PennTags Feed for /tag/films

Performance of or Showing Films in the Classroom

ALA, ARL Release Guidance on Digital Delivery of Content to Classrooms
WASHINGTON, D.C. - The American Library Association (ALA) and the Association of Research Libraries have released a document titled "Performance of or Showing Films in the Classroom" to provide guidance on digital delivery of content to the "physical" classroom.

According to the associations, the Technology, Education and Copyright Harmonization (TEACH) Act enacted in 2002 does not provide librarians clarity on copyright exceptions for the digital delivery of content for distance education. Thus, understanding what is permitted under the TEACH Act in combination with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) and existing exceptions, such as fair use, is becoming increasingly confusing to many practitioners.

EarthStation1.com - Classic

Jean-Piere Melville/ Philippe Garrel

Andrew Sarris | The New York Observer

Jessica Brent - Beyond the Gaze: Visual Fascination and the Feminine Image in Silent Hitchcock - Camera Obscura 19:1

Jessica Brent makes the claim that with the advent of sound, Hitchcock was able to marginalize the feminine image. The sound age forced a change in aesthetic and style with the feminine being destroyed and replaced with the investigative gaze. She asserts that the visual pleasure beyond the gaze is removed from Hitchcock's work. Women and feminine figures are forced into the narrative demands of the male eye.

On one hand, I'm still not entirely convinced of this argument or completely sure of its meaning. However, I think that scene in which Alice kills Crewe escapes Brent's interpretation should it be true. Alice kills Crewe behind a curtain, away from the eyes of the portraits and the audience. The only male eyes that see her are Crewe's and she is usurping his position. Therefore, at the crucial moment of the film where Alice asserts herself and confronts her anxieties, she is separate from any narrative demands that might be forced upon her.

Charlie Chaplin

McCabe, John. Charlie Chaplin. New York: Doubleday & Company Inc, 1978.

Chapter: Modern Times

The chapter in this book analyzes the film and discusses some reasons it was created. Chaplin, in 1901, had a job in which he operated a large machine that terrified him. This, as well as the story of young workers basically losing their minds in Detroit inspired the idea for the film as well as direct scenes from it. The article also discusses the powerful opening of the film which first states Modern Times is "the story of industry, of individual enterprise-humanity crusading in the pursuit of happiness." Next, in the opening scene, a montage metaphor is created by juxtaposing a herd of sheep to workers getting out of the subway.

The discussion of the opening scene precisely relates to my thesis as Chaplin directly attacks the homogenization of workers within the first thrity seconds of the film. In this montage Chaplin critiques industrialization as literally turning workers into a herd to obey the commands of the select few in charge. Like sheep, the workers all look the same and behave the same.

The chapter also discusses the reception of the film in other countries. Workers in Russia under the rule of Stalin were confused by this comparison of people to sheep. The film was banned in Italy and Germany. This also relates to my thesis because it shows that it was not just in the United States where homogeneity was in existence. In Russia especially, a homogenous society was not only encourage, it was the only way to survive.

ScienceDirect - Technology in Society : Neutralizing the piracy of motion pictures: reengineering the industry's supply chain

This article analyzes the preventative measures the movie industry must take in order to protect their copyrights and stifle piracy. It is made clear that various factors, particularly the invent of broadband Internet, peer-to-peer networks, and improvements in video compression technologies have made such efforts extremely difficult. Thus the industry must exercise legal and technical means to battle competing markets. The entertainment industry is aiming to hold the information industry accountable for all copyright violations. Furthermore, they are urging the information industry to also institute anti-piracy technologies in all software and hardware. By elaborating on the previous legal battles that complicate the debate on whether to hold the user or manufacturer accountable for piracy, the authors device a better solution that assigning blame. The article suggests that the movie industry should adapt their supply chain to provide cheaper, quality, convenient products than any illegal form could offer.

This new model would force the industry to reconstruct how they distribute, exhibit, and produce films. The second section delineates the current framework of the industry tracing back to the 1970s. The weaknesses are exposed and the industry's long-term "techo-phobia" is identified as a major culprit. The next section brings attention to the legal battles of the MPAA and the RIAA to protect copyrights and further discusses the benefits and setbacks of the DMCA. Two organizations have been assembled to try and deal with these problems; one is the Digital Media Device Association and the other is Project Hudson, which is made up of technology giants such as Samsung, Toshiba, and Nokia. Various solutions are proposed, such as digital watermarking and smart-card technology, but all have flaws. Because neither legal nor technological solutions effectively can eliminate piracy, the most sensible answer is economically based. In terms of distribution, the article suggests creating e-Blockbusters near ISPs, which would enable consumers to rent movies in a cheap and accessible manner. For exhibition, theaters must adapt by adjusting the "window scheme, offering differentiated digital viewing experiences, and developing fast-access storage to reduce portable media." Production will take on a purely digital form, reducing the need for human interaction almost completely.

