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The Man with the Movie
Camera (Dziga Vertov, 1929)
Imdb
entry on The Man with the Movie Camera
This film was produced at a moment when the “city film” or “city
symphony” became an important form of documentary. (The most famous of
these films is Walther Ruttmann’s Berlin,
Symphony of a Great City, whose opening sequence we’ll see on
Tuesday.) In what ways is The Man
with the Movie Camera a documentary? What elements does is
share with other documentaries? What do we learn about the cities
(Moscow, Kiev, Odessa, and others) where Vertov shot footage for the
film? How does the film present that basic information? Does the space
revealed in the film seem coherent and logical or jumbled and
confusing? Why? What editing and other filmmaking strategies make the
space appear to fit together or crumble apart?
What are the differences between the approach to filmmaking (especially
editing) displayed in Vertov’s film and the theories outlined in the
reading from Eisenstein? If you’ve seen a film by Eisenstein (e.g., The Battleship Potemkin), how would
you compare and contrast the two men as filmmakers, as theorists, and
as bearers of a political message?
How does the presence of the camera and cameraman in Vertov’s work
affect the theoretical and political dimensions of the film? In other
words, does the fact that the tools and the people involved in making a
film are everywhere in The Man with
the Movie Camera (including in the title) change how we receive
the film itself? Does this reflexivity make the story more or less
engrossing? More or less moving? More or less realistic? Imagine a film
about a particular time and place without the reflexivity of Vertov’s
film and without some of the rhetorical bombast. What would the film
gain and lose in the process of toning it down?
The film returns repeatedly to images of people fused with cameras and
people interacting with cameras. What is the relationship between human
beings and the cinematic apparatus in The
Man with the Movie Camera?
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Modern
Times (Charles Chaplin, 1936)
Imdb
entry on Modern Times
Compare the visions of industrial and factory work presented in the
Gilbreth motion study viewed in class last week, Vertov’s The Man with the Movie Camera, and
Chaplin’s Modern Times. How
does each film present this kind of labor? As heroic? As dehumanizing?
As humanity harnessing the power of machines? As humanity subordinated
to machines? Or as a more complex combination of these perspectives? Is
Chaplin’s tramp a hero or a victim in Modern
Times?
How does cinema function in the Gilbreth clip, the Vertov film, and Modern Times? Does the camera
stand apart from the machines that swallow up Chaplin or that Vertov’s
worker uses? Or are the camera and the projector machines like any
other?
Chaplin literally waves the red flag in Modern Times (during the
demonstration scene). How would you characterize the political beliefs
expressed in the film? How is the film’s presentation of modern
technology related to its politics? Is the film purely a product of the
Depression, or is it also making broader claims that transcend the
historical era when the film was produced?
Think about the Soviet filmmakers whose films or writing we’ve
encountered. How would you compare and contrast the political
orientations of Chaplin and these various Soviet films and filmmakers?
Eisenstein places film within a much large theory of history, with the
collision of images in montage the equivalent of forces clashing in
history. Does Chaplin also place film within a much larger historical
and philosophical context? What are the important reference points in
that philosophy?
Chaplin is often compared to Buster Keaton, probably the most famous
silent film comedian other than Chaplin. If you’ve seen any films by
Keaton, think about the similarities and differences between the kind
of comedy, especially physical comedy, performed by the two actors.
Think especially about their relationship to the camera and to editing.
To what extent are their performances the product of editing and other
tricks made possible by cinema? Or are their performances essentially
the same as they’d be on stage, with the camera just
another observer in the audience?
Chaplin made Modern Times
after a five-year hiatus, and one of the reasons cited for his refusal
to make films in the early 1930s was his unwillingness to make sound
films, despite the fact that the industry had already largely converted
to sound production and exhibition. (His 1931 film City Lights is completely silent.)
What strategies does Chaplin use to introduce sound in Modern Times? Does he appear to
embrace this new technology and attempt to exploit all the
possibilities of sound cinema? Or does he seem reluctant to work in
sound? What moments of the film are particularly important when
evaluating Chaplin’s approach to sound? How is the film’s stance toward
sound technology related to the film’s overall vision of industrial
machinery and technological progress in modern times?
