Faculty of Arts
- Introduction
- Learning Resources
- Preventing Plagiarism
- What Tutors Do
- Notes - FILMIC CODES
- Assignment 1
- SHOT TYPES
- Week 3
- Week 1
- Attendance
- Tutorials
- Turnitin Guidelines
- Help
- Film, Television and Media Studies
- Assignment 1 - Names
- Week 3 B
- Week 4
- Week 5
- Week 6
- Week 7
- Week 8
- Assignment 1 - Criteria and Tips
- Staff
- Week 9
- Week 10
- Week 11
- Week 12 Lecture 1
- Class Reps
- Assignment 2
- Assignment 2 - Criteria
- Reading and Independent Study
- Deadlines & extensions
- Formatting coursework
- Plagiarism
- Important dates
- using the web
Mildred Pierce
Star System
Noir Conventions
Bibliography
The Star System
1) The Actor (a theatrical star) before 1909
Names of actors generally not known
2) Picture Personality 1909 – 1914
Identity not based on previous theatrical affiliations
Identity constructed through the films they appeared in and the publicity surrounding those films
Public knowledge about the actor limited to the professional experience as an actor
3) The Star – 1914 –
The existence of the actor’s existence outside of the film (their professional work) becomes a primary focus
‘Noir’ Conventions & M.P.
· Usually central male protagonist –
o Their POV privileged &often reinforced by the voice over narration.
o Usually wry and cynical observers of their own actions.
o Often through first person narration as a confession to a friend, policeman etc.
· Mildred Pierce ( confession to policeman).
2) In Noir the POV often undermined throughout the narrative by :
a)the often torturous plot structure that twists and turns - the frantic attempts of the trapped animal to escape).
b) the narrator often looses control over the story from inside the narrative ( they get drugged, mugged, seduced etc
Mildred Pierce
· Mildred’s point of view, shaped by her voice over is not noir - the mise -en-scene is typical of melodrama, when Mildred is not in control the scenes are shot in noir style.
· Noir style controls the present
· The past - lighter more conventional scenes controlled by Mildred’s narration.
The Hollywood Studio System/Genre: The Woman’s Film & Film Noir
Bibliography
The
Douglas Gomery The
Thomas Schatz The Genius of the System
David Bordwell & Kristin Thompson Film Art: An Introduction
David Bordwell, Kristin Thompson & Janet Staiger The Classical Hollywood Style
Rudy Behlmer (ed) Inside Warner Brothers (1935 – 1951)
Stars and The Star System:
Edgar Morin Stars
Richard Dyer Stars
Richard Dyer Heavenly Bodies
Janet Staiger (ed) Stardom: Industry of Desire
Edward de Cordova Picture Personalities
Pamela Robertson Guilty Pleasures: Feminist Camp from Mae West to Madonna
Genre:
Thomas Schatz
Steve Neale Genre and
Barry Grant (ed) Genre: A reader
Woman’s Film:
Molly Haskell From Reverence to Rape
Annette Kuhn Women’s Pictures
Mary Ann Doane The Desire to Desire: The 1940’s Woman’s Film
Christine Gledhill (ed) Studies in Melodrama and Women’s Film
Christine Gledhill (ed) Home is Where the Heart is
Marcia Landy (ed) Imitations of Life
Andrea Walsh Women’s Film and Female Experience
Women in Film:
Laura Mulvey ‘Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema’, 1975, (article)
Issues in Feminist Film Criticism ed. Patricia Erens
This is the single, most published essay in the filed of feminist film theory. Mulvey uses psychoanalytic theory in a political way to demonstrate how
(It is published in many other collections of feminist film criticism)