There are plenty of viable options available to improve and sustain the movie industry; it is just a matter or time and technology. The aforementioned solutions can improve the industry and successfully eliminate piracy if executed effectively. The article articulates my very thesis and attempts to provide an answer as to how the movie industry can change to this digitally advancing world.

Bootleg Videos: Piracy With a Camcorder - New York Times

This New York Times article from 1997 shows how far piracy has come today. It emphasizes the difficulties the movie industry has to face now compared to eleven years ago. In the last year or so, the two blockbusters that hit the streets before their openings were the "Hulk" and "American Gangster." Although the Internet has made proliferation of these movies capable, bootlegs have existed for quite sometime. Back in 1997 "Men in Black," "Batman and Robin, and "Hercules" were leaked earlier than its intended opening and were available for purchase on the streets of New York for five dollars. The article isolates New York as the major hub for pirated motion pictures. Back then, the estimate of how much the industry loses from domestic revenues is about $250 million (compared to $6.1 billion in 2005).

The author suggest that bootlegs are acquired by people sneaking camcorders into advanced screenings. The films are often of bad quality, but consumers want what is new before anyone else. To clean up piracy, the government and individuals targeted the streets of New York. In 1992 when Spike Lee's film "Malcom X" came out, he and some friends went to 125th Street with baseball bats to scare vendors of bootleg films. The MPAA geared its efforts towards attacking duplication labs in New York; the raids led to the seizure of over 10, 000 bootleg videos. Besides selling copies on the street corners, bootleggers set up booths, akin to tourist attractions, that stock the most recent films for purchase.

This article is a great comparison of how piracy has developed with technology. Pirates are now almost invisible due to the Internet, the quality of the films pirated is of superior quality, and dissemination is almost impossible to contain. The losses incurred by the industry back then have significantly increased and the pirates are more organized. A brief discussion of the drastic changes that have occured in the last decade will help contextualize the efforts the MPAA has had to undergo.

Depression America and its movies.

[Bergman, Andrew. .eries [Ann Arbor, Mich., University Microfilms, 1971].

Call#: Van Pelt Library PN1993.5.U6 B4]

Bergman, Andrew Laurence. Depression America and Its Movies. University of Wisconsin: University of
Michigan Microfilms Inc, 1970.

Bergman offers a survey of how the film industry was affected by the Great Depression in
American history. He describes the changes that Hollywood underwent as a result of economic
crisis following the stock market crash in 1929. In addition to details of how general film-
making and production had to adjust to harder times during the Great Depression, Bergman
also notes the impact that the Great Depression had on the American public. For example,
the author explains how despite having less income to spend on leisurely pursuits, many
Americans started attending films in greater numbers during the Great Depression. This was in
no small part to the shifting cultural sentiments and attitudes of the time. Economic
hardship had a tremendous effect on how films were made and on who came to theaters to see
these movies.

Bergman's description of the movies produced during the years of the Great Depression
help to understand the immediate historical context that "The Philadelphia Story" was born
of. This perspective can be applied to how the film was influences by changes in the industry
as well as what was then popular with American audiences. In 1940 the United States was still
feeling the residual effects of the Great Depression and the movie industry could still
remember the harder times it had come across only a few years previous. Bergman explains that
1932 may have been the lowest point in Hollywood during the entire Great Depression; studios,
such as MGM were keenly aware of the financial risk that was taken with the production of
each film. This is an anxiety that should be kept in mind as an undercurrent that most likely
would have permeated behind the scenes in shooting "The Philadelphia Story". More importantly
perhaps is the statement that Americans wanted to see escapist films during this era. The
deprived public relished having a glimpse into the lives of the American over-privileged during
the Great Depression; the allure of the clothing, manner of speech, and general opulence of
the lives portrayed on-screen offered a temporary vacation from the dreary reality of the
unemployment lines. A chapter of Bergman's volume is titled "Federal Benevolence,
the Search for Authority, The Return of the Law, and Social Realism"; it reaffirms that
Americans were looking to have their values restored and moral codes re-validated during
this period. Watching members of the glamorous Philadelphia gentry celebrate a happy occasion
like a wedding would have offered an hour-and-a-half of escape from everyday life and a confirmation
that Americans were living a sound life.

Seven Pillars of Wisdom: A Triumph

Lawrence, T. E. "Chapter XII: Palm-Gardens." Seven Pillars of Wisdom: A Triumph. New York: Penguin Books, 1962. 90-92.

Seven Pillars of Wisdom: A Triumph, as the personal account of Thomas Edward Lawrence and his involvement in the Arab Revolt, acts as an invaluable resource for any paper written on the David Lean film, as it was originally intended as an adaptation of this written work. Reading Lawrence’s own version of this portion of his life provides a good source for evaluation of accuracy in plotline, detail, and even psychological portrayal of the characters.

The twelfth chapter in particular serves as a vital frame of reference when comparing the film adaptation with the original piece from which it sprung. In these few pages of text is contained the pivotal first meeting between T. E. Lawrence and Prince Fiesal, the Arabian leader in whom the idealistic Englishman immediately recognizes the heroic, traditional qualities for which he had been searching for so long. The tension of this moment as it is described by Lawrence himself, who confronts the imposing leader before a group of fellow tribesmen, is well-reflected by the corresponding scene in the film. Furthermore, the physical description of Fiesal is eerily close to the appearance of Sir Alec Guinness as he portrays this character in Lawrence of Arabia.