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Goddess (Wu Yonggang, 1934)
Imdb
entry on Goddess
Some background information on the film and its context.… Shanghai was
the fifth largest city in the world in the early 1930s, and it
supported a vibrant and cosmopolitan cultural scene. Parts of the city
were occupied by foreign powers, contributing to this cosmopolitan
atmosphere, but also establishing the city as a symbol of China’s
vulnerability and suffering in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Shanghai was also the home of the Chinese film industry, and between
1920 (roughly the year domestic features are first produced) and 1937
(the year Japanese bombing of Shanghai sent many of the leading
directors, actors, and craftspeople into exile, either in Hong Kong or
the Communist camp at Yan’an), about 200 production companies made
thousands of films. Those films both adopted the “global vernacular”
that Hansen writes about and produced a noticeable Shanghai style, a
local variation on those global trends. The star of Goddess, Ruan Lingyu, was probably
the most famous actress in the Chinese film industry before her suicide
in 1935 at the age of 24. She frequently portrayed suffering and
oppressed women, whose tragedy has often been interpreted as an
embodiment of China’s misery at the time.
The Hansen essay on Shanghai silent cinema places Goddess in the context of worldwide
trends in film in the 1920s and 1930s. Which elements of Goddess seem easier to connect to
these global currents? The genre? The editing style? The studio sets?
The acting? The role of the star? Which elements seem to resist this
attempt to think about film as a globalized medium?
Although most of the film was shot in the studio, it includes a number
of shots that show important landmarks in Shanghai (e.g., an enormous
downtown department store). What do we learn about the city from those
shots? What aspects of urban life are the focus of that location
shooting?
Think about the number of shots that show the city juxtaposed in some
way with Ruan Lingyu. Which theorists help us understand that attempt
to link the image of this female star and the city of Shanghai? How do
we interpret those shots in terms of gender? Do these shots suggest
that Ruan Lingyu reigns over the city? That she’s a product of that
particular environment? That she’s excluded from the promise of the
city?
To what extent is Goddess a
“realist” film? How are you defining “realism” in this context? The
film focuses on the details of the main character’s everyday life, and
it’s located not in an idealized environment but on the gritty streets
of this city. Is that enough to make a film “realist”?
To what extent is Goddess a
melodrama? How are you defining “melodrama” in this context? Do the
melodramatic elements of the film contradict the moments of realism?
What is the relationship between the clear social consciousness of the
film and the tear-jerking plot, the heightened emotion of the acting,
and the odd coincidences (why does the boss always walk in when the
prostitute is hiding her money)?
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Mon
Oncle (Jacques
Tati, 1958)
Imdb
entry on Mon Oncle
In Mon Oncle Hulot and the
environment where he lives is clearly distinguished from the home of
his sister and her family. What are the characteristics of each of
those worlds? What is their relationship to tradition and modernity?
What marks the threshold between one world and the other? How does
Hulot respond to the high-tech gadgets and other bizarre objects in the
unfamiliar, ultra-modern environment on the other side of the wall?
Think about the way the city of Shanghai is represented in Goddess and the way the character
of the prostitute is defined in part through her relationship to the
city. What is the relationship between Hulot and the city of Paris?
What are the advantages and pleasures provided by the old city where
Hulot lives or where the boys cause passersby to walk into the
lamppost? What is the nature of the promises and threats contained in
the city occupied by his sister and her family? Does Hulot seem
prepared to adapt to that environment? What strategies, in any, does he
use to make himself at home in that city of the future?
How would you characterize the difference between Chaplin’s comedy in Modern Times and Tati’s in Mon Oncle? Is one actor more of a
physical comedian than the other? Is one more active or passive? How
does Chaplin respond to the modern world that surrounds him in that
film? And Tati?
Think about Tati in connection with the Deleuze reading. Deleuze writes
that in the post-war era, “a cinema of seeing replaces action” (257).
Are there any moments in Mon Oncle
that appear to be “a cinema of seeing” rather than action? In Deleuze’s
account the rubble of World War II is replaced by what he calls the
“any-space-whatever”: deserted but inhabited spaces, disused
warehouses, waste ground, cities in the course of demolition or
reconstruction, the undifferentiated fabric of the city. How do these
“any-spaces-whatever” feature in Tati’s film?
