intimate relations ( 1953 film )
intimate relations is a fairly amazing film - a black comedy that really is very dark, funny, a bit unnerving ...
_ _ _, a panorama of american film noir 1941 – 1953, paul hammond, transl. , san francisco, city lights books, 2002 .
a film within a film. a silent film watched by a cinema audience .
an excellent film deserves a better transfer than this, particularly for a 1996 film .
drama about the strains on a marriage of political / trade union activism, inadequate housing and work. it explores the trade union movement, social class and industrial relations in post ww2 britain
intimate relations, julie walters plays a sex starved lady who runs a b & b; and goes too far with one of her lodger' s, based on a true story its funny but tragic at the same time, like life is, i guess? ... shame quality of cd is rather poor, looks like a copy of a copy, .. contrast was excessive ?
ingmar bergman’s mature cinema provokes the viewer into an intimate engagement in which a range of uncomfortable feelings are opened up, shared and laid bare. and this often occurs, quite literally, face - to - face .
released the same year, sawdust and tinsel is the expressionist correlative of summer with monika’s gritty realism. here bergman uses circus performers to exaggeratedly portray an everyday life where bodies are always in the service of others – in ritualized daily employment and in interpersonal relations, where abject humiliation and emotional violence are the result of a crisis - ridden subjectivity’s impact on the immediate world. slated upon release for its harsh images and portrayal of debased personal and professional relations, the film was later seen as a quantum leap for bergman’s formal - thematic inventiveness .
a film divided against itself: d. w. griffith’s the birth of a nation (1915) - bright lights film journal
film - by - film critical commentary, followed by selections from several screenplays and an anthology of comments by other critics. in french .
lee’s film the answer was a 20 - minute classroom project that almost got him expelled from the new york university film school. [ ↩ ]
o’brien, charles, “film noir in france before the liberation”, iris 21, european precursors of film noir, (1996): 7 - 20 .
this final movement where the giant face gazes straight out of the screen, visually exploring a world beyond that in which it traditionally exists, connects the space of the diegetic subject to my space. and here i sit, troubled yet also thrilled by this uncomfortably intimate experience .
bergman decided to retire from commercial filmmaking with a return to sweden. with long - time friend, filmmaker and writer jörn donner acting as executive producer for this swedish / west - german / french co - production, fanny and alexander was bergman’s (and sweden’s) most expensive film, with lavish set design and cinematography winning two of the film’s four oscars. yet despite its ostentatious scale, the film’s best scenes still feature intimate spaces and interactions, and the extended television version in particular is much more bergmanesque than the work at first appears .
future learning and skills – giving everyone the opportunity to build a lifelong relationship with film .
in contrast to influential scandinavian and anglo - american thematic analysis, it was the formal aspects of bergman’s films which first attracted french critics, whose response (starting with bazin in 1947) (10) really kick - started bergman’s international success in the 1950s. in godard’s overview on the occasion of a hugely successful 1958 bergman retrospective in paris, there is a rapturous discussion of a shot in summer with monika (1953). (11 )
fantastic film. extremely watchable again and again. rip laura sadler who is no longer with us, having died at the tender age of 23. but it is a great film .
founded in 1999, senses of cinema is one of the first online film journals of its kind and has set the standard for professional, high quality film - related content on the internet .
a film divided against itself: d. w. griffith’s the birth of a nation (1915 )
the film was accused of drawing remarkable, unflattering, and uncomplimentary parallels (especially in regards to the susan alexander kane character) to real - life. the notorious battle was detailed in thomas lennon' s and michael epstein' s oscar - nominated documentary the battle over citizen kane (1996), and it was retold in hbo' s cable - tv film rko 281 (1999) (the film' s title referred to the project numbering for the film by the studio, before the film was formally titled) .
on the surface, tavernier’s film reads as an indictment of american globalising media - culture. critical discourse around the film, in noting this, has generally fallen into two camps, according to whether or not the critic finds the characters plausible and the indictment worthwhile or justified. chris darke, reviewing the film for sight and sound, thinks not :
borde, raymond, and étienne chaumeton, panorama du film noir américain, paris, éditions de minuit, 1955 .
but birth is too alive to be shunted aside as a relic or as a reminder of how little (or how much) we’ve accomplished in race relations. it can be both these things, but griffith, a complex, creative, and intensely motivated man, was much more than a regionalist hate monger. the full, diverse range of his films proves this, as does the diversity of intent and expression in the birth of a nation itself .
