Thursday, March 31, 2011

Disney's Pinocchio Part I

After the success of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Walt Disney decided that he would continue making full length animated films. The Disney animation studio's intentions were to have Bambi as it's next film, but there were too many technical issues and Pinocchio was pushed into production.

Pinocchio is not an original story. I honestly did not know that until recently. Disney's version of Pinocchio is even farther off then Snow White. In fact, it probably barely counts as being a version of the original story. Disney's version begins with a few home invasions. First, Jiminy Cricket sneaks into the wood-carver Geppetto's house to get away from the cold. He finds a crazy old man who appears to be talking to the marrionnette that he's carving. Geppetto sees a falling star and decides that he is going to wish on it that his marionnette would come to life and be a real boy. I guess he never heard of adoption. I mean come on. This took place in Italy in the 1880's, so I'm sure that all he had to do was reach a hand out of his window and he would eventually grab onto a street urchin. Geppetto falls asleep muttering to himself about real wooden boys, when the falling star comes in through his open window. The falling star turns into a blue fairy. This is the other home invasion I was talking about. Gepetto really needs to start locking his doors and windows. Apparently the blue fairy only heard part of what Geppetto asked for and made his puppet come alive, though not into a real boy. The fairy tells Pinocchio (which is what Gepetto had named him) that he could become a real boy when he becomes brave, truthful, and unselfish. Couldn't she have made him those things in the first place? Oh well. She tacks on a part about following his conscience, which Pinocchio has no idea about since he is a block of wood that just came to life. Jiminy, the other home invader, decides to show off and tells Pinocchio what a conscience is. Pinocchio reasons that this tiny creature is his conscience and the blue fairy asks Jiminy to watch out for this kid, since he would probably walk into a fire at any moment without some guidance.

Gepetto wakes up to find Pinocchio alive and is so excited that he dances with his little puppet friend. You best believe Gepetto's got moves. Instead of doing about a million other things with his new son, he sends Pinocchio to school. LAME! Pinocchio never makes it to school though, for he was sidetracked by a fox and cat named Honest John and Gideon, respectively. They convince him that school is for fools and showbiz is the way to go. They convince him to join Stromboli's puppet show, which Pinocchio does out of sheer naivety and gullibility. He becomes the star of the show but after he tries to leave, Stromboli locks him up. It turns out that people will pay to see a puppet that can turn it's body 360 degrees without losing eye contact with audience. This may of been where they got the idea for The Exorcist. Jiminy tries to save Pinocchio but it's no use. The blue fairy shows up just in time to rub it in Pinocchio's face that he messed up. She asks him what he's been up to and Pinocchio makes up terrible lies about saving a bus full of orphans and such. Pinocchio's nose grows with every lie, eventually housing a bird's nest. Pinocchio then claims that he will tell no more lies and asks the fairy to save him. She does, but warns him that she cannot help him again. I didn't know fairies had a limit to how many times they can help people. Must be tough life. Meanwhile, Honest John and Gideon meet with the corrupt coachman. The coachman tells them that he needs kids to go to Pleasure Island. This sounds promising. Pinocchio decides to head back home but is again bothered by Honest John and Gideon. Pinnochio, learning his lesson, says that he should go home. The fox and cat, growing impatient, scoop Pinocchio up and take him to Pleasure Island. While he's there, Pinocchio meets Lampwick, the most annoying character in the whole movie. They all have fun gambling, drinking and playing pool until they realize that the island is cursed. How is the island cursed? It turns kids that act like jackasses into...well...jackasses....literally. The coachman apparently uses the donkeys to work in the diamond mines. Sounds....fair. Jiminy finds out and tries to save Pinocchio. Fortunately, is he able to find him and they both escape, though Pinocchio is technically half a jackass. Lampwick, on the other hand, is a total jackass. I mean this literally. He gets turned into a donkey, much to my amusement.

The two flee home to find that Gepetto has gone to rescue Pinocchio from Pleasure Island by taking a boat onto the sea. He gets a little ways out and Jonah...er I mean Gepetto is abruptly swallowed by a whale named Monstro. That's right. Italians name local whales. Pinocchio and Jiminy attempt to save Gepetto but are also swallowed up. They find Gepetto inside with the raft. How is it that Monstro was unable to fully swallow any of them? Also, I'm pretty sure that Pinocchio has the most villains in it. Seriously, there is Monstro, Honest John, Gideon, Stromboli, and the coachman. I didn't think a puppet could have so many enemies! Anyway, Pinocchio comes up with the idea of burning part of Gepetto's boat to get Monstro to sneeze. This succeeds and they are all somehow not spit into the stratosphere. Montstro is pretty peeved that his food is getting away, even though the food consisted of an old man, some wood, a cricket, a cat, and a goldfish. That's like a M&M for us. I don't know, maybe old men and puppets are considered a delicacy by whales. Pinocchio decides to do the stupid thing and sacrifice himself to save the others. Monstro, like a big dog, forgets how big he is, and decides that he is going to dive through a very small hole to catch Pinocchio. FAIL! They are washed up on shore and find that Pinocchio is scrap wood. They all mourn until the blue fairy comes and decides that Pinocchio finally acted with bravery and unselfishness. Pinocchio is turned into a real boy and everyone celebrates! Gepetto breaks out some new moves. Oh, and Jiminy get's a badge for dealing with Pinocchio.

