This week is going to be the start of a somewhat new direction for this blog. I've been having some difficulty coming up with topics twice a week, and this hobby of mine isn't actually encouraging me to see movies I haven't seen or to reconsider movies I have seen. So what I need is some kind of guiding structure to guide my topics and push me to more interesting things, and I think I have just the thing.
My sister gifted me a pair fun posters last Christmas and they've been sitting around doing nothing for about half a year. These posters are comprised of a ton of scratch off sections, each representing a different popular film or television series. One poster is all films/TV from the 20th century the other is all films/TV from the 21st.
The idea is to track what films you have seen. Inspired by this, I'm going to devote this blog (for the foreseeable future) to articles on each of these films as I watch them and scratch off their section. As for the TV shows I don't really have time to watch all that TV so if I've already seen or have the time to see a solid chunk (at least a season, depending on the length of a season,) I'll talk about it on this blog, otherwise they will be skipped. At the end of each post will be an updated picture of the poster with the appropriate section scratched off. I'm going to start with the 20th century and loosely progress across and down the poster until its filled out and then move to the 21st century poster and go across and down. I say "loosely" as I'm sure I'll brake that order often enough to talk about something I happen to be excited about or because it's more convenient. This should keep my film blog going for quite a while.
Those who know film history (and can read the text on the grainy photo) may already notice that the first few films are really short films from the silent era. So to start off this project I'm going to talk about the first four films in this one post: How It Feels to Be Run Over (1900), Jack and the Beanstalk (1902), Those Awful Hats (1909), and The Wizard of Oz (1910) in chronological order.
How It Feels to Be Run Over (1900) is very difficult to review from a modern lens because its very concept is entrenched in the novelty of its medium at the time of it's creation and release. In 1900 it was amazing to just see a picture appear to move in front of your eyes and that novelty alone could, at the time, be worth paying to see. This is evidenced by other films of it's era such as, Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat (1896) and Workers Leaving the Lumiere Factory (1895), depicting simple and short mundane events. However what separates How It Feels to Be Run Over from Workers Leaving the Lumiere Factory is the rather shocking experience it attempts to simulate. How It Feels... Is not depicting a mundane event but rather depicts, from a first person perspective, a violent and horrific event. Also the title suggests that this is an attempt to simulate this negative experience. How It Feels... represents an interesting, very human, desire to engage with negative feelings and concepts, including death. A desire that exists in our entertainment today. The majority of popular media (especially serialized television) tackles unpleasant and dark subject matter that we gather some kind of emotional fulfillment from. The only difference between How It Feels... and modern dramatic film and television being a difference of complexity.
There is a little more to be dug out of this film with the precise sequence of events. First the camera is passed by a horse drawn carriage, then an automobile drives right up to the camera before we cut to black representing a collision. This speaks to a kind of anxiety about motorized vehicles suggesting that their automatic nature makes them more prone to causing accidents. I guess this makes How It Feels... a 1900's era episode of Black Mirror. However the film doesn't simply end with the cut to black but proceeds with a quick succession of title cards reading: "??/!!!/!/Oh!/mother/will/be/pleased." This bizarre, by modern sensibilities, punchline belies a humor very consistent with its origins as a British film. The rapidity of the title cards and the scattered punctuation imply a kind of concussion induced nonsense that lightens the overall tone and probably left audiences of the time with a cathartic chuckle.
Jack and the Beanstalk (1902) is a pretty straightforward adaptation of the well-known fairy tale, but It has a few differences from the way it's typically known today. first of all it's somewhat compressed to about 10 minutes which was not atypical of movies of it's time. Jack only climbs the stalk once and while the singing harp is shown Jack only takes the giant's gold and a chicken that lays golden eggs. There is another more interesting change that adds a dimension to the plot that did not exist in the original fairy tale. In the film there is magical character who is probably best described as a fairy, recalling the popular image of Glinda the good witch in the 1939 Wizard of Oz. It is she who gives the magic beans to the merchant who buys Jack's cow, provides Jack with dreams about the giants valuables, guides Jack to the giant's castle, and also rewards Jack with further riches after he cuts the beanstalk and kills the giant chasing him. This gave me the impression that the fairy basically orchestrated all the events in order to kill the giants whom she must have had some vendetta against. It's an odd complexity that mystifies the story and shifts the moral ambiguity from Jack to this Fairy.
Those who know film history (and can read the text on the grainy photo) may already notice that the first few films are really short films from the silent era. So to start off this project I'm going to talk about the first four films in this one post: How It Feels to Be Run Over (1900), Jack and the Beanstalk (1902), Those Awful Hats (1909), and The Wizard of Oz (1910) in chronological order.
