Connor McShane
September 16, 2010
Film: Blog One
The film industry today relies solely on sound, and speech. The common moviegoer expects to see a movie with dialogue, and the dialogue is what gets the message across—if one were to watch a movie from our era without sound it would be extremely hard to understand the message. It is the era of talking films that takes away the visual aspects of earlier film genres; complete story telling with just the visuals you see on the screen. In this huge change we lose a whole era of finely tuned techniques—In the silent era you find that these techniques are magnified, or as extreme as you can get them.
The films of today are spectacular and visually intoxicating, but they achieve this only through computer graphics and special effects. Even with these spectacular visual effects we lose a large portion of the visual aspects of the film to dialogue—close ups of actors/actresses talking start to take over. The silent era was all about the visual aspect of it, the universal language of getting a feeling or emotion across to the viewer using archetypal images that create a language known throughout the world. Films made mainly in Germany, France, and Italy during the silent era are seen as works of art. These European directors made films that didn’t just tell a story, but were creating films that were 100 percent artistic; every shot and every frame was compositionally pleasing and visually created a mood. Now, in our era, we find that some films can visually have this affect, but the majority of our films today achieve feeling and emotion through dialogue. By doing this we lose this attention to detail and we start seeing that not every shot or frame is visually pleasing. The film industry has replaced their way of getting emotion across from visual aspects to using mostly talking.
In earlier films we see a universal language throughout the silent era that was used to portray a message visually. Dramatic postures of the human form, intense lighting of the sets or figures, and symbolism that is easily seen throughout the films. This visual language is what made these silent films so artistic. This dramatic emotion that was interwoven throughout the films we see a lot in the German expressionism style of movies. It was their goal to express emotion visually. When sound was introduced to film we lose a huge portion of this dramatic language used in silent films, simpler facial expressions, dull acting, all with the motive to get the film as real as possible to life. We see film go more and more in this direction as time goes on. Only certain genres of film today tweak this new direction of film and create a movie with a visual aesthetic that is uncommon to life—it is these types of films today that intertwine the language of silent films and the techniques of today and create a film that is cultivating to watch. It is the visual aspects of the silent era that needs to stay with film today, we need to move back toward creating stories that are visually pleasing, but intertwine sound flawlessly so that there is the attention to detail in every frame.
You mention among your comments about the visual aspect of the silent era the "symbolism that is easily seen throughout the films." I wonder, though, if it may not be the fault of the filmmakers that features such as scenery, lighting and symbolism are not noticed by the audience. It would be my guess that any set designer or cinematographer takes his job and the effort he puts into his work just as seriously as his silent era counterpart. Might it be the audience this is just not paying attention to those little details that were once so important? Like the color red, in The Sixth Sense, for example.
ReplyDeleteIt is true that today most people in the audience do not pay attention to as much visual detail as people did during the silent film era. I think though that the audience and filmmakers share just as much responsibility for this attention span. People today do not want to go to the movies to have to think more they plan on trying to get away from their lives and watch a movie that requires less of them mentally. Thus, most filmmakers pump out the films that audiences want, instead of an artistic film. I know i have a hard time trying to find certain visual details while watching films in class, maybe this is because I am so accustomed to becoming a mindless zombie when 'play' is pushed on the remote. It is the films that make you use your brain while watching that keeping you guessing and wondering long after you have walked out of the theater that we all like so much.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you, I think that sound is very important in movies and without it, many of todays movies would not have been popular.
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