The original version is just as weird, but that will have to wait for another day. Stay tuned for part II!

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs


Everybody knows the story of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, or at least they think they do. Most people believe that the story follows Disney's first full length animated film. What may surprise some people though is the story is based off of a Brothers Grimm tale. The Brothers Grimm versions of fairy tales tend to be quite a bit darker than anything Disney and other productions have created since the early 20th century. You all know Disney's version: The evil queen is jealous of her step-daughter because of her beauty and orders a huntsman to kill her in the woods. He spares her and after running through the creepiest forest in existence, she finds a cottage with seven dwarfs inside. Hilarity ensues as does singing and dancing. There is also a comically large population of forest animals that Snow White appears to know how to communicate with. They live together for awhile until the queen finds out where Snow White is and turns herself into a old woman to trick Snow White. Snow White forgets the first rule about accepting food from strangers and promptly falls into a deep sleep. The dwarfs mourn her and put her in a glass case. Where the heck did they find a glass case to put her in? Did they just have it lying around in case some random chick died in their cottage? That all seems pretty convenient to me! The prince happens to waltz by and decides that he wants to kiss a corpse. Creepy and weird! Anyway, she magically comes back to life and they live happily ever after. Oh yeah...and the queen/witch subsequently gets struck by lightning and has a boulder land on her. That's what happens to vain people! This is a classic cop out ending. The real story has a much odder ending. Is it a great story? Sure, but after reading this we hope that you would want to read the Grimm's version.

What are some of the big differences between the two versions? First off, the Disney version doesn't even mention or show Snow White's biological mother. This starts the trend of Disney main characters not having both biological parents alive or around in the story. No one knows why, but there are many theories, including that Disney wanted to have a more emotional feel in his movies and another that claims that Disney just plain hated nuclear family units. In Grimm's story, the original queen introduces how Snow White receives her name. The mother pricks her finger on a sewing needle and a drop of blood falls onto snow that is on an ebony windowsill. The mother, seeing how beautiful the blood looks in the snow, decides that this is the best time to name her u
nborn child, which I guess she knew was going to be a girl. She declared that she wanted a daughter with snow white skin with blood red lips and hair as black as the ebony windowsill. God forbid she have a son. Her specifications make it sound like she is wishing for a vampire child. Anyway, Snow White is born and the mother dies right after. This is probably from seeing her vampire baby. The king quickly remarries a woman who happens to be the vainest person on the planet. The new evil queen has a magic mirror, just like in the Disney version, that answers any question. It continually tells her that she is the fairest of them all until Snow White reaches the age of seven. Then the mirror finds a seven year old child to be more beautiful than the queen. That mirror has odd standards. Also, what kind of radius is this mirror working with? I find it hard to believe that the two fairest people in the land just happen to be living in the same household. Unlike in the Disney version, where Snow White appears to be at least in her mid to late teens, she is seven years old when she is led out into the forest by the huntsman and then spared. This part is sort of like the Disney version as in the queen asks the huntsman to bring back Snow White's heart as proof of her death. I say sort of, because though in both versions the huntsman kills an animal and takes it's heart to the queen, in Grimm's she decides to eat the heart. I guess by eating Snow White's heart she believed she would gain her beauty? If that were true, we would have loads more cannibalism in America. I'm serious. It would be a bloodbath.


Snow White does meet seven dwarfs, but they are not comically named. The dwarfs did not receive names until the stage version of Snow White in 1912. Disney, deciding he wanted more humor in the story, changed the names to resemble the dwarf's demeanor or affliction. The dwarfs tell Snow White that she can stay as long as she cooks and cleans for them. Sounds fair....I guess. The dwarfs warn her never to let anyone in, probably because they get so many Jehovah's Witnesses in that specific forest. Being a seven year old girl, she decides not to listen. Meanwhile, the queen asks the mirror who the fairest of them all is, and the mirror still says that it's Snow White. Realizing she has been tricked, she dresses as a peddler and for some reason knows exactly where the dwarf's cottage is. The peddler queen offers a seven year old Snow White a lacy girdle and straps it on he so tight that Snow White passes out. The dwarfs come back from work in the mines in time to rescue Snow White. The next time the dwarfs are gone, the queen comes back dressed as another old lady and offers Snow White a comb that just happened to be poisoned. Not learning her lesson about talking to strange people, Snow White allows the queen to brush her hair and promptly passes out again. The dwarfs save her again. How? The story never says. PLOT HOLE! At this point, the dwarfs seriously consider getting a life insurance policy on this dumb-as-rocks girl.


