Silent and Early Cinema
Classic World Cinema
Animation/ Modern Classics
Images VS Quotes
Vocabulary
Production
Theory
Who Paid Attention?
100
The 1902 Georges Méliès film.
What is A Trip to the Moon?
100
This Italian neorealist film follows a father and son searching for a stolen bicycle in postwar Rome.
What is Bicycle Thieves?
100
In WALL-E, the robot is left alone on Earth because humanity has done this.
What is ruined the earth/abandoned Earth / left for space?
100
“You who I called brother… how could you have come to hate me so? Is this what you wanted?"
Rameses, The Prince of Egypt
100
A continuous shot without visible cuts is called this.
What is a long take?
100
A series of drawings that shows how each shot will look before filming begins.
What is a storyboard?
100
This theory says meaning is created by how shots are put together through editing.
What is Montage Theory?
100
Both films generate suspense by placing danger inside intimate, enclosed environments — one within a moving train and the other within a seemingly safe hometown — using restricted knowledge and subjective perspective to force the audience into moral judgment.
What are Murder on the Orient Express and Shadow of a Doubt?
200
This early crime film used innovative cross-cutting to show simultaneous action during a robbery.
What is The Great Train Robbery?
200
Rick sacrifices his love for Ilsa at the airport to ensure she can help the resistance in this city.
What is Casablanca?
200
These films were created using this stop-motion animation technique.
What is The Nightmare Before Christmas and Coraline?
200
Hercule Poirot, Murder on the Orient Express
200
This French term describes the uniquely cinematic quality that transforms ordinary objects or faces into emotionally expressive images on screen.
What is photogénie?
200
A rehearsal where actors practice scenes and camera movement before filming.
What is a blocking rehearsal?
200
This approach studies camera angles, lighting, sound, and editing instead of story or characters.
What is Formalist Film Theory?
200
These two films portray economic survival as a moral struggle rather than a personal failure, using everyday environments to humanize working-class characters.
What are Bicycle Thieves and A Dog’s Life?
300
This scene in Battleship Potemkin is famous for showing civilians caught in a violent conflict with soldiers.
What is the Odessa Steps massacre?
300
In Shadow of a Doubt, this is what Uncle Charlie is hiding from his family.
What is he is a serial killer?
300
The famous detective trying to solve the murder aboard the train.
Who is Hercule Poirot?
300
“You rush a miracle man, you get rotten miracles.”
Miracle Max, The Princess Bride
300
The arrangement of visual elements within the frame is known as this.
What is mise-en-scène?
300
This person is responsible for recording clear dialogue on set.
Who is the sound mixer / boom operator?
300
This theory analyzes how movies show gender roles and representation.
What is Feminist Film Theory?
300
In one film, a reluctant hero sacrifices personal happiness for political responsibility, while in the other, a group of warriors sacrifices safety for communal survival — both redefining heroism as moral action rather than victory.
What are Casablanca and The Seven Samurai?
400
This experimental film tells its story almost entirely through still photographs.
What is La Jetée?
400
This film influenced Westerns such as The Magnificent Seven.
What is The Seven Samurai?
400
The futuristic setting of The Truman Show was achieved by filming in this kind of controlled environment.
What is a studio set / controlled suburban set?
400
Young Charlie, Shadow of A Doubt
400
A composition technique in which foreground, middle ground, and background remain simultaneously in sharp focus to allow layered storytelling.
What is deep focus?
400
This sound artist recreates everyday noises like footsteps, doors, and fabric movement after filming.
Who is a Foley artist?
400
This theory studies how different people interpret the same movie in different ways.
What is Reception Theory?
400
These two films use radically different editing strategies — one through rapid collision of shots and the other through still images — yet both prove that meaning in cinema is constructed primarily through editing rather than performance.
What are Battleship Potemkin and La Jetée?
500
Silent films relied on this technique to convey dialogue and exposition.
What are intertitles / title cards?
500
Hitchcock creates suspense in Shadow of a Doubt using this visual technique, showing what the audience knows that the character doesn’t.
What is dramatic irony / point-of-view editing?
500
The film’s visual style combined traditional and computer animation. This is an example of what technique?
What is hybrid animation / mixed media?
500
“We accept the reality of the world with which we’re presented.”
Christof, The Truman Show
500
A visual strategy that uses lighting contrast to create depth, mystery, or moral tension within a frame.
What is chiaroscuro lighting?
500
Adjusting brightness and color to make shots match visually.
What is color correction / color grading?
500
DAILY DOUBLE
This theory studies how films communicate dominant cultural beliefs and power structures, often reinforcing or challenging social norms.
What is Ideological Film Theory?
500
These two films, made nearly 100 years apart, both explore how cinematic construction manipulates audience perception of reality.
What are A Trip to the Moon and The Truman Show?