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Bicycle
Thieves (Vittorio
de Sica, 1948)
Imdb
entry on Bicycle Thieves
Bicycle Thieves is
often considered one of the masterpieces of Italian neorealism, and
Bazin refers to de Sica often when defining cinematic realism. In your
own viewing experience, which elements of the narrative seemed
realistic? Which elements of the filmmaking style seemed to accentuate
that realism? Which seemed to detract from that appearance of reality?
What definition of “realism” are you explicitly or implicitly adopting
when you define the film or particular moments in the film as “realist”?
Which elements of Bicycle Thieves
does Bazin emphasize when he defines de Sica as a director of realist
films? Are those the same aspects of the film that you focused on in
response to the previous questions? Which elements of de Sica’s films
does Bazin not notice or choose to deemphasize?
In an essay on Bicycle Thieves
Bazin writes that the film “is one of the first example of pure cinema.
No more actors, no more story, no more sets, which is to say that in
the perfect aesthetic illusion of reality there is no more cinema.”
What does Bazin mean by that statement? In your own experience of the
film, did Bicycle Thieves
appear less “cinematic” than in other movies? If cinema is no more,
what takes its place?
How is the realism of Bicycle Thieves
different from the realism of Goddess?
Which elements are more abundant or emphatic in one film rather than
the other? Is Bicycle Thieves melodramatic
like Goddess? What is the
relationship between melodrama and realism in the film? Does the
heartrending story of the family at the core of Bicycle Thieves make the film seem
less realistic? What function is served by the melodramatic aspects of
the film?
At the time of its release, some leftist critics expressed their
disapproval of the ending of the film because it brings the personal
relationship of the father and son to the foreground and allows their
social and economic circumstances to recede into the background? Do you
share that critique? What role does the father-son story play in the
film’s representation of the social and economic conditions of post-war
Rome?
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Nights of Cabiria (Federico Fellini, 1956)
Imbd
entry on Nights of Cabiria
Bazin describes certain scenes in Bicycle
Thieves as perfect examples of his theory of cinematic realism,
and he characterizes Nights of
Cabiria as a “voyage to the end of neorealism.” What are the
crucial differences between Bicycle
Thieves and Cabiria?
What are the major differences between the subject matter of the two
films? What are the major formal differences? Which moments of each
film seem particularly “realistic” (either in Bazin’s definition of the
term or your own)? Which seem to depart from a strictly realistic
aesthetic?
Think about the conclusions of both films. In the de Sica film we see a
father and son holding hands and disappearing into a crowd; in Cabiria we see the title character
walking off with a chorus of singing and dancing young people, turning
toward the camera, and perhaps nodding in the direction of the
audience. Is either of these endings realist according to Bazin’s or
some other criterion? At what precise moment does the appearance of
realism break down and give way to some other mode of filmmaking?
Based primarily on his work after Cabiria,
Fellini is known for films that feature bizarre and often grotesque
spectacles and films that focus on the peculiar culture of movies and
show business. We can see less excessive versions of these spectacles
in Cabiria (e.g., the visit
to the religious shrine), and we catch a glimpse of the world of
entertainment during Cabiria’s night with the movie star. What is the
relationship between these scenes and other, more realist moments of
the film? Does the world of saints and miracles or movies and mansions
make the world of rundown shacks seem more realistic by comparison? Or
does it lend an air of unreality to the film as a whole?
The sequence that shows the “man with a sack” distributing charity to
the poor was originally removed from the film because it was considered
offensive to religious and political authorities. Why do you think that
particular scene would be removed rather than the many other candidates
for censorship?