yet griffith learned early on in his career – in his short films for biograph – that motion picture acting, as captured by the camera’s lens, must rely less on gesture and exclamatory facial expressions (and in silent film, none at all on theater acting’s modulating speech). instead, in an intimate, naturalistic exchange, it emanates from within the actor, who can project emotion, or even a delicate process of thought, through the eyes and onto the film’s emulsion. from over a century of the movies, it’s a mode of performance that’s second nature to us, and one that, even in 1915, griffith understood and produced with skill and consistency .
book review: into the dark: the hidden world of film noir, 1941 - 1950, by mark a. vieira
the gossip columnist louella parsons persuaded her newspaper boss hearst that he was being slandered by rko and orson welles' film when it was first previewed, so the hearst - owned newspapers (and other media outlets) pressured theatres to boycott the film and also threatened libel lawsuits. hearst also ordered his publications to completely ignore the film, and not accept advertising for other rko projects .
unsurprisingly, the apogee of bergman’s idiosyncratic modernist explorations also comprises the work in which his particular authorial intensity is at its strongest. in an ambivalent article in the january 2002 issue of sight and sound, peter matthews suggests bergman’s critical fate rests on authorial markers that are almost uniquely “overdetermined”. all bergman’s mature work exhibits what is both the most appealing and disconcerting about his films; no one has enunciated a clearer and more intimate authorial voice through cinema’s mass - produced, industrial medium .
as of this writing in june 2016, race relations in the us are not good – the progression of racial equality appears to have stalled, or is even revolving backward. as mentioned above, linda williams refers to dylann roof’s charleston rampage directly, but only after deftly summarizing – using the concept of melodrama – how griffith, in his outlandishly successful epic melodrama, had adapted, streamlined, and delivered the sectional southern writer’s racial melodrama – and with it the old, perverse romance of the old south – into national consciousness .
more recently and perhaps in recognition of birth ’s centenary, another black filmmaker mocks the film, albeit obliquely. premiering at sundance in january 2016, nate parker’s film about the slave insurrection leader nat turner carries, with maximum, billboarding irony, the title birth of a nation .
after the release of the misunderstood film, it caused considerable controversy when it was maligned, censored and banned. it was exhibited at the 1948 venice film festival, but was basically a flop in italy after catholic officials denounced it as
an abominable profanation .
the film was imported into the us in 1949 by polish - jewish immigrant joseph burstyn, and in late 1950 opened at the paris theater in manhattan. the short film was then challenged by the new york state board of regents in 1951 under 30 year - old censorship regulations barring' sacrilegious' films .
within the context of the current climate of race in the us and the still raw news of roof’s murders, none of the speakers defends any intent or portion of the film; the all too brief discussion focuses mainly on the film’s reflection of the country’s racism then (1915), since, and now. paul mcewan of muhlenberg college says he’s currently less involved with the film itself, which he dislikes, than with the legacy of birth. author melvyn stokes, who chairs the discussion, apparently doesn’t just dislike birth; he calls it an “evil film. ”
in terms of the justification for seeing french film noir as reflective of french attitudes to american culture, the answer, as others have observed, lies in noir’s constitutive hybridity. firstly, classic noir is a french critical construct of an american film phenomenon. french critic nino frank writing for
hay, stephen, bertrand tavernier: the film – maker of lyon, london & new york, i. b. tauris, 2000 .
mcdonald, neil, “fidélité et maladie (the french film festival) ”, quadrant 45. 5 (2001): 65 - 67 .
i came out of that movie house reeling like a drunkard, drugged speechless, with the film rushing through my bloodstream, pumping and thudding .
hamish ford is a lecturer in film, media and cultural studies at the university of newcastle, and a regular contributor to senses of cinema .
this widely - acclaimed film from debut film director / actor orson welles (24 years old) is usually regarded as the greatest film ever made. the film, budgeted at $ 800, 000, received unanimous critical praise even at the time of its release, although it was not a commercial success (partly due to its limited distribution and delayed release by rko due to pressure exerted by famous publisher w. r. hearst) - until it was re - released after world war ii, found well - deserved (but delayed) recognition in europe, and then played on television .
the face of ullmann, anguished performer of so many bergman subjects, has never been more chillingly open than in scenes from a marriage as we almost embarrassingly watch it up close for v ery long periods without a cut. forced upon us through such extended looking, the face has never been more confrontingly interior, our relationship with it more disturbingly intimate – as we watch the material communicative nerve ends of our giant onscreen companion as it seeks to look ‘inside’ itself, by means of a gaze ultimately directed straight out at us .
bergman immediately followed the huge success of fanny and alexander with a much more characteristically small film called after the rehearsal (which i have not been able to see). like marionettes, it was intended only for tv, but was nonetheless then sold for theatrical release. this was the last film written and directed by ingmar bergman to be commercially distributed – although in late 2002 he has completed shooting a new film possibly to be released in 2003 .
