Download or read book Still written by David S. Shields and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2013-06-18 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The success of movies like The Artist and Hugo recreated the wonder and magic of silent film for modern audiences, many of whom might never have experienced a movie without sound. But while the American silent movie was one of the most significant popular art forms of the modern age, it is also one that is largely lost to us, as more than eighty percent of silent films have disappeared, the victims of age, disaster, and neglect. We now know about many of these cinematic masterpieces only from the collections of still portraits and production photographs that were originally created for publicity and reference. Capturing the beauty, horror, and moodiness of silent motion pictures, these images are remarkable pieces of art in their own right. In the first history of still camera work generated by the American silent motion picture industry, David S. Shields chronicles the evolution of silent film aesthetics, glamour, and publicity, and provides unparalleled insight into this influential body of popular imagery. Exploring the work of over sixty camera artists, Still recovers the stories of the photographers who descended on early Hollywood and the stars and starlets who sat for them between 1908 and 1928. Focusing on the most culturally influential types of photographs—the performer portrait and the scene still—Shields follows photographers such as Albert Witzel and W. F. Seely as they devised the poses that newspapers and magazines would bring to Americans, who mimicked the sultry stares and dangerous glances of silent stars. He uncovers scene shots of unprecedented splendor—visions that would ignite the popular imagination. And he details how still photographs changed the film industry, whose growing preoccupation with artistry in imagery caused directors and stars to hire celebrated stage photographers and transformed cameramen into bankable names. Reproducing over one hundred and fifty of these gorgeous black-and-white photographs, Still brings to life an entire long-lost visual culture that a century later still has the power to enchant.
Download or read book Silent Film Sound written by Rick Altman and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2004 with total page 492 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Silent films were, of course, never silent at all. However, the sound that used to accompany the screen picture in the early days of cinema has been neglected as an area of study. Altman explores the various musical, narrative, and even synchronized sound systems that enriched cinema before Jolson spoke.
Download or read book Silent Pictures written by Pat Graham and published by Akashic Books. This book was released on 2007 with total page 148 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Modest Mouse, Fugazi, Bikini Kill, Blonde Redhead and Shellac are just a few of the subjects in Pat Graham's visually stunning new book. Many of these photographs have shaped the iconography of 90s underground rock.
Download or read book Silent Movie written by Avi and published by Atheneum/Anne Schwartz Books. This book was released on 2003-03 with total page 66 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Black-and-white images follow one after another. The story of an immigrant family alone in a big city. Close-ups of a mother, a son -- faces filled with heartache and joy. Plenty of action. Excitement. Melodrama. A Silent Movie.
Download or read book Silent Cinema written by Lawrence Napper and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2017-09-05 with total page 182 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since the spectacular success of The Artist (2011) there has been a resurgence of interest in silent cinema, and particularly in the lush and passionate screen dramas of the 1920s. This book offers an introduction to the cinema of this extraordinary period, outlining the development of the form between the end of the First World War and the introduction of synchronized sound at the end of the 1920s. Lawrence Napper addresses the relationship between film aesthetics and the industrial and political contexts of film production through a series of case studies of "national" cinemas. It also focuses on film-going as the most popular leisure activity of the age. Topics such as the star system, cinema buildings, musical accompaniments, film fashions, and fan cultures are addressed—all the elements that ensured that the experience of the pictures was "big." The international dominance of Hollywood is outlined, as are the different responses to that dominance in Britain, Germany, and the USSR. Case studies seek to move beyond the familiar silent canon, and include The Oyster Princess (1919), It (1927), Shooting Stars (1927), and The Girl with the Hatbox (1927).
Download or read book A History of Film Music written by Mervyn Cooke and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2008-09-25 with total page 627 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides a comprehensive and lively introduction to the major trends in film scoring from the silent era to the present day, focussing not only on dominant Hollywood practices but also offering an international perspective by including case studies of the national cinemas of the UK, France, India, Italy, Japan and the early Soviet Union. The book balances wide-ranging overviews of film genres, modes of production and critical reception with detailed non-technical descriptions of the interaction between image track and soundtrack in representative individual films. In addition to the central focus on narrative cinema, separate sections are also devoted to music in documentary and animated films, film musicals and the uses of popular and classical music in the cinema. The author analyses the varying technological and aesthetic issues that have shaped the history of film music, and concludes with an account of the modern film composer's working practices.