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The Battle of Algiers
(Gillo Pontecorvo, 1965)
Imdb
entry on The Battle of Algiers
Some historical background on the film . . . The Battle of Algiers focuses
primarily on one three-year phase in the Algerian War of
Independence—the years 1954-1957—and it concludes with a brief coda set
in 1960. The revolution began in 1954, when the National Liberation
Front (FLN) and its military wing (ALN) launched a guerrilla war, and
ended in 1962, when the FLN forced the French army and colonial
settlers to withdraw. The fighting began in the countryside but spread
to the city in 1956, when three women placed bombs at three crowded
urban locations (a key event in the film), sparking the Battle of
Algiers. The character of Colonel Mathieu is a composite based mainly
on General Jacques Massu, the leader of the French paratroopers in
Algeria. The film combines material salvaged from the original
screenplay, called Para, which presented the battle from the
perspective of a French soldier, and other stories adapted from Souvenirs de la Bataille d’Alger, a
memoir by Saadi Yacef, one of the FLN military commanders. Most of the
major Algerian figures in the film are based on historical figures with
the same name and played by non-professional actors. The film was
banned in France until 1971, and the torture scenes were initially
removed from American prints for fear of inciting anti-French sentiment.
Although it looks like a documentary shot during the Algerian War, The Battle of Algiers contains not
a single foot of documentary or archival footage, despite the fact that
French archives contained an abundance of material shot by the military
and journalists. Why would the filmmakers refuse to use existing
documentary footage and instead recreate a fictional documentary of
their own?
Although every scene in the film was re-created years later, The Battle of Algiers is renowned
for its appearance of documentary realism and newsreel-like
authenticity. Do you share the opinion that the film looks like a
documentary rather than a re-creation or fictional account? How does The Battle of Algiers create the
illusion that it was shot on the scene of real historical events? How
do the cinematography and editing contribute to that effect? And the
sound?
What does the film have in common with the Italian neorealist films
that we’ve seen in class? And with Bazin’s writing on realist cinema?
Does the film use the long shot/long take aesthetic of early neorealist
pictures like La Terra trema?
What are the key areas of overlap and difference between the neorealism
of films like The Bicycle Thief
and Algiers.
What elements of the film appear artificial? Does the film ever draw on
conventions of fiction filmmaking? When? Do those moments undermine the
realism of the film?
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Safe (Todd Haynes, 1995)
Imdb
entry on Safe
How would you describe the visual strategy that Todd Haynes uses in Safe? Does the film adopt a style
closer to the long shot/long take aesthetic characteristic of
neorealism or the analytical editing of classical Hollywood cinema?
Which specific shots from Safe
do you have in mind?
When Safe was first released
one critic remarked that much of the film looked like it had been shot
with a security camera. Which specific scenes do you think the critic
was referring to? What function does that surveillance camera aesthetic
serve? Who is watching whom? How is the impression that someone is
watching related to the film’s title? Should this surveillance make us
feel “safe in our world”?
In the doctor’s office Carol sees an ad asking if she is allergic to
the 20th century. Of course, nobody is allergic to an entire century,
and the words “allergy” and “20th century” are being used in a larger,
more metaphorical sense in this ad. What is Carol allergic to? What
does this condition have to do with the 20th century?
Think about the suburban southern California location of the film. Why
set the film in this particular environment? How are the security
camera aesthetic and the overarching theme of safety related to this
setting?
At certain moments the film draws upon Hollywood genre conventions
(especially when Carol is suffering from an attack). Which genres does
the film refer to, and how does it make those allusions? Do these genre
elements seem excessive in a film that’s otherwise relatively
restrained? What do they contribute to the film?
Think about various trajectories of the narrative. What kind of space
does Carol inhabit in the beginning of the film? Where does she find
herself at the end? What does Carol look like at the beginning of the
film? What changes does her body undergo over the course of the film?
How does Carol see herself at the beginning of the film? How does she
see herself in the final sequence in front of the mirror? Do you view
this narrative trajectory as a journey of self-discovery? Of escape? Of
retreat to safety? Or of something else? If Carol is finally safe in
her world, what are the benefits and costs of that safety?
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Rear
Window (Alfred Hitchcock, 1954)
Imdb
Entry on Rear Window
In what ways does the experience of Jefferies as he watches events
unfold across the courtyard parallel that of a spectator watching a
film? Be as specific as possible, and think about each aspect of the
process of watching a film: think about the physical condition of
Jefferies and/or Lisa, about their state of mind (as they betray their
fascination with what happens in the windows across the way and their
desire to know more), and about the object of their attention contained
in those rectangular windows. Which of these elements is most closely
analogous to some aspect of watching a film? Why?