Figuring that the third times the charm, the queen
comes back disguised as a farmer's wife and offers Snow White an apple which also happened to be poisoned. Snow White had gained a little sense now and refused. The queen cut the apple in half and took a bite off the non-poisoned white part inside. She then gave snow white the poisoned red part and Snow White took a bite. This time the dwarfs couldn't find a way to revive Snow White and like the Disney version, put her in a glass case. A prince happens along and instantly falls in love with the seemingly dead Snow White. May I remind you that she is still only seven. Can anyone say pedophile? Though the prince himself could be around her age. The story is based on medieval Germany and historically, it was at the age of seven when a person could consent to be married. The prince buys the glass case from the dwarfs and has his men carry it away to his castle. The journey must have been extremely bumpy, because the men carrying Snow White's glass case were fumbling along which helped dislodge the piece of poisoned apple that was stuck in her throat. Everyone rejoiced! Snow White agrees to marry the prince. The story does not end there however. What about the queen? Well, she finds out that Snow White is still alive and plans on crashing Snow White's wedding to the prince. When she arrives however, she is quickly captured and made to wear heated iron shoes and dance til she dies. Maybe not as cool as getting struck by lightning and being crushed by a boulder, but still pretty creative. I'm wondering what everybody did in the meantime while this lady was screaming in agony and dancing around. "Alright everybody, ignore the screams and smell of burning flesh and enjoy some cake!" So, as you can see, the Disney version is not nearly as morbid, but still manages to scare us with Snow White's run through the possessed forest.

Disney decided that it was about time to go into feature films instead of just sticking with shorts. Walt, however, had no idea how much work was ahead of him. Disney started working on the full length feature film in 1934 with a projected budget of $250,000, almost ten times the cost of a Silly Symphony short. Walt had to fight to get the film into production, as his brother and business partner, Roy Disney, and his own wife, Lillian, had tried to talk him out of it. The movie industry considered it a big waste of time and declared the movie "Disney's Folly" while it was in production. Walt even had to mortgage off his house to raise money for the making of the feature. By the time the production wrapped, the movie had cost almost $1,500,000 to make. That was huge in 1937 when the film finally came out.

Walt really wanted the story to be a funny one. He wanted a lot of focus to be on the dwarfs and their hi-jinks. They wanted to give the dwarfs funny names that fit their demeanor and afflictions so they picked from a group of fifty possible names which included: Jumpy, Deafy, Dizzey, Hickey, Wheezy, Baldy, Gabby, Nifty, Sniffy, Swift, Lazy, Puffy, Stuffy, Tubby, Shorty and Burpy. Luckily for us, none of those names were used. The finalist ended up being Doc, who was to be the leader, then Grumpy, Bashful, Sneezy, Sleepy, Happy, and the one that took the longest to decide, Dopey. Dopey ended up being the most popular dwarf when the movie came out even though he didn't speak throughout the whole movie. What happened was that Disney couldn't find a voice that fit the role properly and decided to make Dopey a mute. Walt wanted other parts of the story to be humorous, such as the queen. He wanted to make her fat and have lots of warts, but later decided to make her a beautiful queen instead. Many ideas about the story were thrown around, mainly ones that would make the story not resemble the Grimm's version at all. It took several years of ideas and lost hope, but after taking some time off, Disney regained his passion for the project and reworked the story to what it is now.

Walt filled Snow White with memorable music, including Whistle While You Work, Heigh Ho!, and Someday My Prince Will Come, which Walt won an Oscar for. The feature was the first to have a soundtrack album be released in conjunction with the movie. Having a soundtrac
k album in the first place was unheard of at the time. Unfortunately, Disney didn't have its own music publishing company, they had to have the music published by a separate company, Bourne Co. Incidentally, the Bourne Co. still owns the rights to the music of Snow White. This is the only movie in which Disney does not fully own the music rights.

Many movies influenced Snow White. The scene at the balcony/well and Snow White dead in the glass case is basically from Romeo and Juliet. German Expressionism com
es out in the film during the queen's transformation and Snow White's run through the scary forest. Movies like Nosferatu and the Cabinet of Dr. Calligari heavily influenced these moments. The witch's transformation is also supposed to be reminiscent of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. It just goes to show you that literature from other authors can help create a masterpiece.