pressure was also brought to bear by the roman catholic archdiocese to revoke the film' s license on the grounds that the work was
blasphemous
and
sacrilegious .
catholic leader francis cardinal spellman, with the catholic - dominated legion of decency, attacked the miracle as
a despicable affront to every christian
and
a vicious insult to italian womanhood .
the film was subsequently banned by the new york state board of regents. the film lost its license and the film' s distributor, joseph burstyn, appealed the decision. the new york appeals court backed the board of regents decision .
the fifteen feature films bergman directed between 1945 and 1954 received very mixed reactions in sweden. a review of crisis, his first film as director, argued :
yet, as the discussion ends with a very brief q & a, conciliatory notes arise cautiously in answers to the question, “if the film is evil, how can we enjoy it? ” clearly, someone in the audience has responded to stokes’ dubbing birth “evil” just minutes before and wonders what it might mean if he / she ends up enjoying such a film. without just coming out with it, the audience member has asked the pundits: is it okay to like this film ?
. in all the above examples, the film shows that the gangrene eating away at the fabric of french society is, in many respects, home - grown .
though dated, this remains a useful handbook for kubrick’s films through the shining (1980). the author provides a biographical essay, an overview of the critical responses to the film, and full cast and credits. there are many film reviews, and these are valuable for anyone wanting to do a reception history of the films .
the potential for generic coding as art - horror may be why hour of the wolf is the only film of bergman’s best decade to be available in australia on video .
it faced close scrutiny by the hays office (and joseph breen), due to its exploitation of star jane russell' s prominently - uncovered 36d
chest in her debut film by hollywood huckster russell birdwell. salacious advertising added to the lurid sensationalism and kept the film from being widely circulated. in addition, pin - up shots of big - busted russell rolling around in the hay had the desired effect at the box office (especially among wwii gis). one of the film' s most vulgar stunts, also orchestrated by birdwell, was to have skywriting planes fly over san francisco where they spelled the film' s title followed by two giant circles - - each dotted in the center .
i had seen this film on t. v. a few years ago but it was in my opinion a film that you could see more than once so i decided to purchase it. i enjoyed it for the second time and knew that i had made the right decision to add it to my large collection of d. v. d' s .
by simply allowing griffith and his film context, brownlow makes solid points here, and i find myself not only agreeing with them but proceeding to enlarge upon them in this article .
maintaining the intimacy and close - ups of bergman’s ’60s work, with this film décor has an added role too, thanks to nykvist’s oscar - winning wide - screen cinematography in its rendering of a red - saturated mise - en - scène. the film was deemed harrowing at the time, yet the period setting and poetic tone also bring a movement towards grace. his biggest hit since the seventh seal, the film’s heavily symbolic color scheme and mise - en - scène would influence peter greenaway and countless other 1980s and ’90s art - house directors .
this film was so good when it finished i was sad as i could never watch it for the first time again. the parts played by julie walters and les dennis were brilliant .
the full five - hour cut of bergman’s last official film includes some of this filmmaker’s clearest, most mature working through of age - old concerns, in the guise of a warmer, more accessible address. for casual viewers fanny and alexander is bergman’s most attractive film, while for connoisseurs it is a massive crystalline prism text that refracts the central concerns of a forty - year oeuvre .
this remarkable disney film was based on the
uncle remus
stories in the late 1800s of joel chandler harris (first published as columns in the atlanta constitution newspaper), and was presented as one of their earliest, innovative live - action and animation mixtures. the film' s song
zip - a - dee - doo - dah
won the academy award for best song .
a passion attracted critics who did not usually admire bergman, a noted dissenter from the avant - garde like jonas mekas remarking in the village voice that it was the first bergman film he really liked .
this daring sex farce and romantic comedy was the first major studio - produced film from hollywood that was released without an approved code seal from the production code administration (pca). it was deliberately made as a test case by its producer / director otto preminger. despite its lack of a seal of approval and the controversy, it proved to be a major hit film (grossing $ 6 million) .
this was actually filmed in a small town in wales called abergavenny where i am from and i remember seeing all the film crews around at the time so i was always on the lookout for ...
stokes. p. 169. but the film did help the organization to double in size and quickly, reports stokes; by december, 1915, membership had risen to 10, 000. [ ↩ ]
la relation passionnelle entre la france et les états - unis sera examinée à travers le prisme réfracteur du film noir français. une brève étude diachronique faisant apparaître l’image de plus en plus négative de la culture américaine dans le film noir français sera suivie d’une analyse détaillée de l’appât de bertrand tavernier (1993). basé sur un fait divers, le film raconte la trajectoire criminelle de trois jeunes français, gavés par un régime culturel de films d’action et de jeux télévisés américains et pourris par une société de consommation américanisée qui les conduiront jusqu’au meurtre. l’analyse débutera par une interrogation critique du propos du film, en apparence violemment antiaméricain, pour être ensuite reliée à des questions plus générales concernant la relation franco - américaine, notamment les craintes françaises et européennes devant le processus de mondialisation et le quasi - monopole hollywoodien du marché cinématographique mondial .
