Essay on How has the meaning of the term "modern" changed over the years?

Introduction

According to Clement Greenberg, the term "modern" not only means the style or change in movement, but it comprises the whole period of Impressionism during art history. This means that the term gives all the difference the art has undergone from the 1920s to the early 1960. Modern has taken several forms from historical background to cultural context.

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What are the three main ways in which cinema became ‘modern’ in the 1920s?

Cinema became modern through its response to cultural development and artistic. The mean it incorporated literature, theatre, music, and visual art.

Through German expressionist films such as pure cinema, French impressionist films and surrealist films.

Cinema became modernized by emphasising the actual and inner lives rather than only on the representation of physical activity.

What were the significant stages in the institutionalization of art cinema?

Film d'art this film theory that shows that film is closely tied to extensions such as theatre literal arts and novel.

Vachel Lindsay's discusses The Art of the Moving Picture as an art rather than an entertainment tool.

The idea of specialized film exhibition of “quality films” (France): discussions of the conflict between the industrial and artistic aspects of cinema; the beginning of the distinction between elite and mass culture.

How does Deleuze understand the classical-modern distinction?

Gilles Deleuze: modern cinema is more advanced than classical cinema because it fulfills cinema's potential for expressing abstract thoughts and for articulating time: he identifies Italian Neorealism and post-neorealism as the historical moment when cinema became modern in this sense (hence the importance of World War 2: the experience of trauma, alienation from the world, disorientation, loss of faith in so-called 'grand narratives' such as the belief in Reason, Progress, Humanity, God, etc.)

For Deleuze, the distinction between classical and modern cinema lies in their different treatment of movement and time; he stresses contemporary cinema's ability to represent mental states (thoughts, dreams, fantasies, memories) rather than only physical actions.

What are the major characteristics of classical Hollywood cinema? Identify and explain at least five of these. How does North by Northwest exemplify these characteristics?

Hollywood is driven through desire. This means that the narrative explains the essence of need giving tasks that should be accomplished by a protagonist.

Classical Hollywood cinema has a background of conflict and opposition: how the main character becomes a hero towards a specific goal is faced by many challenges.

It is human-based: the whole story revolves around the center if an individual.

It is occupied by a distinguished motivation of events and actions. This means every effort should entail the reason why is in the cinema.

Is ended by exact parts of closure. No room for ends with unclear circumstances meaning all challenges are overcome and become fulfilled.

What does David Bordwell mean when he argues that classical narration tends to be omniscient, highly communicative, and only moderately self-conscious?

David means that the flow of narration is conversant with every character in the play. It does not explain what will happen while revealing its identity to the audience. Several generic factors bring on the variation attached to these perceptions. A film relating to the investigation of detectives will be limited to its ability to conceal casualties.

Films such as melodrama like In This Our Life can be more understanding than The Big Sleep, which is mainly used in acting and music. What is the difference between the linear, circular, and spiral type of narrative?

Linear narrative narrates the events in a chronology order. This means the narrator explains the problem involved and how it has been solved. Circular- the problem is not solved, but by the end, we understand better the initial situation. Spiral-the initial problem is partially solved, but this triggers a new question and a new conflict that cannot be resolved (often ends with the characters).

According to Kovacs, what is the most critical thematic difference between modern cinema in Eastern and Western Europe?

Western Europe filmmakers were inspired by Neorealism but eventually transcended it in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. Neorealism was not just a matter of style but also a political issue: Neorealism was adopted as am antiheroic and undramatic model to circumvent the official trend of socialist realism (note: 'social realism' is not the same as 'socialist realism,' the latter of which is heavily ideological and hyper-dramatic/heroic).

Identify and briefly explain at least 2 popular misconceptions in the West about cinema under communism.

A popular misconception in the West—that all films made were socialist realist and no popular genres that all films were highly politicized. BUT there were adventures, science fiction and comedy, western spoofs like Lemonade Joe (show excerpt—by Oldrich Lipsky, 1964) and westerns based on Karl May adaptations. Many imported western films, films from brotherly nations like Vietnam and Cuba, and third world cinema.

What are some of the characteristics of ‘French impressionism”? Why does Kovacs argue that French Impressionism was “the most synthetic phenomenon of early modern cinema” (19)?

Film in the form of French Impressionism is based on a virtual rhythm, according to Impressionism. The idea behind this should be the stem of the Impressionist emotions and belief but not stories found in the film. Impressionist assumes that its movie is giving viewers an opportunity to exploring beyond what they think is real. The French Impressionism leaves the audience with experience to understand the film's emotions.