How It Feels to Be Run Over (1900) is very difficult to review from a modern lens because its very concept is entrenched in the novelty of its medium at the time of it's creation and release. In 1900 it was amazing to just see a picture appear to move in front of your eyes and that novelty alone could, at the time, be worth paying to see. This is evidenced by other films of it's era such as, Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat (1896) and Workers Leaving the Lumiere Factory (1895), depicting simple and short mundane events. However what separates How It Feels to Be Run Over from Workers Leaving the Lumiere Factory is the rather shocking experience it attempts to simulate. How It Feels... Is not depicting a mundane event but rather depicts, from a first person perspective, a violent and horrific event. Also the title suggests that this is an attempt to simulate this negative experience. How It Feels... represents an interesting, very human, desire to engage with negative feelings and concepts, including death. A desire that exists in our entertainment today. The majority of popular media (especially serialized television) tackles unpleasant and dark subject matter that we gather some kind of emotional fulfillment from. The only difference between How It Feels... and modern dramatic film and television being a difference of complexity.
There is a little more to be dug out of this film with the precise sequence of events. First the camera is passed by a horse drawn carriage, then an automobile drives right up to the camera before we cut to black representing a collision. This speaks to a kind of anxiety about motorized vehicles suggesting that their automatic nature makes them more prone to causing accidents. I guess this makes How It Feels... a 1900's era episode of Black Mirror. However the film doesn't simply end with the cut to black but proceeds with a quick succession of title cards reading: "??/!!!/!/Oh!/mother/will/be/pleased." This bizarre, by modern sensibilities, punchline belies a humor very consistent with its origins as a British film. The rapidity of the title cards and the scattered punctuation imply a kind of concussion induced nonsense that lightens the overall tone and probably left audiences of the time with a cathartic chuckle.
Jack and the Beanstalk (1902) is a pretty straightforward adaptation of the well-known fairy tale, but It has a few differences from the way it's typically known today. first of all it's somewhat compressed to about 10 minutes which was not atypical of movies of it's time. Jack only climbs the stalk once and while the singing harp is shown Jack only takes the giant's gold and a chicken that lays golden eggs. There is another more interesting change that adds a dimension to the plot that did not exist in the original fairy tale. In the film there is magical character who is probably best described as a fairy, recalling the popular image of Glinda the good witch in the 1939 Wizard of Oz. It is she who gives the magic beans to the merchant who buys Jack's cow, provides Jack with dreams about the giants valuables, guides Jack to the giant's castle, and also rewards Jack with further riches after he cuts the beanstalk and kills the giant chasing him. This gave me the impression that the fairy basically orchestrated all the events in order to kill the giants whom she must have had some vendetta against. It's an odd complexity that mystifies the story and shifts the moral ambiguity from Jack to this Fairy.
Those Awful Hats (1909) is one of the most timeless silent films I've seen. The basic premise for what amounts to a brief comedy sketch is that the movie going experience for an audience is ruined by some patrons' inordinately large and fancy hats. A patron complains and a giant claw comes down from the ceiling to pluck said hats from the offending patrons' heads to the cheers of the rest of the crowd. This is followed by a title card reading "ladies will please remove their hats." While large hats are no longer in fashion, the sentiment of the film's frustrations regarding ruined filmgoing experiences by inconsiderate audience members still feels very modern and fresh. The absurdity of the claw coming down from the ceiling to pluck the ladies' hats adds a very modern feeling kind of "meme humor" surriality. Those Awful Hats looks exactly like a sketch one could find on YouTube today but filtered through the lens of the early 20th century.
1910's Wizard of Oz is about as close to a film being obsolete as possible. At 13 minutes long it's at best a cliffnotes version of the popular book, and at worst it's an incomprehensible mess made only somewhat coherent by intertitles that bear the burden of storytelling. There are baffling omissions such as the complete absence of the silver slippers (which indeed means Dorothy never actually returns to Kansas), and the yellow brick road. Dorothy just wonders for a bit finds the cowardly lion, Toto gets turned by Glinda into a guy in a fur suit, the tin man plays a little song for everyone on some kind of flute, and suddenly there's a cat now too? The Wizard sends out a decree that he's under the power of Momba (the wicked witch of the west) and that he's not a real wizard and tired of being king of Oz anyway so if anyone takes care of Momba they can have his crown. Dorothy and crew see this and get captured by Momba but Dorothy somehow wasn't captured? And pours water on Momba causing her to dissolve. Also the scarecrow is from Kansas too but still talks and moves? I don't know what else to say this is a weird one. Notable only for being the first cinematic adaptation of a work known for MANY much better adaptations.
So that was the first 4 movies on my scratch off poster. There will be a ton more better movies to come. It'll be a week or two before we're out of the silent era but there are more interesting movies coming down the pipe such as Nosferatu (1922) and Metropolis (1927). In my mind the 20s is really when silent cinema came into its own. (Incidentally the actual scratching off takes some finesse I pretty much ruined Jack and the Beanstalk's image but as you can see by my attempt at Wizard of Oz I've gotten better).
So that was the first 4 movies on my scratch off poster. There will be a ton more better movies to come. It'll be a week or two before we're out of the silent era but there are more interesting movies coming down the pipe such as Nosferatu (1922) and Metropolis (1927). In my mind the 20s is really when silent cinema came into its own. (Incidentally the actual scratching off takes some finesse I pretty much ruined Jack and the Beanstalk's image but as you can see by my attempt at Wizard of Oz I've gotten better).
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