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Pa Nah

Vocab

- Celluloid: Thin transparent, pliable material that could hold a coating of chemicals sensitive to light.
- Kinetograph: Early movie camera that was created by William Kennedy Dickson combining Edison‘s incandescent light bulb, Goodwin’s celluloid, and Le Prince’s camera.
- Kinetoscope: A single-person viewing system (created by William Kennedy Dickson)
- Vitascope: Large-screen system which enabled filmstrips of longer lengths to be projected without interruption and hinted at the potential of movies as a future mass medium.
- Narrative films: Movies that tells stories.
- Nickelodeons: A form of movie theater whose name combines the admission price with the Greek word for “theater.”
- Vertical Integration: Growth and management control. 3 levels:
            - Production: Everything involved in making a movie from securing a script and actors raising money and filming.
            - Distribution: Getting the films into theaters.
            - Exhibition: Playing the films in theaters.
- Oligopoly: A situation in which a few firms control the bulk of business.
- Studio system: An arrangement of film production and distribution dominated by a small number of "major" studios in Hollywood.
- Block booking: Gain access to popular films with big stars like Mary Pickford, exhibitors had to agree to rent new or marginal films with no stars.
- Movie palaces: Full-time single-screen movie theaters that provided a more hospitable movie going environment.
- Multiplexes: Multiple screens (movie theaters) lure crowds to interstate highway crossroads.
- Big Five: Paramount, MGM, Warner Brothers, Twentieth Century Fox, and RKO.
- Little Three: (Do not own theaters) Columbia, Universal, and United Artists.
- Genre: Category.
- Documentary: “The creative treatment of actuality,” or a genre that interprets reality by recording real people and setting.
- Cinema verite: A French term for “truth film.”
- Indies: Independently produced films.
- Hollywood Ten: 9 screen-writers and 1 directors.
- Paramount decision: Forcing the studios (Paramount, Warner Brothers, Twentieth Century Fox, MGM, and RKO) to gradually divest themselves of their theaters.
- Megaplexes: Facilities with 14 or more screens.
- Big Six: Warner Brothers, Paramount, Twentieth Century Fox, Universal, Columbia Pictures, and Disney.
- Digital video: A shift from celluloid film; allowing filmmakers to replace expensive and bulky 16-mm and 35-mm film cameras with less expensive, lightweight digital video cameras.
- Consensus narratives: Describes cultural products that become popular and provide shared cultural experiences.

Book Outline Section by Section

The Development of Film
- Leonardo DaVinci, who theorized in the late 1400s about creating a device that would reproduce reality. The invention of the thaumatrope in 1824, a two-sided card with different images on each side that appeared to combine the images when twirled; and the zoetrope in 1834, a cylindrical device that rapidly twirled images inside a cylinder, which appeared to make images move. 

Muybridge and Goodwin Make Pictures Move
- Eadweard Muybridge, an English photographer living in America, is credited with being the first to manipulate photographs to make them appear to move while simultaneously projecting them on a screen.  He studied motion by using multiple cameras to take successive photographs of humans and animals in motion (first project: racehorse motion).
- George Eastman (founder of Eastman Kodak), in 1884, developed the first roll film. The first roll had a paper backing that had to be stripped off during the film developing stage.
- Louis Aime Augustin Le Prince, a Frenchman living in England, invented the first motion picture camera using roll film.
- Hannibal Goodwin, New Jersey minister, in 1889, improved Eastman’s roll film by using thin strips of transparent, pliable material, celluloid, that could hold a coating of chemicals sensitive to light.  

Edison and the Lumieres Create Motion Pictures
Thomas Edison failed to merge phonograph technology and moving images to create talking pictures and lost interest in the late 1800s until the brothers Louis and Auguste Lumiere developed the cinematograpg, a combined camera, film development, and projection system. But before Edison gained interest back he directed his assistant to create the kinetograph, movie camera, and a single-person viewing system, kineoscope.

The Introduction of Narrative
French magician and inventor Georges Milies opened the first public movie theater in France in 1896 because he believed that a movie was not simply a means of recording reality. He believed that a movie could be artificially planned and controlled like a staged play. Edwin S. Porter, a cameraman who studied George Melies idea in the Edison’s lab, adapted the idea and created America’s first narrative film.