What is Peter Wollen’s theory of “the two avant-gardes”?

Peter Wollen's theory of the two avant-gardes is the classical differentiation between the meta-language and object-language. The idea began to break down between text and commentary. The approach has interacted with the labor division and practice of the culture that tries to counter-strategy. Instead of dissolving one into the other, the strategy was to work them together and explore their relationship

Who is the individual in the modern art cinema?

Individuals in modern art cinema are the characters who act in that specific film. They are believed to be involved in different sections of the play. The flow of the film is elaborated by giving modern art identity. Individuals in contemporary art cinema provide the movie better imagery. For Kovacs, early cinematic modernism (the 1920s) was cinema's response to artistic and cultural developments outside of cinema like in the other arts (visual art, music, theatre, literature, and dance)

How did Neorealism influence modern cinema development in Italy, France, Britain, the Soviet Union, and Poland? How do we account for the different roles it played in cinema's modernization in these other countries?

Neorealism, also known as structural realism, explains that power is the critical factor in international relations. The Neorealism has influenced the development of modern cinema in France, Italy, Britain, the Soviet Union, and Poland since the power in the said nations made the art to thrive better since the power governance was maintained.

Why is it essential to distinguish between the 'stylistic' and the 'moral' meaning of Neorealism?

This is because stylistic as used in Neorealism makes the cinema to be classy as it involved arrangements that allow the character to portray authentic style in the film. This makes the cinema attractive since the concentration of the power versus style is directly proportionately. In moral as used in Neorealism, the acting entails individuals moral reflect the filmmaker up.

How did Jean Rouch’s ethnographic documentary influence modern art cinema in France?

French new wave directors were inspired by Italian Neorealism but rarely imitated it, as explained in the Kovacs's comparison between De Sica’s Bicycle Thieves and Rohmer’s The Sign of Leo. This is how the modern art cinema in France influenced the borrowing of some content in this area. Jean Rouch’s explains in the ethnography documentary.

How does Godard’s film Breathless exemplify the Romantic period of modern art cinema?

Films made during the Romantic period are often influenced by (borrowing from) already established genres, particularly film noir such as in the Breathless and melodrama (L’avventura), and are generally more emotional or sentimental that is, they still encourage some degree of viewer identification with the characters in the film compared to films made in the next two periods which tend to be more dispassionate, distanced and mostly interested in formal experimentation

Identify and briefly explain at least 3 characteristics of the Soviet cinema of the thaw.

The film means used to create an authentic, realistic representation of social reality: long shots stressed the observer's perspective, while images of longer duration gave people time to examine the shot content and experience time; the mise en scene moved more profound within the frame forcing the viewer's gaze further into the screen. It also narrative linearity receded; unpredictability and ambiguity of heroes' actions. It contains an Interior monologue, focus on internal psychology. The films began in medias res and ended ambiguously. It is often ordered as a series of autonomous episodes.

In her article on Ballad of a Soldier, Vida Johnson praises the film for transcending the Cold War rhetoric of the 1960s. How does the movie do that?

The film is considerably praising strong technical and its craft throughout the subtle story. As it is viewed from the youthful protagonist point of earnestness and unabashed, the film was praised by Vida Johnson as it assisted classic American critics and Soviet. The American magazines applauded the author to make the film flow swiftly and conceal good lyrics quality.

Discuss the influence of music, dance, painting, and literature on the European 1920s and 1930s experimental films you saw the first week of classes. Give specific examples from these films.

Music, dance, painting, and literature played a vital role in experimental films—the help to cover the film part that needs a clear explanation for the audience's understanding of the film. From the development of audio-visual technology, does the evolution of film language refer to the film medium's sheer technical progress? Or from the development of aesthetic forms such as Bazin’s arguments about the depth of field and the long take.

How does the evolutionists' approach to the classical-modern distinction differ from the style analysts' system?

Evolutionists: modern cinema is the result of the evolution of film language and thus represents a higher stage in the development of cinema than classical cinema

Style analysts (David Bordwell, Noel Burch): classical and modern cinema do not oppose or invalidate each other but co-exist. Such as modernist cinema can refuse or break the rules of classical cinema. Still, even this breaking of rules presupposes an awareness/acknowledgment of the rules for style analysts. Modernism does not mean a more mature film practice but only a different kind of approach that emerges during specific film history periods.