Film and Theory 3 // 7th December 2011
Film and Theory 3 // 7th December 2011
Italian Vernacular Cinema
- 1970's: 'film is not the art of scholars, but of illiterates' - Werner Herzog
Fellini
- Federico Fellini, was an Italian film director and scriptwriter. He is considered one of the most influential and widely revered filmmakers of the 20th century. He won five Academy Awards in a career that spanned over forty years, and was most famous for a distinct style that blends fantasy and baroque images.
- Fellini is taken very seriously as an Auteur and comments of the superficiality of middle class existence. His films are associated with style and sophistication and seen as worthy of critical appraisal.
- La Dolce Vita (1960) Fellini
- Italian cinema involves a lot more than regular views of cinema; audiences, historical and social contexts and economics.
- “A forkful of westerns: industry, audiences and the Italian western,” Christopher Wagstaff
•prima visione and seconda visione – cinemas that attracted a middle class sophisticated audience usually in major cities, audience selected a film to watch
•terza visione – less populated areas, cheaper tickets, audience went to cinema based on habit rather than selecting a film. Films were more formulaic and popular films
Italian working classes
- Italian cinema is very popular and the average working class citizen goes the the cinema every night; therefore the film industry need a lot of films. In Italy the conventions of watching films are very different to that of the UK. People can talk during a movie, and drink and eat during the film also. People enter the cinema at the beginning, half way through the film and also in some cases towards the end as well. The cinema is thought of as a very social space and somewhere to make friends.
- Wagstaff notes that the terza visione audience was more like a television audience, going to he cinema after dinner, without any particular film in mind, arriving without respect to start time and often using the outing as a social event to talk during the screen, meet with friends, etc.
Filone / Genre
- Filone is similar in many ways to the word 'Genre'. Filone is based n the idea of geology - layers of veins within a
larger layer. Examples of filone; giallo - based on detective novels, spaghetti westerns, mondo/cannibal films,
poliziottesco - police procedural.
'The good, the bad and the ugly' Sergio Leone
- use of sound
- use of music
- lack of dialogue
- use of eyeline and cutting
- differences in scale
- use of camera to tell a story
- fragmentation of body
- catholic references
Focus on Giallo
- Italian for 'yellow' and stems from the series of cheap paperback crime and mystery novels with trademark
yellow covers.
- Mario Bava, Dario Argento, and Lucio Fulci (Giallo Directors)
These films may be stylish and expressionistic, but at their worst they challenge our senses and the standards of 'good taste'. These films are often considered as exploitation movies and gross out movies. Similar to the American Grindhouse/Drive-in Movies; wonderful titles used to sell the concept.
- 'The girl who knew too much' (Mario Bava, 1963)
First Giallo with many of its defining characteristics. 'The girl who knew too much' is a 1963 Italian Giallo film directed by italian film maker Mario Bava. 'THe girl who knew too much' is considered to be the first Giallo film, a film genre with a mixture of thriller, sexploitation and horror conventions. The was Bava's last film shot in black and white.
Amateur detective as tourist
- The protagonists are usually American or British, visiting Italy
- They usually work in the creative industries; artists, writer, musician, fashion, photography)
- They seem to evoke a cosmopolitan 'jet set' life style
City scape
- Rome / Milan
The Baroque
The popularity and success of the Baroque style was encouraged by the Roman Catholic church. The aristocracy also saw the dramatic style of Baroque architecture and art as a means of impressing visitors and expressing triumphant power and control.
- La Dolce Morte: Vernacular Cinema and the Italian Giallo film by Mikel J. Koven.
An in-depth study of Giallo
Giallo Killers
- Black gloves
- Black hat
- Black over coat
- Disguises gender
- Priests often used as part of a gender confusion
Blood and Lace
Dario Argento
- The Italian Hitchcock
- Places himself in the film - as the Killer's black gloved hands
- Visually stunning 'set pieces'
- Shot without sound so film could be dubbed
- Worked with Sergio Leone on 'Once upon a time in the West'.
- Son of 'Salvator Argento' (Film producer)
- Brother of Claudio Argento (Producer)
- Father to Asia Argento (Actress)
- Long term partner and collaborator: Dario Nicolodi
'The bird with the crystal plumage' Dario Argento, 1970
Typical Beginning on aeroplane
Protagonist is an American writer
Changing POV
The beginning of the 'set piece'
Connection to art
Fast cutting using eye-line shots
End of set piece
Run of the mill dialogue joins the set pieces together (like a musical)
Argento always plays the killer's hands
Typical Giallo killers
Story told visually
References to Hitchcock
Solution of the mystery is within a piece of art
Stylish disorientating POVs
Ending mirrors the beginning
Subjective POV
- killer-cam
- eye line shot - killer/victim/amateur detective
- Set pieces
- Art and cultural references
- Semiotics
- Ambivalence towards modernity, religion and superstition
- The fall
Dubbing and heightened sound
- Like Leone, Argento shot his films without sound then added dialogue and sounds effects later.
- This allows the film to be dubbed using many languages
- Often sold to America and Britain as 'B' movies - drive in movie.
Product placement J&B brand evoking a sophisticated life style
- Five dolls for an August Moon (Mario Bava)
- Bird with a Chrystal Plumage (Dario Argento)
- Black belly of the Tarantula
- Don't torture a duckling
Freudian Psychology
- Many Giallo demand to be read from psychoanalytical point of view
- Based on false memory
- Childhood trauma
- Fetish (eyes, gloves, cut-throat raiser)
- Solution mystery lies in art
- works of art in Giallo are often subverted and associated with the madness of the psychopath and regularly provide a conduit into the past and into the mind of the antagonist.
Are exploitation films worthy of examination?
- Innovation and auteurship
- Necessity is the mother of invention
- Technical mastery
- Visual critique based on spectacle rather than literary critique based on narrative
- Tells us about different kinds of audiences and modes of viewing
- Challenge to Hollywood's continuity cinema
Is vernacular film dead?
- Multiplexes aimed at people with cars
- Going to cinema is a special event
- Cinema tickets are expensive
- DVD and digital formats mean audiences watch in own home or on the move
- Social aspect of film watching done on line rather than at the cinema
American / Canadian Giallo
- Black Swan (Darren Aronofsky, 2010)
- Death Proof (Quentin Tarantino, 2007)
- Dressed to Kill (Brian de Palma, 1980)
- Halloween (John Carpenter, 1978)
- Black Christmas (Bob Clarke, 1974)
