Plot & Themes of Films
A young man struggles with his middle class background and the ideas of the Communist party, and after a sexual relationship with his aunt, the man chooses his middle class life.
Bonus points: name two themes from the film.
Bernardo Bertolucci, Prima della rivoluzione (Before the Revolution) (1964)
The characters, costumes, sets/setting, etc. in front of the camera.
What is Mise-en-scene?
A journal where film enthusiasts fought over interpretation, published reviews, and discussed ideas for radical cinema.
What is the Cahiers du Cinema?
Name of at least one Italian filmmaker of the New Wave whose films we did not study.
Roberto Rossellini
Pier Paolo Pasolini
Michelangelo Antonioni
Define and give an example of the Buddy film genre.
A genre of film that has two leads of same gender that go on adventure together and form non sexual intimacy.
Example: Věra Chytilová, Daisies (1966)
Plot: A singer navigates a short period of time while she waits for test results for abdominal cancer
Bonus points: name two themes from the film.
Agnes Varda, Cléo from 5-7 (1962)
When a shot is broken into two parts, with a piece of footage being removed, and has the effect of jumping forward in time.
Bonus points: name an example from a film we watched.
What is a jump cut?
A film that does not have a strict linear plot, the actors are not famous stars, and there is strong expressive intent from author.
As defined by David Bordwell.
What is an Art Film?
Name of at least one French filmmakers of the New Wave whose films we did not study.
Francois Truffaut
Claude Chabrol
Louis Malle
Define and give an example of Metacinema.
When a film emphasizes that it is a piece of art, it is something constructed for you.
Example: The opening credits of Contempt (Godard)
Name three examples of foods that Marie I and II cut in Věra Chytilová's Daisies (1966).
Croissants, cucumbers, sausages, eggs, bananas.
A style of film that includes the following: Discontinuous editing, graphic metaphors, non linear narrative stories, dream logic.
Bonus points: name an example from a film we watched.
What is surrealism?
The second largest film industry in the world that emerged in 1990s, based mostly in Lagos, and produced “video films” that were viewed in homes.
What is Nollywood?
Name of at least one sub-Saharan African filmmaker of the era whose films we did not study.
Souleymane Cissé
Gaston Kaboré
Kwaw Ansah
Name one important detail about Ousmane Sembène' career and/or international reception.
Fought on behalf of France in WWII
A celebrated novelist
Studied film in Moscow
Award winner at Cannes Film Festival (Complexity of accepting prizes at Cannes due to history of colonization).
From Emma Dollery article
How many newspapers does Sili first receive to sell in Djibril Diop Mambéty's The Little Girl Who Sold the Sun (1999)?
13 newspapers
Sound that does not have a visual source in a scene.
Bonus points: name an example from a film we watched.
What is acousmatic sound?
A language of of film that emerged in the 1940s that uses psychological, physical, and economic grittiness to express the harsh realities of the postwar experience.
What is (Italian) Neorealism?
Name of at least one Brazilian filmmaker working in the era whose films we did not study.
Nelson Pereira dos Santos
Carlos Diegues
Paulo Cesar Saraceni
Name 3 stylistic features of the French New Wave?
discontinuous editing
metacinema
jump cuts
exploration of characters' psychology
on-site location filming
What are the student revolutionaries doing before they get arrested in Enrique's story in Mikhail Kalatozov's I Am Cuba (1964)?
They are printing political flyers
A tilted camera angle, which usually communicates a subjective view and/or instability.
Bonus points: name an example from a film we watched.
What is a Dutch angle?
Films that serve as propaganda, and often utilize newsreel footage or a newscaster voiceover for an ideological bent.
What is Agitprop?
Name of at least one Cuban filmmaker working in the era whose films we did not study.
Gutiérrez Alea
Humberto Solás
Manuel Octavio Gómez
Define 'Cinema Novo' and give an example of a cinema novo film.
Cinema Novo or "New Cinema" was a film movement in Brazil from the 1950s-1970s which sought new cinematic approaches to show poverty, exploitation, and underdevelopment. Cinema Novo was a fundamentally antiwestern, anticolonial, and anti-Hollywood. It sought to enlighten and promote the interests of Latin American people.
Ex. Glauber Rocha's Entranced Earth (1967).