The Arrival of Nickelodeons
The growth of nickelodeons, a major development in evolution of film as a mass medium.

The Rise of the Hollywood Studio System
Thomas Edison forms the Motion Picture Patents Company, Trust, in 1908. Trust was a strict and expensive term. Therefore, two Hungarian immigrants, Adolph Zukor, who found Paramount Pictures, and William Fox, who found Twentieth Century Fox, found a way to bypass Trust.

Production
Adolph Zukor hired a number of popular actors and formed the Famous Players Company in 1912 to compete against Trust. From there his famous actress, Mary Pickford, broke free from his contract and opened up her own company, United Artists. And Triangle emerged introducing the studio system.

Distribution
Adolph Zukor led the fight to distribution due to Trust’s strict guidelines. He developed block booking distribution, gaining access to popular films with big stars like Mary Pickford, exhibitors had to agree to rent new or marginal films with no stars. Another distribution strategy involved the marketing of American films in Europe due to World War I.

Exhibition
Trust attempted to monopolize by controlling the flow of films to theater owners but failed due to the flow of films from independents in Hollywood and foreign films. Therefore, Trust collapsed. Theater owners competed against Zukor. Zukor opened up his own theaters along with several major studios.

Hollywood Narrative and the Silent Era
D. W. Griffith, was the single most important director in Hollywood early days. He paved the way for all future narrative filmmakers by refining many of the narrative techniques introduced by Melies and Ported.

The Introduction of Sound
Talkies proved to all doubters that talkies were here to stay by investing $200,000 to make a film (took in $5 million).

The Development of the Hollywood Style
Hollywood dominated business, style, storytelling, sound, narrative, genre, and author.

Hollywood Narratives
Basic components of narrative: the story (what happens to whom) and the disclosure (how the story is told).

Hollywood Genres
Making films fall under popular genres reaching, product standardization and product differentiation.

Hollywood “Authors”
Directors = “Author” of a film.

Outside the Hollywood System
3 alternatives to Hollywood: international films, documentaries, and independent films.

Global Cinema
American films captures up to 90% as foreign films captures less than 2% Yet the largest film industry is in India, “Bollywood”, 1000+ films a year.

The Documentary Tradition
Documentary developed an identity apart from its commercial presentation. As an educational, noncommercial form, the documentary usually required the backing of industry, government, or philanthropy to cover costs. Documentary cameras went where no other cameras would.

The Rise of Independent Films
They make movies inexpensively, relying on real-life situations, stage actors and non-actors, crews made up of friends and students, and local non-studio settings. Rise of independent films are declining.

The Transformation of the Studio System
The “Golden Age” is over for the Hollywood movie industry. The attendance in the United States for theaters are declining yet movie industry are slowly adapting and barely surviving.

The Hollywood Ten
Nine screenwriters and one director. An aggressive political radicals in the film industry that forced writers and executives to give up the name of colleagues suspected of having politically unfriendly tendencies; violating their free speech rights (due to communism). The Hollywood Ten were blacklisted, boycotted, etc. ruining their careers. 

The Paramount Decision
Mid 1940’s the government increased its scrutiny of movie industry’s aggressive business practices; demanding that the major companies, Paramount, Warner Brothers, Twentieth Centruy Fox, MGM, and RKO, end vertical integration. Yet nothing really changed because the consumer demand was still high.

Moving to the Suburbs
Decline in profits of the movie theaters due to baby boomer effect and war.

Television Change Hollywood
Radio rise and fall due to television.

Hollywood Adapts to Home Entertainment
DVDs/CDs rise and fall due to internet streaming.

The Economics of the Movie Business
Movie business rise and fall but barely survives due to changing its constant change to its ownership, distribution, production, and exhibition.

Production, Distribution, and Exhibition Today
Movie production, distribution, and exhibition was highly demanded before the 20th century.

Making Money on Movies Today
80 - 90 % of movies fail when they enter the movie theaters. In order to make profit out of the movies, without a loss profit, there are procedures to take. 1) The studio gets a portion of the theaters’ revenue. 2) 4 months later (in time), the movie is released out in DVD, rentals, streams, etc. 3) The film hits the cable, pay-per-view, etc. 4) The studio distributes to foreign countries.