This chapter also provides additional details as to setting, architecture, and the structures and hierarchies of Arabian society. It serves to firmly ground T. E. Lawrence’s story within the much vaster historical movement of which he was a part. Particularly when dealing with a film that falls into the genre of epic and spectacle, it is extremely important to have a grasp of the actual persons and events so as not to be deluded by the inevitable artistic license the directors and editors will utilize.

Lawrence of Arabia: A Film's Anthropology

Caton, Steven C. "An Allegory of Anthropology." Lawrence of Arabia: A Film's Anthropology. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1999. 142-171.

In this chapter of his book, Steven C. Caton discusses the anthropological leanings of the main character of Lawrence of Arabia, T. E. Lawrence. He does not posit that the anthropological elements of the film are purposefully constructed by either the director or the scriptwriters, but rather that they appear in the film as subconscious manifestations of clichés about anthropologists. According to Caton, it is an accepted belief that individuals enter into the fields of anthropology and archaeology because, during their childhoods, they experienced feelings of alienation and liminality. Thus Lawrence, the bastard son of an English nobleman, and a young man desperately attempting to escape from the stifling atmosphere of the English countryside into the exotic, Oriental environment of the Arabian desert, perfectly fits into this stereotype. Lawrence’s condescending, objectivist studies of and perspectives about the Arabian culture mark him as a Westerner with a drive, just like cultural anthropologists, to discover identity within a distant, mysterious land, and to ‘play-act’ as a member of whatever culture they happen to be studying.

Steven Caton’s chapter is a cleverly thorough and well-written piece of allegorical analysis. It provides an excellent look into the motivations of the main character, and furthermore into the filmmakers who, according to Caton, were filled with a sense of adventure as profound, and in some ways naïve, as that of Lawrence himself. His work offers a unique spin on the traditional take on Lawrence, since Caton views Lawrence from his own perspective as an anthropologist. Just as Lawrence serves as a figure for fascination and study to later generations, the Arabian culture served as a great and compelling mystery to Lawrence. Through a close study of Lawrence's reactions throughout several scenes of the film, the reader gains a much clearer understanding of just how condescending and intrusional Lawrence's sojourns in Arabia truly were.

Penetrating the Enigma: Finding the Man within the Myth of Lawrence of Arabia (1962, David Lean)

Lawrence of Arabia has always been one of my favorite films, and the figure of T. E. Lawrence, who serves as the focus of the four-hour-long spectacle, seems surrounded by an aura of mystery that is both impenetrable yet incredibly alluring. I wish to answer the question, "Who is Lawrence of Arabia?" Why does this warrior-poet continue to captivate audiences so many years after his exploits in the Arab Revolt? By exploring the means of propagandizing during World War I, American fascination with his myth, and the actual historical personage, I hope to understand what it is that makes T. E. Lawrence a figure worthy of this epic film, and what it is in turn that fuels the film's enduring legacy.

Lawrence of Arabia: Elements and Facets of the Theme

Wilson, Michael. "Lawrence of Arabia: Elements and Facets of the Theme." Cineaste: America's Leading Magazine on the Art and Politics of the Cinema 21.4 (1995): 30-32.

Michael Wilson’s article, although brief, acts as a valuable starting point for research on Lawrence of Arabia. Wilson highlights the important themes that arise when studying the portrayal of T. E. Lawrence’s character in the epic film, and the various complexities and contradictions that arise when attempting to unravel the mystery that lies behind the man. Presented in the format of a numbered list, Wilson extends his proposal of each subject matter with a brief description and an argument as to its relevance in providing a deeper understanding of the film’s underlying messages. He covers such themes as the marginal status of T. E. Lawrence within Great Britain, Lawrence’s desire for fame and the immortality that comes with it, and even his secret admiration and devotion to a mysterious figure known only by the initials ‘S.A.’

This article serves to introduce the reader to the incredible sense of history that saturates the film: American participation in World War I, and their subsequent need to see a hero arise from the ashes of mass murder and immeasurable bloodshed; the long Arabian tradition of autocratic rule; Britain’s attempts to expand its empire into the Arab front. Overall, while this piece would not serve as a central source to back up the arguments in a longer paper, it still functions well as a stepping stone, a pool of ideas that can aid during the essential brainstorming process that comes before any significant researching feat.

T. E. Lawrence, the Turks, and the Arab Revolt in the Cinema: Anglo-American and Turkish Representations

Raw, Laurence. "T. E. Lawrence, the Turks, and the Arab Revolt in the Cinema: Anglo-American and Turkish Representations." Literature Film Quarterly 4.33 (2005): 252-61.

The author of this work compares the perspectives of two different films on the Turkish people: David Lean’s Lawrence of Arabia and Lüfti E