a cultural ideal.  Every ying has its yang.  People can be seen as two pieces to a puzzle – no matter how different people are (inside and out), the only thing that matters is that they fill the voids in one anothers’ life.   This type of marriage allowed the roles of husband and wife to be played with.  Whatever had to be done, by whoever in the relationship, had to get done.

An interesting sidenote is what companionate marriage has come to mean.  Answers.com, Bartleby.com and thefreedictionary.com all define companionate marriage as a marriage  in which the partners agree not to have children  and divorce by mutual consent, with neither partner responsible for the financial welfare of the other.  Wow.

This was a show broadcasted in Venezuela in the 1980s. This is the introduction.

I find it odd that they made Jo’s hair blonde. I feel that her dark hair was a trademark character trait that helped advance her boyish nature. Anyway, this is hilarious and I wanted to see what you all thought of it.

I was incredibly surprised by the amount of people who felt that Beth’s character was completely useless to the plot and/or theme/s of Little Women. First of all, I don’t see how a character in a novel that has been studied for years can be seen as simply “useless.” Obviously there is a point to each character in the novel, or A. he/she wouldn’t have been put there, B. classes would’ve stopped studying Little Women (because I believe that each character in every credible story has some reason for being, no matter how small or large – thus, we study them), or C. so many film adaptations wouldn’t be made on the novel, or the film adaptations could’ve taken Beth out.

I believe that all four girls reflect eachother in some way or another. Beth ignites Jo – she’s her fire and Beth is the match. Even at the beginning of the novel at Christmas when the girls are sitting to breakfast and learn that the Hummel’s have none, it is Beth who first mentions that she is no longer hungry. Only after Beth reveals her concious does Jo come to think the food should be given over to the Hummels. Jo leaves for New York because she feels that Laurie’s feelings for her are hindering the feelings he may feel for Beth (at this point remember, Jo feels that Beth is infatuated by Laurie). So, she leave home for her sister’s well-being, along with her own. It is in New York where she will meet her future husband and learn of the true talents she possesses. It was Beth, the “Angel of the Hearth,” who got Jo up and moving. Also, in the end, when the family needed to be reunited, it was Beth who brought them all home. Sadly, it’s because of her death, but the family is together once again. It is the death of Beth that fully ignited Jo’s art. Her flame continues to burn because of Beth. Also, it is as if Beth is still alive – a book lives forever.