Download or read book Music and Sound in Silent Film written by Ruth Barton and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-12-07 with total page 214 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Despite their name, the silent films of the early cinematic era were frequently accompanied by music and other sound elements of many kinds, including mechanical instruments, live performers, and audience sing-alongs. The 12 chapters in this concise book explore the multitude of functions filled by music in the rapidly changing context of the silent film era, as the concept of cinema itself developed. Examples are drawn from around the globe and across the history of silent film, both during the classic era of silent film and later uses of the silent format. With contributors drawn from film studies and music disciplines, and including both senior and emerging scholars, Music and Sound in Silent Film offers an essential introduction to the origins of film music and the cinematic art form.
Download or read book Seductive Cinema written by James Card and published by . This book was released on 1999 with total page 319 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: On the history of silent films.
Download or read book Flickering Empire written by Michael Glover Smith and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2015-01-20 with total page 233 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Flickering Empire tells the fascinating yet little-known story of how Chicago served as the unlikely capital of American film production in the years before the rise of Hollywood (1907–1913). As entertaining as it is informative, Flickering Empire straddles the worlds of academic and popular nonfiction in its vivid illustration of the rise and fall of the major Chicago movie studios in the mid-silent era (principally Essanay and Selig Polyscope). Colorful, larger-than-life historical figures, including Thomas Edison, Charlie Chaplin, Oscar Micheaux, and Orson Welles, are major players in the narrative—in addition to important though forgotten industry titans, such as "Colonel" William Selig, George Spoor, and Gilbert "Broncho Billy" Anderson.
Download or read book Silent Films 1877 1996 written by Robert K. Klepper and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2015-09-16 with total page 597 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This film reference covers 646 silent motion pictures, starting with Eadweard Muybridge's initial motion photography experiments in 1877 and even including The Taxi Dancer (1996). Among the genres included are classics, dramas, Westerns, light comedies, documentaries and even poorly produced early pornography. Masterpieces such as Joan the Woman (1916), Intolerance (1916) and Faust (1926) can be found, as well as rare titles that have not received critical attention since their original releases. Each entry provides the most complete credits possible, a full description, critical commentary, and an evaluation of the film's unique place in motion picture history. Birth dates, death dates, and other facts are provided for the directors and players where available, with a selection of photographs of those individuals. The work is thoroughly indexed.
Download or read book Silent Echoes written by John Bengtson and published by . This book was released on 2000 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Silent Echoes: Discovering Early Hollywood Through the Films of Buster Keaton is an epic look at a genius at work and at a Hollywood that no longer exists. Painstakingly researching the locations used in Buster Keaton's classic silent films, author John Bengtson combines images from Keaton's movies with archival photographs, historic maps, and scores of dramatic "then" and "now" photos. In the process, Bengtson reveals dozens of locations that lay undiscovered for nearly 80 years. Part time machine, part detective story, Silent Echoes presents a fresh look at the matchless Keaton at work, as well as a captivating glimpse of Hollywood's most romantic era. More than a book for film, comedy, or history buffs, Silent Echoes appeals to anyone fascinated with solving puzzles or witnessing the awesome passage of time.
Download or read book Comic Venus written by Kristen Anderson Wagner and published by Wayne State University Press. This book was released on 2018-03-05 with total page 424 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Examines the social and historical significance of women’s contributions to American silent film comedy. For many people the term "silent comedy" conjures up images of Charlie Chaplin's Little Tramp, Buster Keaton's Stoneface, or Harold Lloyd hanging precariously from the side of a skyscraper. Even people who have never seen a silent film can recognize these comedians at a glance. But what about the female comedians? Gale Henry, Louise Fazenda, Colleen Moore, Constance Talmadge—these and numerous others were wildly popular during the silent film era, appearing in countless motion pictures and earning top salaries, and yet their names have been almost entirely forgotten. As a consequence, recovering their history is all the more compelling given that they laid the foundation for generations of funny women, from Lucille Ball to Carol Burnett to Tina Fey. These women constitute an essential and neglected sector of film history, reflecting a turning point in women's social and political history. Their talent and brave spirit continues to be felt today, and Comic Venus: Women and Comedy in American Silent Film seeks to provide a better understanding of women's experiences in the early twentieth century and to better understand and appreciate the unruly and boundary-breaking women who have followed. The diversity and breadth of archival materials explored in Comic Venus illuminate the social and historical period of comediennes and silent film. In four sections, Kristen Anderson Wagner enumerates the relationship between women and comedy, beginning with the question of why historically women weren't seen as funny or couldn't possibly be funny in the public and male eye, a question that persists even today. Wagner delves into the idea of women's "delicate sensibilities," which presumably prevented them from being funny, and in chapter two traces ideas about feminine beauty and what a woman should express versus what these comedic women did express, as Wagner notes, "comediennes challenged the assumption that beauty was a fundamental component of ideal femininity." In chapter three, Wagner discusses how comediennes such as Clara Bow, Marie Dressler, and Colleen Moore used humor to gain recognition and power through performances of sexuality and desire. Women comedians presented "sexuality as fun and playful, suggesting that personal relationships could be fluid rather than stable." Chapter four examines silent comediennes' relationships to the modern world and argues that these women exemplified modernity and new womanhood. The final chapter of Comic Venus brings readers to understand comediennes and their impact on silent-era cinema, as well as their lasting influence on later generations of funny women. Comic Venus is the first book to explore the overlooked contributions made by comediennes in American silent film. Those with an interest in film and representations of femininity in comedy will be fascinated by the analytical connections and thoroughly researched histories of these women and their groundbreaking movements in comedy and stage.