What point of view is established by Hitchcock’s camera? Is that POV
always consistent, or does the film depart from that POV at certain
moments? Also consider the many glances and gazes shown to us and
exchanged by characters throughout the film. Who looks at whom, who is
seen by whom, who watches without being seen in return? What
technological devices aid or impede vision in the course of the film?
How are those devices related to the film camera?
How does the relationship between Jefferies and Lisa (discussing issues
of marriage, commitment, gender roles, etc.) relate to the drama
unfolding across the courtyard? Which relationships are most analogous
to those of Jefferies and Lisa? Miss Torso? Miss Lonelyheart? The
Thorwalds? How does the dynamic of the film and their relationship
change when Lisa moves over to the other side of the courtyard and
participates in the drama that she and Jefferies had been content only
to watch?
In one of its aspects, this is a detective film concerned with the
discovery of a crime. But Hitchcock seems as concerned with the motives
of the amateur detectives as he is with those of the villain. What does
the film suggest about their desires and motives? What do we learn
about our own desires and motives from watching the film?
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Peeping
Tom (Michael Powell, 1960)
Imdb
entry on Peeping Tom
Like Rear Window, Peeping Tom tells a story that
revolves around some of the fundamental acts of cinema: looking, being
seen, recording images, and projecting them. How does the dynamic
change when the news photographer of Rear
Window becomes the cinematographer of Peeping Tom? To what extent are the
characters in Rear Window punished for their voyeurism? Is there more
guilt and retribution in Peeping Tom?
What are people guilty of, and how are they punished?
The film received horrible reviews when it was released in 1960, it was
eventually pulled from the theaters, and it virtually ended the career
of one of Britain’s most important directors. What do you think was the
cause of this outrage (in addition to the acting)?
What is the relationship between the films that Mark Lewis makes and
watches, on the one hand, and the film that we (the spectators) are
watching? What devices are used to distinguish between the two films?
What makes Mark’s scopophilia pathological and the voyeurism of the
film audience normal? How does the mother’s blindness and almost
extra-sensory perception contribute to this meditation on limits of
vision?
Laura Mulvey writes that cinema involves a number of different types of
gaze: the look of the camera on the world it records, the look of
characters in the film, and the look of the audience on the film. How
does Peeping Tom
differentiate between these gazes? Is any of these gazes more sinister
and dangerous than the others? How are male and female gender roles
apportioned in the course of this movie? Is any of these gazes (the
camera, the character, the spectator) assigned a gender?
How and why does the film relate the acts of filmmaking and viewing to
the act of murder? What is the difference between Mark’s “perfect film”
and the other snuff films he shoots? What is the relation between
Mark’s movies (“perfect” and otherwise) and the other types of images
presented in Peeping Tom
(pornography, studio productions, documents from Mark’s father’s
research, and the pictures to be taken by the “magic camera” in Helen’s
books for children)?
What motivates Mark to commit his crimes? Do we have any sympathy with
him? Is he a victim in any sense as well? Why does Mark feel naked
without his camera?
One of the taglines for the film was “Do you know what the most
FRIGHTENING thing in the world is?” According to Peeping Tom, what is the most
frightening thing in the world?
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Strange Days (Kathryn Bigelow, 1995)
Imdb
entry on Strange Days
Think about the experience of “clip” production and spectatorship
offered by the SQUID. How is it different from the gaze of the voyeur
and the camera that we’ve seen in Rear
Window and Peeping Tom?
How is the reception of those images different from the way the snuff
films are screened in Peeping Tom?
What fundamental challenges does this device pose to film theories
based on a model with a camera, a projector, and a screen?
Who records their experience (or has it recorded) in Strange Days and who watches the
clips that result? Are the dynamics of the gaze—the active male viewer
and passive female object—the same as in Mulvey’s model? What changes?
What are the implications of a form of media that allows people to
exchange their sensory experience of the world with someone else? Which
characters refuse to participate in this exchange? Why?
What clips are considered beyond the pale in Strange Days? What standards do
different characters uphold in order to maintain some distinction
between moral and immoral voyeurism and between the SQUID and real life?
Kathryn Bigelow is probably most famous for being one of the few female
action directors and because of her adaptation and transformation of
very formulaic genres. Does Strange
Days introduce any unexpected, genre-altering twists to the
action movie? How?
