On The History Of Film Style

Description:
The study of cinematic style has in many ways shaped attitudes towards films. Style assigns films to a tradition, distinguishes a classic and signals the arrival of an innovation. This book aims to show how film scholars have attempted to explain stylistic continuity and change across the history of cinema. The author explores the theories of style launched by Andre Bazin, Noel Burch and other film historians. In the process he celebrates a century of cinema, integrating discussions of the film classics such as 'The Birth of a Nation' and 'Citizen Cane', with analysis of more current box-office successes such as 'Jaws' and 'The Hunt For Red October'. The contributions of noted and neglected directors are examined, and the author considers the earliest film making, the accomplishments of the silent era, the development of Hollywood, and the strides taken by European and Asian cinema in recent years. The book proposes that stylistic developments often arise from filmmakers' search for efficient solutions to production problems. The author traces this activity across history through a detailed discussion of cinematic staging.

Table of Contents:
Part 1 The way movies look - the significence of stylistic history. Part 2 Defending and defining the seventh art - the standard version of stylistic history: s developing repertoire - the basic story; film culture and basic story; the standard version - central assumptions; coming to terms with sound; Bordeche, Brasillach and standard version. Part 3 Against the seventh art - Andre Bazin and the dialectical programme: a new avant-garde; the evolution of film language; toward an impure cinema; from stylistic history to thematic criticism. Part 4 The return of modernism - Noel Burch and the oppositional programme: radicalizing form; the institutional mode and its others; living shadows and distant observers. Part 5 Prospects for progress - recent research programmes: piecemeal history; culture, vision and the perpetually new; problems and solutions. Exceptionally exact perceptions - on staging in depth: ideology and depth; making the image intelligible; dumb giants; depth, decoupage and camera movement; redefining mise en scene; expanding the image and compresing depth; eclecticism and archaism.