FIL 1030 History of Film - MDC Faculty Home Pages

School of Entertainment and Design Technology
FIL 1030 History of Film
Lecture Notes
Chapters 5 and 6
prepared by
Mario Beguiristain, Ph.D.
Associate Professor, Film
from
Mast, Gerald and Bruce F. Kawin. A Short History of the Movies.
Abridged Ninth Edition. Longman Press, Pearson Education, Inc. 2007. ISBN #: 0-321-41821-2
These notes are intended solely as a study aid and are not meant to replace the reading assignments from the text.

The Motion Picture Patents Company
� Controlled by Edison
� Marketed one-hour programs of short films for Nickelodeons
� Hired the Pinkerton Detective Agency to enforce their rights
� Created the “Trust Wars” that resulted in filmmakers leaving NYC
� Lost the public battle in the courts in 1917
The New Producers
Carl Laemmle, William Fox, Samuel Goldfish, Adolph Zukor,
Jesse Lasky, Marcus Loew, Lewis J. Selznick and Louis B. Mayer
� Produced two-hour feature films
� Owned and built larger, more comfortable theaters fit for an
evening’s entertainment
� Jewish immigrants from Germany or Russia
� Film was a new business without a controlling “clique”
� Widely seen as a risky, illegitimate business; not for serious people
Advertisement for
Edison Motion Picture
Equipment
Edison with his invention
Founders of the MPPC in 1906

Trenches of World War I
The Three Silent Film Periods:
1.1894-1907—Edison, Lumière & Méliès
2.1908-1919—Griffith, Sennett & Chaplin
3.1920-1929—Keaton, Gance, Murnau,
Eisenstein & von Stroheim
American Films Rule:
By 1914, American films, which had trailed after French
and British films, establish their dominance of the world’s
screens due to:
1. World War I: Nitrate used in films was needed to
make explosives
2. The films of Griffith, Sennett Chaplin and Pickford
3. The Star System: Names draw in the crowds
4. The Studio System: The industrial approach to
filmmaking
The Three Tiers of the
American Film Business:
1. Production: Studios located in Hollywood
2. Management and Distribution: In New York
3. Exhibition: Theaters throughout the land
Mary Pickford

The Star System
� Biograph opposed giving actors
screen credit because then they
would ask for more money.
� The Biograph Girl, Florence Lawrence,
was hired away by Carl Laemmle in 1910
who promised to feature her name.
She became “The First Movie Star.”
� Movie stars do not play characters as they are characters themselves.
� In 1912 Photoplay Magazine begins national publication.
� Studio Publicity Departments are created to feed stories to the press.
� The Movie Star Gossip Mill begins grinding.
Florence Lawrence
In 1915 Fox manufactures a “star”
Theda Bara--actually Mrs. Theodocia
Goodman, a housewife from Cincinnati.
Known as the first “vamp,” her screen
name was an acronym for “Arab Death.”

Mack Sennett
Began directing shorts for Edison, then went to Biograph, and later founded Keystone, his own production company.
1. Sennett’s comedy was achieved by:
� Making humans look like machines
� Using fast motion (under-cranking)
� Moving and flying props (invented pie fight)
� Cross-cutting, chases and cliffhangers
2. The Keystone Kops:
� Ridiculed the police
� An ensemble where no actor stood out
� Training ground for many silent comics
3. “Tillie’s Punctured Romance” (1914)
� First feature-length comedy, six reels long
� First pairing of Marie Dressler with Chaplin
� A big hit!

Charles Chaplin
1. Tours the U.S. with Fred Karno’s British Music Hall Troupe
2. In December of 1913 reluctantly joins Keystone Studios
3. Brought character and individuality to Sennett comedies
4. Phenomenal rise: from $7,200 a year in 1914 to $1 Million a year in 1917
5. The World is serious and mean; social structures keep you in your place
6. Develops “The Little Tramp” character
7. Uses pathos as counterpoint to comedy
8. First International Superstar
Characteristics of “The Little Tramp”
a) An outsider/ an immigrant/ a worker
b) Longs for respect, love, money, social status
c) Goes to the very depths of comedic situations
d) Optimistic in spite of incredible hardship
e) Kind/ generous of heart
f) Protector of women and children
g) Comments on the values of society
h) Ingenious use of props in gags