Film Noir:
E. Ann Kaplan (ed) Women in Film Noir
Alan silver and Elizabeth Ward (eds) Film Noir
Ian Cameron (ed) The Movie Book of Film Noir
Joan Copjec (ed) Shades of Noir
Mildred Pierce:
James M. Cain Mildred Pierce
Albert LaValley (ed) Mildred Pierce (screenplay)
Sidney Rosenzweig
Some Film Noir Movies (in ‘AV Library)
The Maltese Falcon John Huston 1941 FTV 5015
Double Indemnity Billy Wilder 1944 FTV 4781
Mildred Pierce Michael Curtiz 1945 FTV 5630(DVD)
The Woman in the Window Fritz Lang 1945 FTV 378
The Postman always rings Twice, Tay Garnett 1946 FTV 5290
Key Largo John Huston 1948 FTV 432
The Third Man Carol Reed 1949 FTV 5258
In a lonely Place Nicolas Ray 1950 FTV 243
Sunset Boulevard Billy Wilder 1950 FTV 4933
On Dangerous Ground Nicholas Ray 1951 FTV5786
Kiss me Deadly Robert Aldrich 1955 FTV 6135
Touch of Evil Orson Welles 1958 FTV 5099
Contemporary Film Noir
LA Confidential Curtis Hanson 1997 FTV 5903 Memento Christopher Nolan 2001 FTV 8029 (DVD)
Women’s Picture/Melodrama
Stella Dallas King Vidor 1937 FTV 1951
Now,Voyager Irving Rapper 1942 FTV 4017
Leave her to Heaven John Stahl 1945 FTV 5012
The Red Shoes Michael Powell, & Emeric Pressberger 1948 FTV 5267
Sunset Boulevard Billy Wilder 1950 FTV 4933 Magnificent Obsession Douglas Sirk 1954 FTV 711 Written in the Wind Douglas Sirk 1956 FTV 5878 Imitation of Life Douglas Sirk 1959 FTV 142
Contemporary Women’s Film
The Purple Rose of Cairo Woody Allen 1985 FTV 1076
Documentaries; Film Noir/German Expressionism;
American Cinema Pt 4: Film Noir. (looks at the evolution FTV 4295 of the genre from ‘Double Indemnity’ to ‘Mean Streets’ and the influence of German Expressionism & Post war paranoia.)
BFI Century of Cinema Series: American Cinema Pt 2: A personal journey with Martin Scorsese FTV 5628
Visions of Light – The Art of Cinematography FTV 4386(DVD)
Hollywood; The Golden Years (History of RKO Studios Pt 5; DarkVictory (Postwar USA & Film Noir) FTV 1598 5248
Hollywood; The Golden Years (pt 5 & 6 Dark Victory) FTV 1578 Cinema Europe – the Other Hollywood: Pt 3 ‘The Unchained Camera’(German silent film& G.Exp). FTV 5322
Documentaries on Hollywood/Studio System/Censorship
Hollywood Chronicles – Pt 2 the studio System takes over. FTV 4696
Hollywood Chronicles – Pt 6 – Poverty Row (The ‘B’ Movies) FTV 4699
Hollywood Chronicles – Pt 17- How movies are made (production) FTV 4707
Hollywood;Single Beds and double standards (Hays Code) FTV 8500
Hollywoodism; Jews, movies and the American Dream FTV 5955 MGM;
When the Lion Roars (3 part History of MGM FTV 4776 (3 tapes)
The Universal Story FTV 8299
Documentaries - Women’s Film
That’s Hollywood – H’Wood’s soaps and sobs FTV 710 (A) Documentaries - Joan Crawford American Cinema Pt2; The Star (examination of the concept of ‘the star’ – includes case study of Joan Crawford as a prototypical star. FTV 4294
Joan Crawford: the Ultimate Movie Star (on M.P. DVD) FTV 5630
Films of Joan Crawford (in AV Library)
Possessed Clarence Brown 1931 FTV 5907
Rain Lewis Milestone 1932 FTV 4162
Grand Hotel Edmund Golding 1942 FTV 3064
Mildred Pierce Michael Curtiz 1945 FTV 5630 (DVD)
Humoresque Jean Negulesco 1947 FTV 5904
Harriet Craig Vincent Sherman 1950 FTV 5906
Johnny Guitar Nicholas Ray 1953 FTV 4319
Whatever Happened to Baby Jane Robert Aldrich 1962 FTV 1496
Biopic;
Joan Crawford Mommie Dearest Frank Perry 1981 FTV 5637 (Based on the memoirs of her adopted daughter, Christina Crawford)