from the vantage point of thirty - six years, persona can be seen as a standout film in terms of bergman’s oeuvre and cinema history. the essays in ingmar bergman’s persona, a 2000 compilation volume edited by lloyd michaels, position the film as a cinematic work of high modernism par excellence. and it is the sort of artwork about which those who have experienced it feel the utmost emotional and intellectual commitment. (16 )
gordon thomas, trained as a painter, is a photographer living in jamaica plain, massachusetts with his wife. film has fascinated and worried him ever since, as a small child, he saw godzilla in 1954 .
remarkably, it has never been released for home video consumption in the us (although it has been available in european and asian markets). after this film' s last theatrical release in 1986, it has simply vanished and been unavailable for purchase. recently, a disney spokesman reiterated the fact that the film may continue to be unavailable due to
the sensitivity that exists in our culture
and fears of political - correctness repercussions .
but melvyn stokes, reader in film history at university college london, would likely categorize the 78 - year - old film historian’s critical take on birth as old school. stokes’ 2008 monograph d. w. griffith’s the birth of a nation: a history of the most controversial motion picture of all time spends many pages detailing the efforts of the naacp, beginning the year of the film’s release, to either prevent showings of it or encourage local or state governments to ban it outright. stokes presents how, as the decades slid by, and white society’s attitudes toward racial equality changed incrementally, the naacp grew more successful in its goal to prevent public showings .
bergman himself in retrospect argues the latter, saying that tarkovsky and fellini eventually made ‘tarkovsky’ and ‘fellini’ films, and “that autumn sonata is an annoying example” of bergman making a ‘bergman’ film. see images, p. 334 .
ruth dunning (17 may 1911, prestatyn — 27 february 1983, london) was a welsh actress of stage, television, and film. she first came to prominence in the role of gladys grove in bbc television' s the grove family (1954–1957), also portraying that character in the 1955 film it' s a great day. in 1962 she was awarded the british academy television award for best actress for her work on armchair theatre .
in this case, the americans were forced to back down on the issue, l ’ exception culturelle won the day and france has continued to foster and protect its national film industry, though for how long, is unsure .
today we hardly know how to approach something so serious and philosophically ‘big - picture’ yet also so accessible and burlesque as bergman’s most famous film. this is at least in one sense odd: for all its preposterous thematic reach and blatant theatricality, the film achieved its immense cultural impact (still being shown twice daily somewhere in the us four years after initial release) through a reflexively coded intertextuality – something not so unfamiliar to attuned postmodern minds after all .
a long period away from bergman’s cinema should allow serious film culture to look afresh at a body of work that is today one of film history’s best - kept secrets. faced with new uncertainties and doubts about a turn - of - the - century world, our role in it and what we want out of images, as well as perennial problems of subjectivity that are far from overcome, fresh eyes and minds could really open up bergman’s most challenging work .
bergman has written and directed around fifty feature films, and for over twenty years from the late - ’50s his work was canonical to ‘art - house’ movie culture, academic cinema studies and film clubs all over the world. today, a young film enthusiast or student is most likely only to have seen the seventh seal or perhaps wild strawberries (both 1957), or in some countries, persona. however, they are just as likely to have seen no bergman at all .
during this very active twenty - year epilogue to one of the most remarkable careers in world cinema, ingmar bergman has been a specter haunting film history. although not often invoked in film culture, he is still in some quarters thought of as an important figure that asked of cinema what it is – and what are the beings that invent it. during ullmann’s press interviews for faithless, half the questions were about bergman. there was curiosity about his script for the film, as well as his personal and creative relationship with ullmann. but there were also questions about bergman per se as if to simply acknowledge one of the not so often mentioned masters of world cinema, and to gesture towards the corner that shrouds an already dark oeuvre .
currently book and film still enjoy wide - ranging popularity. any surviving repertory theater can screen gwtw without fear of angry demonstrations. in 2011, scribner issued a 75th anniversary edition of mitchell’s novel, with a new preface by author pat conroy, who claims that gwtw inspired him to become a writer. how many high - profile filmmakers today would voice the same soft spot for griffith’s film? and in 2016, there are more people watching gwtw on blu - ray than bfi’s new edition of birth .