Movie Palaces are built…
The “ugly duckling” Nickelodeons
are transformed into extravagant
Palaces with thematic architecture:
Atmospheric, Arabian,
Egyptian, Rococo,
Spanish Mediterranean, etc.
� The Roxy in New York
� Grauman’s Chinese in Los Angeles
� Grauman’s Egyptian in Los Angeles
� The Fox in Atlanta and Oakland
� The Loew’s Ohio in Columbus
� The Olympia in Miami, etc.
Here, any modest-income
family could spend a whole
day watching movies in the
lap of luxury.

By 1915 most of the film companies had
settled in Los Angeles, CA because of:
� The Trust Wars: Proximity of Mexican Border
made for and easy and quick get-away
� Excellent weather with lots of sunshine
� Topography: a wide variety of natural scenery
� Cheap real estate to build big studios
In 1919, Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks and D.W. Griffith found their own production,
distribution and exhibition company: UNITED ARTISTS.
“Now the lunatics are running the asylum”
--Typical Hollywood reaction

Hal Roach Studios:
Where Silent Comedy Was King
receiving his
Honorary Oscar
in 1984
Achieved immortality in TV syndication
as “the Little Rascals”
Baby-faced innocent
The greatest comedienne
The greatest comedy duo of all time
Urbane, sophisticated, college guy

Movies and Morality:
Scandals and the Threat of Censorship
Movies start to be seen by many religious groups as lewd and
licentious spectacles bent on corrupting American youth and morality.
When movie stars become role models, their private lives come under
public scrutiny.
In 1921, Fatty Arbuckle was involved in two scandals:
� Making a payoff to a Massachusetts politician
� Arrested and accused of the murder of
“actress” Virginia Rappé at a raucous
Labor Day Party in San Francisco’s
St. Francis Hotel.
After a lengthy trial that was widely covered
by the media, Arbuckle was found innocent;
but it was too late. His career had already
been destroyed.
In 1922, former Postmaster General
Will Hays, is hired to head the Motion
Picture Producers Association (MPPA)
and to “police” Hollywood.
For eight years, Hays would “put the lid”
on many off-screen scandals, but it wasn’t
until 1930 that the Catholic Legion of Decency
forced him to write and enforce
The Production Code.
Virginia Rappé
Will Hays

Cecil B. De Mille
Finds in the scriptures an endless source of
audience titillation above moral reproach.
Though best remembered for his Biblical Epics,
De Mille excelled in other genres, including the
Western, Sea Adventure and Comedy of Manners.
The Ten Commandments, 1956
The Sign of the Cross, 1932 Manslaughter, 1922
Don’t Change Your Husband, 1918

Erich von Stroheim (The man you love to hate)
� Austrian Actor,Writer, Producer and Director
� Obsessed with total realism down to every detail
� Made Old-World melodramas about infidelity and deception
� Constantly fought with movie executives, especially Thalberg
� His excesses caused him to be blacklisted in Hollywood
“Blind Husbands” 1919
“Foolish Wives” 1921
“The Wedding March” 1928
Directing “Greed” in 1924
� In the naturalist tradition of Zola
� Ran 9 hours at first screening
� Legendary lost masterpiece

1922
Robert Flaherty
� Father of the Feature Documentary Film
� Anthropology proves to be a big box office attraction
1931
“The Land” 1942
1934
1948

Buster Keaton
1. Insight: both funny and serious
2. Deadpan—the great stone face
3. Irreverent to women
4. No pathos
5. Elaborate gags that build up
6. Buster goes about his business while
the world around him is going mad
7. Narrative, not character, is the driving
force of his films

Buster Keaton’s
“The General” (1927)
� Civil War background
� A journey, an epic story, the Odyssey
� He suffers hardships and adventures
on his way back home
� Turns obstacles into tools
� Most expensive scene in silent films

FIL 1030 History of Film
Lecture Notes
Chapters 5 and 6
“The End”
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