Notes
The following material is from Wikipedia.
1957-1964: The Shock of the New – Modern Filmmaking in Western Europe.
- Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory (1895) (introduced in Episode 1) dir. Louis Lumière
- Summer with Monika (1953) dir. Ingmar Bergman
- amongst the most sensuous of its time
- actress looked straight into the camera, hadn’t been tried before
- The Seventh Seal (1957) dir. Ingmar Bergman
- Winter Light (1963) dir. Ingmar Bergman
- Bergman’s films reflected death
- autobiographical film, related to his own life
- Persona (1966) dir. Ingmar Bergman
- self-awareness
- “didn’t only tell the story, it was the story”
- Pickpocket (1959) dir. Robert Bresson
- themes of imprisonment
- not extremely theatrical (flat lighting, 5omm lens, plain clothing, etc.) – was Bresson’s style
- “one does not create by adding, but by taking away”
- stardom had no place in his films, he rejected glossiness
- Bresson was religious, root of his filmmaking
- Au hasard Balthazar (1966) dir. Robert Bresson
- Taxi Driver (1976) (introduced in Episode 1) dir. Martin Scorsese
- Ratcatcher (1999) dir. Lynne Ramsay
- inspired by Bresson
- Monsieur Hulot’s Holiday (1953) (introduced in Episode 2) dir. Jacques Tati
- Mon Oncle (1956) dir. Jacques Tati
- Tati disliked strong storytelling
- shows feelings of modern life
- films past in warm lighting, films future in flat lighting, makes statement about modernity
- Tati never used close-ups to show the whole picture of a society, key details would appear in a tiny part of the frame
- Fellini’s Casanova (1976) dir. Federico Fellini
- films comparable to the circus: colors, larger than life, etc.
- Nights of Cabiria (1957) dir. Federico Fellini
- showed how modern his films were
- changed style throughout the film
- 8½ (1963) dir. Federico Fellini
- helped open up the form of cinema
- Stardust Memories (1980) dir. Woody Allen
- Cléo from 5 to 7 (1962) dir. Agnès Varda
- first film of new wave
- captured the flow of thought and its unpredictability
- Last Year at Marienbad (1961) dir. Alain Resnais
- made people question memory and truth
- themes of uncertainty
- The 400 Blows (1959) dir. François Truffaut
- Truffaut thought films were too left and social
- showed film becoming more personal
- À bout de souffle (1959) dir. Jean-Luc Godard
- preferred closeups which isolated people from the world
- used jump cuts to emphasize beauty of cinema
- Life of an American Fireman (1903) (introduced in Episode 1) dir. Edwin S. Porter
- Arsenal (1929) (introduced in Episode 3) dir. Alexander Dovzhenko
- Une femme mariée (1964) dir. Jean-Luc Godard
- American Gigolo (1980) dir. Paul Schrader
- inspired by Godard
- Accattone (1961) dir. Pier Paolo Pasolini
- captured Pasolini’s life experiences
- used religious music to make everyday struggles spiritual
- The Gospel According to St. Matthew (1964) dir. Pier Paolo Pasolini
- challenged otherworldly way that virgin mary is usually shown in Catholic art
- instead portrayed her as plain
- inspired by The Passion of Joan of Arc
- Pasolini felt consumerism was taking over
- The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928) (introduced in Episode 2) dir. Carl Theodor Dreyer
- A Fistful of Dollars (1964) dir. Sergio Leone
- Leone hated comedies
- innovative visual style
- deep staging with wide screen, gave imagery an epic quality, could do with new technology invented in Italy
- Once Upon a Time in the West (1968) (introduced in Episode 1) dir. Sergio Leone
- channels neorealism with concepts of time
- used idea of waiting for the future
- Johnny Guitar (1954) (introduced in Episode 6) dir. Nicholas Ray
- Senso (1954) dir. Luchino Visconti
- scale and emotions of opera seen in his filmmaking, due to Visconti’s history working in opera
- Visconti was a master of the crane shot
- Rocco and His Brothers (1960) dir. Luchino Visconti
- shows Visconti’s sympathy for the poor
- shows “bruised beauty of the people” with cinematography
- L’eclisse (1962) dir. Michelangelo Antonioni
- Antonioni saw life as more abstract, filmed more on the edge
- frames actors unconventionally
- shows void of modern life with framing
- The Passenger (1975) dir. Michelangelo Antonioni
- space in frame takes over
- character’s spiral outwards, dissolve into space
- The Travelling Players (1975) dir. Theodoros Angelopoulos
- doesn’t follow cinema norms of editing
- The Wheelchair (1960) dir. Marco Ferreri
- new wave manifested itself in comedy
- edgy, non-conformist tone
- What Have I Done to Deserve This? (1984) dir. Pedro Almodóvar
- same tones as The Wheelchair
- Viridiana (1961) dir. Luis Buñuel
- Bunuel’s most banned film
- I Am Curious (Yellow) (1967) dir. Vilgot Sjöman
- modernist new wave surged
- La Maman et la Putain (1973) dir. Jean Eustache