but if the birth of a nation had been, during its 100 years before us, simply a delivery system for its melodramatic thrills, or for a racist ideology, we’d not be discussing it now. the film survives as something far more complex and compelling than either of these elements would allow. griffith, man and artist, was complicated, too. placing the confusion of griffith’s ambitions, inner struggles, and intuitive vision alongside the ideological and aesthetic turbulence of his film only deepens our perceptions of it .
in his monograph, stokes conjectures that, if some african americans managed to see birth upon its release in 1915 and, like the white audience, were entertained, even awed, by the experience – despite the film’s depiction of blacks – it may have been because the sight of whites playing blacks “emphasize [ d ] the film’s character as fictionalized entertainment. ” 17 stokes goes on to wonder if blacks may have discounted the relevance of the events they saw on screen because they depicted those from a distant past .
but as much as the film gone with the wind may appear to distance itself from the birth of a nation, it still talks the same talk of southern victimhood. indeed, selznick’s gwtw, as much or more as birth, helped extend the legend of the old south and the exquisite pathos of its demise – all of which mitchell’s novel had honored wholeheartedly – into the middle of the 20th century and beyond. the film also retains mitchell’s version of slavery as the same beneficent institution we see in birth .
it is a misreading that extends to the film as a whole, namely that scarface is an illustration of hollywood glorification of crime and violence. anyone familiar with this film will remember it as an unequivocal critique of the falseness and emptiness of the american dream when it is a) reduced to wealth, image and status, since even when the character has it all, happiness eludes him; and b) built on crime and violence, since he who lives by the sword will inevitably die by the sword .
today, shown elsewhere than in the us, the film’s race to the rescue would likely be received differently, to say the least, and with less post - screening soul - searching. in the discussion williams recalls a recent, non - controversial public showing of birth in italy – no protests feared there – where the audience sprang to its feet at the klan’s ride and gave it an ovation. in the us, you’d have to screen the film to an audience of white supremacists to get that kind of reaction .
the oscar - nominated film (with four nominations, but no wins, including best actress and best adapted screenplay) was called notorious, salacious, revolting, dirty, steamy, lewd, suggestive, morally repellent and provocative. time magazine was noted as stating :
just possibly the dirtiest american - made motion picture that has ever been legally exhibited ...
new york' s cardinal spellman declared the film
evil in concept... certain to exert an immoral and corrupting influence on those who see it .
the newly mature existentialist quandaries of summer interlude clearly states the modern subject’s situation which one can discern in every bergman film of the 1950s: how to sustain a life without real belief – in human good, in society, in god, or even in the self .
although it has been rumored that the naacp banned this disney movie, that was untrue - - they simply expressed their disapproval of the portrayal of african - americans in the film, and their concern about its potential to present an image of an idyllic master - slave relationship .
but then, linda williams’ response does seem to grant permission – but with a condition. “of course you should enjoy it, ” she says, before adding, “you should think about it afterwards. ” where stokes describes his students as millennials who can only be coaxed from their phones by an action - packed film, williams speaks in a tone of parental admonishment to those less thoughtful in the audience. she’s right, of course, but she’s demanding a given. i’m not sure about millennials, but most people in the us who see this film today (and enjoy it or not) will do a lot of thinking afterwards without any finger - wagging prompting. has any other film in the history of the medium caused more thinking? and bfi’s edition gives us a goodly, worthwhile sample of current critical thinking about birth .
[ t ] he filmmaker who still best exemplifies to a large part of the public the serious and difficult artist is often ignored by critics whose stated concern is the art of film. to them, bergman represents only a stage in film history that has been bypassed in the inexorable progress of the avant - garde. as a modernist who is no longer new, bergman falls prey to the danger identified in one of oscar wilde’s sayings: “nothing is so dangerous as being too modern; one is apt to grow old - fashioned quite suddenly. ” (6 )
not mentioned anywhere in the release is exactly what kind of event made up this conference, other than, i assume, a showing of the film, with this roundtable perhaps following it. speaking in bfi’s southbank in london, linda williams of the university of california, berkeley, makes the point that the film could not currently be shown publicly in the us without attracting protest in the form of demonstrations or even violence – a stricture that has held fast for decades. indeed, the only way anyone in this country can see birth these days is on home video .
the stark, controversial, black and white film was so viciously denounced by the legion of decency upon its release with a
c
( or condemned) rating that many theaters were forced to cancel their showings, but it still did moderately well at the box office despite the uproar .
one local judge in baltimore, maryland was quoted as saying that russell' s breasts
hang over the picture like a summer thunderstorm spread out over a landscape .
however, it appeared that the publicity pin - up shots were much more revealing, sultry and suggestive than the film itself .
