| Re: Season of the Severed Head, resumed |
http://groups.google.com .. |
| Parry (parry@perfectmail.com) |
2003/07/17 02:44 |
elag <elag@cloud9.net> wrote in message news:<3F0A3C4D.8AC42312@cloud9.net>...
> Parry wrote:
> >
> > elag <elag@cloud9.net> wrote in message news:<3F066371.15889405@cloud9.net>...
> > [snips]
> > > Parry wrote:
> > > > Anyway, attempting a survey of all the decapitations in
> > > > movies and literature would be quite an undertaking. Alas, I have
> > > > other utterly pointless projects to attend to first.
> > >
> > > The good thing about being a Filmmaker is that every project has a point
> > > if you just attach it to some future film springboard. Currently I'm
> > > watching as many silent films as possible; the point of which only I can see.
> > >
> > > Any suggestions?
> >
> > I've seen only maybe three dozen silent features, and many shorts, but
> > have found most of them very affecting,
>
> If I may, I'll suggest a few favorite gems which represent the pinnacle
> of the silent era...
>
> Sunrise (1927) F.W. Murnau, Pandora's Box (1928) G.W. Pabst, The Crowd
> (1928) King Vidor, The Lodger (1926) Hitchcock.
>
> I've purposely restricted these to more available titles, and I've
> avoided comedies because the list would be 100 films long.
Available in some places, but I'd probably have to go to Moosomin to
find titles like those. Sadly, I haven't seen any of those films. But
as I said most of the ones I have been able to see left a great
impression on me. Particularly Stroheim's "Greed" and "Foolish Wives,"
most anything by Keaton, "Haxan." And "Nosferatu," "Phantom of the
Opera," "Hunchback of Notre Dame." Also "Napoleon," Eisenstein, a
couple of Fritz Lang. Not to forget the shorts -- comedies, Melies,
"Un Chien Andalou." The titles you mentioned are on my wish-list,
along with Feuillade serials and some Tod Browning. A fellow in
England reported seeing "Unholy Three" with live accompaniment
provided by John Cale. Yikes.
> > as if their lack of colour and
> > noises give their imagery a more direct and intimate impact, like
> > being visited by ghosts.
>
> I do find that the mental mechanics of watching silents is very
> different. The imagination must work on a different level when dialogue
> is banished, Eventhe titles seem to be processed through the visual filters.
>
> In the age of mobile phoning when we're all assaulted by an increasing
> barrage ofbabbling inanities I've gained an increasing appreciation for
> the world of silence.
>
> > In a respect, the increasing verisimilitude
> > of films -- via colour, dialogue, sound effects -- takes them further
> > from dreams, and the current enthusiasm for special effects seems to
> > me to distance them from all human concern.
>
> I agree with the above sentiment. Much of the current cinema seems fit
> only for heavy gamers or perhaps to entertain the machines themselves.
>
> > It's also a lost art, for a film done like that now would seem very
> > self-consciously stylized.
>
> That's true to a large degree, but I won't let that stop me. If a
> film's funny it doesn't really matter what style is used to cobble it together.
>
> > There's a Canadian director named Guy
> > Maddin who tries, using iris shots and stilted action, but I've never
> > been able to sit through more than twenty minutes of one of his
> > movies. Tati's films were low on dialogue, which gave them a
> > deceptively "silent" feel.
>
> Yes, I really love his films. It shows that even w/in the context of
> color/sound film it's possible to make essentially silent/monochrome
> work in the spirit of the best of the silent era. His films give me
> hope that I can realize similar goals.
>
> > Sometimes the influence of silents burble
> > up in interesting ways. Coppola's Dracula relied on old-fashioned
> > in-camera effects, which I really liked.
>
> There's a great silent robbery sequence in Pierre Melville's "Cercle
> Rouge" (Red Circle) that you'd likely appreciate.
>
> > What I feel are James
> > Cameron's best movies are structured like the chase films one finds in
> > silents (I've suggested this unpopular theory here previously).
>
> An interesting observation... I wonder if the influence was direct or
> once removed via more recent film history. Do you think Cameron makes
> time for the silents?
I can't say, but in interviews he's said he never really studied film
history, and that his knowledge of the action genre comes more from
looking at a car-chase movie from Corman, for whom he worked. I
suspect the resemblance to old chase movies is accidental -- a style
that evolved into "Aliens," after which with "Terminator 2" and
"Titanic" he may just have been imitating himself. "Titanic" also
seems atavistic for its "poetic" symbolism and melodramatic scenes
(like when the villain has the hero handcuffed to a pipe in a chamber
that fills with water).
> > I once made a 16mm film that had sound/dialogue but also intertitles
> > that looked like silent film cards. I wasn't trying to be retro or
> > anything, it just seemed like an appropriate device.
>
> Personally, I feel that every existing film technique should always open
> for consideration. I don't mind a touch of whimsy and I experience film
> history as more or less simultaneous... "retro" styles can always be
> renewed. I don't
> think there's anything inherently "dated" in any technique. Of course
> the audience may disagree.
>
> > The cards would
> > comment on or confuse the action, and were good for making abrupt
> > transitions. When a scene was stopped by a title card, the action
> > could resume anywhere. I was probably taking after "O Lucky Man,"
> > which had title cards. Another time I crudely re-edited an 8mm copy of
> > a silent film and made a soundtrack for it from a Popeye the Sailor
> > album. It was almost watchable.
>
> I'd be willing to watch it.
I wonder what ever became of it. It's sort of a lost... um, whatever
the opposite of "treasure" is.
> > What sort of approaches do you think you could take? Perhaps just
> > filming with the intention of projecting the final result without
> > sound? Or are there other aspects of silents which appeal to you?
>
> Well, what I'm thinking of right now is making a silent cartoon w/
> synchronized music roughly in the style of 20's cartoon's, which I've
> lately been researching. It's really just a convenient peg upon which
> to hang a loosely structured series of visual gags, while borrowing the
> more absurd and dreamlike ideas from throughout the history of the early toons.
McLaren was influenced by Emile Cohl. One never knows where a squiggly
line may end up.
> I like the idea of working in a simple and graphic style and borrowing
> some of my favorite themes from the Jazz age like Rum Runners, Hobos &
> Flappers. It doesn't have to literally seem like a lost film from the
> era but that's the general idea visually. Thematically, the story board
> is looking increasingly like early Fleischer Bros. stuff.
Lots of metamorphosing?
> At the very least it will be a load of fun to make.
Sounds interesting. How do you intend to animate it?
-- Parry
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