Download or read book Silent Players written by Anthony Slide and published by University Press of Kentucky. This book was released on 2002-09-27 with total page 595 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: " From his unique perspective of friendship with many of the actors and actresses about whom he writes, silent film historian Anthony Slide creates vivid portraits of the careers and often eccentric lives of 100 players from the American silent film industry. He profiles the era's shining stars such as Lillian Gish and Blanche Sweet; leading men including William Bakewell and Robert Harron; gifted leading ladies such as Laura La Plante and Alice Terry; ingénues like Mary Astor and Mary Brian; and even Hollywood's most famous extra, Bess Flowers. Although each original essay is accompanied by significant documentation and an extensive bibliography, Silent Players is not simply a reference book or encyclopedic recitation of facts culled from the pages of fan magazines and trade periodicals. It contains a series of insightful portraits of the characters who symbolize an original and pioneering era in motion history and explores their unique talents and extraordinary private lives. Slide offers a potentially revisionist view of many of the stars he profiles, repudiating the status of some and restoring to fame others who have slipped from view. He personally interviewed many of his subjects and knew several of them intimately, putting him in a distinctive position to tell their true stories.
Download or read book The Survival of American Silent Feature Films 1912 1929 written by David Pierce and published by . This book was released on 2013 with total page 74 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Commissioned for and sponsored by the National Film Preservation Board."
Download or read book Buster Keaton written by James Curtis and published by Knopf. This book was released on 2022-02-15 with total page 833 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: **One of Literary Hub’s Five “Most Critically Acclaimed” Biographies of 2022** From acclaimed cultural and film historian James Curtis—a major biography, the first in more than two decades, of the legendary comedian and filmmaker who elevated physical comedy to the highest of arts and whose ingenious films remain as startling, innovative, modern—and irresistible—today as they were when they beguiled audiences almost a century ago. "It is brilliant—I was totally absorbed, couldn't stop reading it and was very sorry when it ended."—Kevin Brownlow It was James Agee who christened Buster Keaton “The Great Stone Face.” Keaton’s face, Agee wrote, "ranked almost with Lincoln’s as an early American archetype; it was haunting, handsome, almost beautiful, yet it was also irreducibly funny. Keaton was the only major comedian who kept sentiment almost entirely out of his work and . . . he brought pure physical comedy to its greatest heights.” Mel Brooks: “A lot of my daring came from Keaton.” Martin Scorsese, influenced by Keaton’s pictures in the making of Raging Bull: “The only person who had the right attitude about boxing in the movies for me,” Scorsese said, “was Buster Keaton.” Keaton’s deadpan stare in a porkpie hat was as recognizable as Charlie Chaplin’s tramp and Harold Lloyd’s straw boater and spectacles, and, with W. C. Fields, the four were each considered a comedy king--but Keaton was, and still is, considered to be the greatest of them all. His iconic look and acrobatic brilliance obscured the fact that behind the camera Keaton was one of our most gifted filmmakers. Through nineteen short comedies and twelve magnificent features, he distinguished himself with such seminal works as Sherlock Jr., The Navigator, Steamboat Bill, Jr., The Cameraman, and his masterpiece, The General. Now James Curtis, admired biographer of Preston Sturges (“definitive”—Variety), W. C. Fields (“by far the fullest, fairest and most touching account we have yet had. Or are likely to have”—Richard Schickel, front page of The New York Times Book Review), and Spencer Tracy (“monumental; definitive”—Kirkus Reviews), gives us the richest, most comprehensive life to date of the legendary actor, stunt artist, screenwriter, director—master.
Download or read book The Talkies written by Donald Crafton and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 1999-11-22 with total page 656 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This text offers readers a look at the time when sound was a vexing challenge for filmmakers and the source of contentious debate for audiences and critics. The author presents a view of the talkies' reception, amongst other issues.
Download or read book Fantasia of Color in Early Cinema written by Tom Gunning and published by Amsterdam University Press. This book was released on 2015 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Presents and discusses a treasure trove of early color film images from the archives of EYE Film Institute Netherlands, bringing to life their rich hues and forgotten splendor.