within minutes of screen time, gus is caught, “tried, ” and, though not shown, executed by the klan. swept along by griffith’s splendidly visceral cross cutting, you might not pause to consider the abhorrence of the proceedings until the mounted, robed riders toss gus’s corpse onto silas lynch’s front porch like a sack of meat. it’s perhaps the ugliest moment in the film – the real climax of the story’s racial hatred – and for anyone who attempts to admire the film, the toughest to negotiate. and it’s a climactic juncture that griffith encourages us to forget in the gathering heat of the final rescue .
elia kazan' s film (based on tennessee williams' play) told about a thumb - sucking, white - trash, 19 year - old virginal' baby doll' child bride (carroll baker) who was married (but unconsummated) to mississippi cotton gin operator archie lee meighan (karl malden), and seduced by a competing vengeful sicilian cotton - gin owner silva vacarro (eli wallach in his film debut). in the opening scenes, baby doll was crib - bound in nursery furniture, spied upon through a wall by her' peeping tom' husband, and given no privacy while taking a bath .
i’ll admit it: i enjoy the birth of a nation. how do i manage that? be assured, it’s complicated. after watching bfi’s new release, it became clear that any pleasure i take in this film involves an increasingly troublesome process, a maneuvering of my sensibilities and aesthetics around and about my social awareness and historical perspectives, however narrow and limited these latter two may be. and what role does my race (caucasian) play in my ability to enjoy it? i doubt that many african americans, lacking the ability to dodge or compartmentalize the film’s racism, can enjoy, respect, admire griffith’s achievements in birth .
over the years, boutique labels like britain’s bfi and the u. s. ’s kino international can’t seem to stop issuing video editions of the birth of a nation because, apparently, they sell – perhaps not like hotcakes – but for a 100 - year - old silent film, i’m guessing, very well indeed .
during the writing of this film, bergman was arrested mid - theatre rehearsal for tax evasion, and while the matter was being investigated (bergman was cleared years later), he flew into another deep depression, spending a period in a psychiatric ward. he then left sweden to live and work in germany for many years .
italy has its own societal woes, of course, and most likely within these its own varieties of racism, but it doesn’t share america’s unique racial legacy. so, if a few of their citizens are willing to take in a screening of a 191 - minute, century - old silent film and end up enjoying it without self - examination, it’s because they need not process, as any us viewer must, how they experience birth ’s racial polemic. what we must necessarily view as hateful, demagogic propaganda, a non - us audience can accept as the background for a tale of epic sweep in which racist dynamics are merely fuel for the film’s thrill machine .
the film engendered controversy (and efforts at suppression in early 1941 through intimidation, blackmail, newspaper smears, discrediting and fbi investigations) before it premiered in new york city on may 1, 1941, because it appeared to fictionalize and caricaturize certain events and individuals in the life of william randolph hearst - a powerful newspaper magnate and publisher .
dixon’s fiction offers more than one actual rape, but griffith, for the purposes of his grand rescue finale, only allows its threat, which has the effect of softening dixon’s dedicated polemic by making the film adaptation concerned more about entertainment than avenging stowe’s book and reconstruction, a need not shared by the average moviegoer, even in 1915 .
this is a handy, though nonscholarly, guide to all aspects of kubrick’s work. entries are included not only on the films, but also on the various people who worked on them as well as peripheral figures such as sound effects artist jack foley and topics such as film noir; includes a moving afterword by kubrick assistant leon vitali .
pretty spectacular, nothing less than a complaint from the american that french support for their film industry violated the principles of the free market. tavernier’s reaction had been explosive. he pointed out that france had only a fraction of its own market, which was swamped by american product. tavernier was a formidable adversary. (mcdonald 2001: 65 )
naval officer and his wife try to make money by smuggling brandy from france. christopher craig age 16 was convicted of murder of a policeman (with derek bentley) bentley said' let him have it chris' and bentley was hung. craig saw my death is a mockery that afternoon and it was said that the film egged him on the violence
the film' s philosophical theme was about the prospect of remaining a virgin, in order to remain respectable, and the efforts of two aging playboys attempting to score in a love triangle with an attractive young virgin - wholesome (or virtuous) and chatty 22 year - old heroine and struggling beer - commercial actress patty o' neill (maggie mcnamara in her film debut). the two lotharios were successful 30 year - old architect and wolfish bachelor donald gresham (william holden), donald' s upstairs neighbor - 41 year - old divorced, martini - drinking, charming david slater (david niven), the father of cynthia slater (dawn addams), donald' s ex - fiancee .