Think about the many recent films concerned with some variation on
virtual reality (e.g., The Matrix
trilogy). Why do you think this concept—a perfect recording or
imitation of the world that someone else can view or experience as
reality itself—has been so important to contemporary filmmakers? Which
theorists that we’ve read this quarter help us understand this
phenomenon?
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The Magnificent
Ambersons (Orson Welles, 1942)
Imdb
entry on The Magnificent Ambersons
Some background on the film . . . This version of The Magnificent Ambersons is
radically different from the original “director’s cut” complete by
Welles. The film was edited down from over two hours to under and hour
and a half, and the ending is dramatically different (really a
180-degree change) from the one Welles envisioned. Most of the original
footage has been destroyed, so we are left with a mutilated masterpiece
and only the screenplay and some film stills to reconstruct the
original. For some of those images and the complete story of these
conflicts between Welles and his producers, see this website: http://ambersons.com/.
Think about and describe the style of the cinematography, editing, and
especially the mise-en-scene (i.e., the theatrical elements of the
film: set design or location, lighting, costume design, figure behavior
and movement, etc.) of The
Magnificent Ambersons? Is this a film that relies on rapid
editing and shallow space or long takes and deep space? If you’ve seen Citizen Kane, think about the
continuities and differences between that film and Ambersons. Is there a noticeable
Welles style that links these two films? Does that style seem better
suited to one story or the other? Which elements of the film seem
choppy or incomplete, perhaps as a result of this radical re-editing?
Which sequences seem particularly effective at compressing time and
allow Welles to tell an epic story in a relatively short narrative?
What is the relationship between the film and the moment of American
history it portrays? What transformation of American society and cities
does the film focus on, and how does this social history relate to the
family melodrama that occupies most of the screen time?
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Gentlemen
Prefer Blondes (Howard Hawks, 1953)
Imdb
entry on Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
The Cahiers du cinéma critics
famous for developing auteur theory used Howard Hawks as one of their
prime example of a director who worked within the Hollywood studio
system but still developed a personal style in his films. (Because of
their enthusiasm for Hawks and Hitchcock, they were know as the
“Hitchcocko-Hawksians.”) If you’ve seen any other Hawks films, can you
notice any continuity between those films and Gentlemen Prefer Blondes? Even if
you haven’t seen any Hawks films, can you imagine any room within the
formula (a musical with two major stars stealing the show) for a
director to place his stamp on the film? Where and how would the
director have an opportunity to make this into a Hawks film? If you
were asked to identify the author of this film, how would you respond?
What do you know about the star persona of Marilyn Monroe? Where did
you get that information? Do you know about her through her films? How
has her celebrity endured over 40 years after her premature death?
Does Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
confirm or complicate your own preconceptions about Marilyn Monroe? Is
she living up to the stereotypes and legends? Or is there more to her
performance than the myth of Marilyn?
More generally, think about the way that a star persona is constructed
(try using one of your favorite stars as a model). What do you know
about this person and how do you know it? What does this individual
represent beyond him- or herself? What values and qualities begin to
accumulate to the star?
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Ed Wood (Tim
Burton, 1994)
Imdb
entry on Ed Wood
One of the tag lines for the film is the following: “When it came to
making bad movies, Ed Wood was the best.” What does the word “bad” mean
in this context? What are the standards of excellence applied here? Can
we learn anything from watching bad movies that we can’t learn from
watching good ones? What role does trash culture, schlock, and camp
play in our culture? What freedoms do they provide? What limitations do
they impose?
How does this film differ from a conventional biopic dedicated to the
life of a great artist (e.g., Maurice Pialat’s Van Gogh or the more recent film
about Johnny Cash, Walk the Line)?
Why should we care about the life and thoughts of a master of bad art?
How does the film we’re watching incorporate recreations and film
excerpts from the work of Ed Wood? What do we learn about Wood by
watching him at work, seeing his method, and then experiencing the
final product?
Think about the use of locations in Ed
Wood. What view of Hollywood does it present, and how does that
vision differ from films like Safe,
Strange Days, and The Player?
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jtweedie@u.washington.edu
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