Theater Chains Consolidate Exhibition
Film exhibition is controlled by a theater chain. 50%+ is controlled by the leading 7 companies, Regal Cinemas, AMC Entertainment, Cinemark USA, Carmike Cinemas, Cineplex Entertainment, Rave Motion Pictures, and Marcus Theatre.
The Major Studio Players The Big Six: Warner Brothers, Paramount, Twentieth Century Fox, Universal, Columbia Pictures, and Disney.

Convergence: Movies Adjust to the Digital Turn
The internet is the biggest challenge to the movie industry. The movie industry is constantly competing against the internet due to the internet constantly changing, reviewing, promoting, marketing, etc.

Alternative Voices
The changes of the cameras needed for filming in a simple and more quick and easy structive matter. But, not all improvements are good.

Popular Movies and Democracy
Culture and international movie filming/making that highly influences viewers due to cultural significance, critical thinking, and time invested (questions answered).

Reba

People

• Leonardo Da Vinci – who theorized in the late 1400s about creating a device that would reproduce reality.
• Eadweard Muybridge – an English photographer living in America, credited with being the first to manipulate photographs to make them appear to be moving while simultaneously projected to a screen.
• George Eastman – (founder of Eastman Kodak) developed the first roll film
• Louis Aime Augustin Le Prince – a Frenchman living in England, invented the first motion picture camera using film roll.
• Hannibal Goodwin – Improved Eastman’s roll film by using celluloid.
• Louis and Auguste Lumiere – developed the cinematograph, a combined camera, film development, and projection system.
• Thomas Edison – created the vitascope
• George Melies – opened the first public movie theater in France in 1896.

 Events

• Nickelodeons – a form of movie theater (nickel-theater)
• 1941 Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane
• 1977 Star Wars
• 2009 Avatar

Models

• The Magic Lantern – in the 17^th century, which projected images painted on glass plates using an oil lamp as a light source.
• Thaumatrope – in 1824, a two-sided card with different images on each side that appeared to combine the images when twirled
• Zoetrope – a cylindrical device that rapidly twirled images inside a cylinder, which appeared to make the images move.
• Kinetograph
• Kinetoscope
• Vitascope – which enabled filmstrips of longer lengths  to be projected without interruption and hinted at the potential of movies as a future mass medium.

Terms

(1^st Tier)

• CRT Television
• VCRs
• Drive-In Theaters
• Black and White
• Silent Movies
• Video Tapes

(2^nd Tier)

• LCD/LED Televisions
• Color
• Sound
• Plasmas
• Theaters
• DVDs
• Digital Video Recorder (DVR)
• Narrative Films

(3^rd Tier)

• Three Dimensional (3D)
• High Definition
• Blu-rays
• 4K Televisions
• Blu-ray Player
• IMAX Theaters

Tomas

Mary Pickford- an astute business woman, key figure in elevating the financial status and professional role of film actor- known as amercias sweetheart-1917 weekly salary of 15,000

Talkies-movies with sound beginning in 1927 newsreels-weekly 10 minute magazine style compilations of filmed news events from around the world organized in a sequence of short reports; prominent in movie theatres between 1920s and 1950s

Blockbuster-the type of big bdget special effects films that typically have summer or holiday release dates, heavy promotion and lucrative merchandising tie-ins

Hollywood adopted the motion picture production code in the 1930s.  In 1967, after the code had been ignored by producers for several years, the motion picture associatioin of amerca initiated the current rating system which rated films on age appropriatenes rather than censoring all adult content.

Movie palaces- full time single screen movie theatres that provided a more hospitable moving going environment- 1914 in newyork first movie palace.