in fighting back: responding to the birth of a nation – the opening essay in bfi’s booklet – “film curator” ashley clark shares the thrust of stokes’ book by summarizing the naacp’s decades - long protest before closing with mention of the blasting critical response to birth by two current black filmmakers, spike lee and paul d. miller (aka dj spooky). 9
as he began work on birth, griffith believed he was still inventing what a movie could and should be, and while entertainment was uppermost in this burgeoning definition, griffith the pioneer, the self - proclaimed cinema artiste, had those other qualifications in mind when imagining an epic historical film like birth: education, edification, and the truisms of history. 19
earlier in the film, a union deserter, after discovering tara is bereft of valuables, appears to have similar designs on scarlett, but before these can be clarified, she blows a hole in his skull with a concealed pistol. scarlett’s feistiness in the face of male violence is a nice antidote to mae marsh’s passive suicidal response to it. [ ↩ ]
perhaps most importantly, dvd allows bergman’s peak modernist work, in which the thorny issues of demonic subjectivity and authorship are most thoroughly explored and intertwined, the possibility of a fresh position within contemporary film discourse and history. in his excellent 1982 book ingmar bergman and the rituals of art, paisley livingston hones in on the problem of bergman’s particular modernism, saying that already :
in 1936, when david o. selznick bought the film rights to margaret mitchell’s novel gone with the wind – before it was published – he knew full well what the public was prepared for, and what they would consider a grand night’s entertainment. and by then, the realities of reconstruction, fully disregarded by an indifferent nation at large, were even further in the past .
such criticism exemplifies problems swedish film writers would intermittently continue to have with bergman’s work throughout his career. this quote and the copious writing that followed over forty years (perhaps most notably the criticism he received from the swedish left in the 1960s) suggests this filmmaker’s position as a pebble in the shoe of a hyper - enlightenment culture, loudly articulating repressed aspects of a highly rationalist modernity .
some folks, too, may have elitist, gourmet tastes for censured films like triumph of the will and birth, the ugly content of which they savor as if it has a sort of inverted coolness. in the late ’70s i remember being at a party held by young art school students where a video of riefenstahl’s film was played as visual background to the hip gaiety. [ ↩ ]
with the svensk filmindustri phones ringing hot for sales of bergman’s international hit comedy, the filmmaker slipped his most personal script yet onto the producer’s desk. drunk with the success their cannes - crowned auteur was bringing the company, a cheap shoot was approved. the outcome was the seventh seal – a genuine landmark in film history that would exemplify ‘art cinema’ the world over for years to come .
the pca' s joseph breen complained about the film' s unacceptable, comedic
light and gay treatment of the subject of illicit sex and seduction .
it was subsequently rated condemned by the catholic legion of decency for vulgarity, in part because of its offensive use of prohibited words such as
virgin ,
seduce ,
pregnant ,
and
mistress
in the dialogue .
hughes' picture was notorious for leering camera views of statuesque and formidable jane russell' s ample, buxom cleavage - displayed to the fullest and greatest effect to anger hays code censors. she was often pictured with an oft - unbuttoned, low - cut peasant blouse. the film was denied a production code administration seal of approval for the exploitative use of young star jane russell' s prominent, bulging breasts and cleavage .
as the novel opens in the antebellum south, mitchell’s use of “nigger” in her novel is limited mostly to blacks speaking of fellow blacks – an interesting but uneasy parallel to its current use among african americans in the same context. until reconstruction begins, the whites of southern gentry refer to blacks consistently as “darkies. ” the only whites to use the term without hesitating are poor whites. the word occurs nowhere in the film. [ ↩ ]
few people in 1915’s white america saw anything wrong with gus’s lynching, the klan’s ride to the rescue, or with the brief scene at the end of the film in which the klan terrorize blacks out of voting. in woodrow wilson’s history of the american people (1901), the author had written of the need for the kkk as a “veritable empire of the south, to protect the southern country” – a passage quoted in one of birth ’s intertitles .
with their abrasive intimacies, there was always something a bit too public, too ‘shared’, about watching films like through a glass darkly (1961), persona, or scenes from a marriage (1973) with strangers or friends in the cinema. at home, with a film preserved in almost hyper - real fidelity, one has the undistracted opportunity to experience and reflect upon the awkwardly close power of our singular encounter – face to (onscreen) face .
rather than philosophical explication, the silence ‘s almost wordless images generate our experience and reading of a very open film, concluding the loose trilogy in an unexpected way. the complex combination of an uneasy realism with stark formalism makes for clean and complex deep - focus shots matched with an immaculate hyper - diegetic soundscape. so little is literally said here that the formal affect and hermeneutic generativity of bergman’s sound - image compositions are given space to speak louder than ever .
