why did filmmakers and producers move to Hollywood- The mountains, plains and low land prices made Hollywood a good place to establish film studios, this year-round climate was the best atmosphere for shooting films.
Big stars from this era, (filmmakers and actors)- Billy Wilder (director) Humphrey Bogart (actor) John Wayne (actor)
In what ways were the early Hollywood system like a factory or production line– actors were practically owned by production companies with extremely strong contracts that they could not get out of.
When and what was the first talking picture? The jazz singer, 1927
why did the end of the silent era cause problems for performers working in the industry. A lot of silent film stars disappeared from the movie industry, because they didn’t possess the right kind of voice for spoken cinema. There were other reasons: failure to understand the mechanics of sound and also not taking the new medium seriously.
what events were happening in America during this time– Prohibition, economic disaster, dustbowl catastrophe, WW1
THE HOLLYWOOD STUDIO SYSTEM
•1) What were the Big 5 studios & what type of movies was each studio famous for? Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Warner Bros., Paramount, Fox, and RKO.
•2) Explain what vertical integration and block-booking was? Vertical integration means that production, distribution, and exhibition were handled “in-house.” although the proper definition of it being; the combination in one firm of two or more stages of production normally operated by separate firms
•3) Why and when did the original studio system collapse? The studio system was challenged under the antitrust laws in a 1948 Supreme Court ruling which sought to separate production from the distribution and exhibition and ended such practices
•4) What was happening in America(and around the world) at this time? (post WW2) A new world order began to emerge in 1948. The U.S. announced the Marshall Plan to help rebuild Europe, while a group of European nations formed an alliance that would evolve into NATO. The Berlin Blockade escalated tensions between the emerging superpowers, which eventually would come to result in the cold war, lasting until 1991
•5) What genres were popular and why did people go to the movies in this period? Westerns, musicals, screwball comedies, and film noir. Films at this time were crafted to be grand spectacles, and cinema was the only entertainment that the public had, many thought of it as an escape.
CLASSICAL HOLLYWOOD STYLE
in Casablanca, invisible editing is used to silently back up the dominant use of story telling. Continuity editing is also a technique used by old Hollywood directors. This is an editing technique where shots are arranged in a certain way to suggest a progression of events. This style of editing was popular in old Hollywood as they relied heavily on dialogue and story telling to create a cinematic experience for the viewer, while small unnoticeable edits are used to add to the aesthetic of the film
Invisible story telling was an unnoticeable technique used by editors to immerse the audience within the story without making the edits and cuts obvious.