Niko

Actors

1. Marlon Brandon: American actor who brought the techniques of method acting to prominence in the films A Streetcar Named Desire and On the Waterfront, both directed by Elia Kazan in the early 1950s. His acting style, combined with his public persona as an outsider uninterested in the Hollywood of the early 1950s, had a profound effect on a generation of actors, including James Dean and Paul Newman, and later stars, including Robert De Niro.
2. Charlie Chaplin: Comic visionary who enjoyed a successful career as an actor, director, writer, and music composer during the silent-movie era, he is consider the father of the silent comedy. His comic portrayal of a drunk in a bowler hat and baggy pants, better known as “The Little Tramp,” captured the hearts of early movie-goers and became one of his most endearing and enduring characters. Chaplin became one of the most famous and admired men in the world until he fell victim to McCarthyism in 1952. He continues to be held in high regard, with The Gold Rush, City Lights, Modern Times, and The Great Dictator often ranked among industry lists of the greatest films of all time.
3. Alfred Hitchcock: Known as the “Master of Suspense,” Alfred Hitchcock was one of the most famous film directors of the 20th century. He directed more than 50 feature-length films from the 1920s into the 1970s. Hitchcock’s image, seen during Hitchcock’s frequent cameos in his own films and before each episode of the hit TV show Alfred Hitchcock Presents, has become synonymous with suspense.

Movies

1. Schindler's List: Premiered on November 30, 1993, in Washington, D.C. and it was released on December 15, 1993, in the United States. Regarded as one of the greatest films ever made. Directed by Steven Spielberg. The film is based on the life of Oskar Schindler, a German businessman who saved the lives of more than a thousand mostly Polish-Jewish refugees during the Holocaust by employing them in his factories. It’s a movie that speak about the Holocaust in a brilliant way without a happy ending.
2. Jaws: Is the first film to ever be released nationwide all at once, instead of hitting different theatres all at different times. At a time, it was also the highest earning movie of all history, until Star Wars arrived. It was the first movie ever to go past the 100 million dollar box office. It won several awards and is also listed in many top film lists. It is one of the most successful and groundbreaking films of all time. It’s consider the summery of blockbuster movies.
3. 2001: A Space Odyssey: is a 1968 British-American science fiction film produced and directed by Stanley Kubrick. The screenplay was written by Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke, and was partially inspired by Clarke's short story "The Sentinel". It is notable for its scientific accuracy, pioneering special effects, ambiguous imagery, sound in place of traditional narrative techniques, and minimal use of dialogue.

Directors

1. Steven Spielberg: American film director, screenwriter, producer, and business magnate. In a career of more than four decades, Spielberg's films have covered many themes and genres. Spielberg's early science-fiction and adventure films were seen as archetypes of modern Hollywood blockbuster filmmaking. In later years, his films began addressing humanistic issues such as the Holocaust, the transatlantic slave trade, war, and terrorism. He is considered one of the most popular and influential filmmakers in the history of cinema. He is also one of the co-founders of DreamWorks movie studio.
2. Georges Méliès:  French illusionist and filmmaker famous for leading many technical and narrative developments in the earliest days of cinema. Méliès, a prolific innovator in the use of special effects, accidentally discovered the substitution stop trick in 1896, and was one of the first filmmakers to use multiple exposures, time-lapse photography, dissolves, and hand-painted color in his work. He is consider as one of the fathers of science fiction genre.
3. Woody Allen:  American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, playwright, and musician whose career spans more than 50 years. He is well known for his devoted attention in the psychoanalysis and psychoanalysts.

Studio

1. Pixar: American computer animation film studio based in Emeryville, California. The studio is best known for its CGI-animated feature films created with PhotoRealistic RenderMan, its own implementation of the industry-standard RenderMan image-rendering application programming interface used to generate high-quality images. This did a major change to animated movies.

Anita

Animators

1. Walt Disney:  American film producer who was influential in many aspects of film, but most notably in animation. Walt and his staff created some of the world's most well-known animated fictional characters. No one had a greater impact on the entertainment industry and popular 20th Century culture than Walt Disney.  
2. DreamWorks:   An American animation studio that creates animated feature films, television programs and online virtual worlds.  The studio began using traditional animation for their films, but currently utilize computer animated movie techniques. The award winning studio has won two Academy Awards for their animated films.
3. Pixar:   Pixar Studios have been creating animated films for 25 years. In 1995, Pixar released the world's first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, which was the highest grossing film of that year. Pixar and Disney collaborated to release at least one animated feature film per year. Disney/Pixar animated films have gotten nominated for Academy Awards every year since they started their collaboration.

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