von sydow and ullmann are again the couple in 1968’s the shame. sometimes seen as concluding a trilogy about the artist’s ethical relationship to social reality with the previous two films, it also takes a step back in formal complexity. this is a war film without action, heroes or oppositional clarity, concerned with the basic responses of the human subject – in this case, two naïve ex - concert violinists – to the sheer existential un - understandability of war .
the dramatic plea of these battleground meetings may have the flavor of 19th - century theater or fiction, but griffith largely keeps part one free of what linda williams, as quoted in stokes’ monograph, calls “linking melodramatic form to the dialectic of racial pathos and antipathy. ” 24 the heart of this film beats truest within the modest confines of the camerons’ front porch, which, as it faces that small - town street, begins and ends birth ’s first part .
following her breakdown in the attic karin is penetrated again, by the all - too - real cold fluid of science as her doctor / husband calmly applies a sedating needle, to which she responds with only marginally more displeasure than to the benign and genuine (but to her, meaningless and perfunctory) words of love he offers throughout the film. meanwhile, outside awaits the giant spider shape of a helicopter in which von sydow will accompany her to his secular sureties of institutionalised care .
any socially aware american viewer, in feeling the excitement of the klan’s ride, must pay the price of thinking about it. that is, in the wake of the film, he or she would have to consider what it means to be a 21st - century us citizen cheering – however inward and silently – a horse - mounted army of white - sheeted vigilantes that calls to mind repulsive but culturally embedded images of massed klan marches like the one in washington, dc, in 1928 .
hay’s reading of the bait ’s protagonists is that “they have been anaesthetised by their cultural diet”. for cultural diet, read american - driven consumerism. for american - driven consumerism, read american cinema, namely, violent action and horror movies and noir - inspired thrillers like scarface. but scarface, as we have seen, is not a film that would anaesthetize in this way, unless misread by spectators already in some way lacking in knowledge and / or moral values. as tavernier explains :
if cries was the lush color masterpiece for those who found bergman’s more radical (and monochrome) ’60s cinema too extreme, like seventh seal, the film is also one of his prism works. it looks back at themes more thoroughly essayed in earlier films, and glancing toward a more accessible – though difficult – humanist tonality. yet despite its more prosaic form and thematic concerns, it is the following scenes from a marriage that more relentlessly and radically continues bergman’s diverse engagement with modernity’s crisis of belief .
television seemed the best means through which to fund new projects, and in 1974 bergman staged, directed, and filmed a version of mozart’s magic flute. the film recreates a 17 th century swedish theatre in which a modern audience watches the opera. the camera also shows us behind - the - scenes moments during the performance, amid a subtle essay on the mediation of art forms and the constant presence of other textual realities (perhaps no less revealing) beneath that of the ‘primary’ text / performance .
additionally, to bring the film’s characters up close to the fighting, there are two sequences in which the younger and elder sons of each family meet in battle. in contrast to the brady - like images, these scenes are couched in the theatrical, sentimental device made popular by 19th - century romantic fiction, in which separated and far - flung relatives, lovers, or friends meet in highly coincidental and often ironic circumstances. in such meetings, emotional coals theretofore banked in distance and longing suddenly flare .
the studio system, an industrial, factory approach to moviemaking, had been in place at least since mgm’s emergence in 1925, killing off independent filmmaking for decades to come. and griffith had been an independent, more so than selznick, who certainly attempted to act like one, but who was held in place by what the american public expected, especially in the adaptation of a nationally revered novel, which needed to be, as a completed film, a nearly one - to - one equivalent of mitchell’s text .
adapting another book whose southern characters are caught in the same mesh of war and defeat as the birth of a nation, selznick played it safe. birth may have been a cautionary tale for him. although mitchell’s romantic historical brought the author a pulitzer instead of notoriety, the producer, before commencing principal photography, vetted the screenplay with black leaders to eliminate possible offenses. among these was reportedly the use of the “n” word – although it seems unlikely a major film of its time would use the term anyway. 20
out of a genuinely avant - garde prologue emerges a story in which an actress refuses to speak, while a nurse is assigned to her ‘recovery’. most of the film takes place in and around a beach - house on the windswept coast of fårö. but the women’s experience of space and time, along with the viewer’s grasp of these forms and persona ‘s narrative, suffers increasing interruptions as fragmenting layers of formal - thematic stimuli build into one of the most difficult, open and generative feature - films ever made.
intimate relations is a 1953 british drama film directed by charles frank . the film was known in the u.s. as disobedient . it was entered into the 1953 cannes film festival . 
intimate relations is a 1953 british drama film directed by charles frank. the film was known in the u.s. as disobedient. it was entered into the 1953 cannes film festival.
intimate relations is a 1953 british drama film directed by charles frank. the film was known in the u.s. as disobedient. it was entered into the 1953 cannes film festival.