The movie premiered in Dec
ember, 1937 to a receptive crowd, most of them being the ones that labeled the film "Disney's Folly." The movie received a standing ovation from the star studded audience which included, Shirley Temple, Charlie Chaplin, Judy Garland, Jack Benny, Clark Gable, Douglas Fairbanks, and Ed Sullivan. Six days later, Walt and the seven dwarfs were on the cover of Time and the New York Times said, "Thank You Very Much, Mr. Disney." So much for being a folly. I'm sure Walt had a few choice words for all who doubted him. This would include his wife who told him that "No ones gonna pay a dime to see a dwarf picture." Walt proved everybody wrong. The movie went on to gross $6.5 million internationally on it's first theatrical run and has since grossed $184,925,486 with the original release and many re-releases. It is currently ranked 10th in highest grossing pictures of all time when adjusted for inflation. The movie was also the first full length animated film to be shot in Technicolor. The movie won a Honorary Oscar for "significant screen innovation" and was also nominated for best musical score. On Oscar night, Walt received a one of a kind Oscar that no one else has ever gotten. Presented by Shirley Temple, it was a large Oscar statuette with seven small Oscars.

The movie was continuously praised by the media and the stars that attended the opening, including Charlie Chaplin who said the film was a notable achievement in cinema. Snow White inspired many others to bring their stories to the silver screen, most notably is The Wizard of Oz. The movie hasn't lost it's fans. As the first of the Disney animated films, it holds a level of reverence. People still love the story of Snow White, and it never fails to find an audience with new generations.

Monday, March 21, 2011

Talkies and the Golden Age of Film

The year was 1927, and the film industry would never be the same. Warner Bros. studio came out with The Jazz Singer starring Al Jolson. What was so special about this movie? It happened to be the very first "Talkie." Warner Bros. had successfully found a way to get spoken word onto the silver screen. Warner Bros. owned Vitaphone, which was the technology they used to put language with the movie. The whole process of Vitaphone was very simple. All you had to do was play a phonograph of the sound of the movie and play it with the movie itself. It just had to be exact or the movie looked off. Warner Bros. only owned Vitaphone until 1928, and many other companies tried to duplicate the process to churn out their own talkies. By May 1928, Electric Research Product Incorporated had a monopoly on sound distribution. In the years after, sound quality and techniques greatly improved.

The Jazz Singer stands out among movies for that distinction of being the first one to be given a voice, though the use of black-face in the movie is cringe-worthy today. Many who went to see the film looked around the theater to see where the singer was or wondering who was talking since there was no way that it was actually part of the movie. The audience at the premiere of the movie were described as being in hysterics over hearing dialogue during the movie. With that first talkie came many more.

Talkies were not embraced by all. Audiences around the U.S. loved them, but a lot of actors and actresses now found themselves out of a job. Hollywood couldn't go back after talkies were introduced, they had to switch over from silent films to make more money. Silent films would cease altogether by 1935 with the last being Legong: Dance of the Virgins, which incidentally wasn't shown in American theaters due to concern with female nudity in the film. Many of the silent film era stars couldn't switch over to talkies due to their lack of vocal talents and their inability to memorize their lines. The well known musical Singin' In the Rain does a great job of capturing the transition from silent films to talkies in Hollywood, including the hardships that many actors faced. Charlie Chaplin and other actors, as well as directors that made it during the silent era initially refused to star in any talkies because they thought the new films were just a novelty. When it became apparent that talkies were here to stay and making studios lots of money, Chaplin and other silent film aficionados decided they would jump on board. Chaplin's first talkie would be The Great Dictator, a film about Nazi Germany and Hitler. Chaplin starred in and directed the film, which was the first American film to satirize the Nazi's and Hitler. The U.S. was still formally at peace with Germany at the time, so the film was somewhat controversial.

The Jazz Singer officially started the so-called "Golden Age of Film." The era would arguably last until the late 50's. The big movie studio's during this time were Warner Bros., MGM, Paramount, Fox, and RKO. These studios used the same formulas for all their movies, as in they only did specific genres: slapstick comedy, musical, animated cartoon, and biopic. The studios were rather restrictive on their talent though, as once you had a contract with a major studio, they basically owned you. You went where they wanted you to go, you dated who they say you dated, and you starred in the movies they wanted you to. The first two were for publicity's sake, and the last for consistency. If you had a contract, you couldn't make a movie with another studio unless you were lent out for a price. Many stars like Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney were unfortunately typecast as being teenagers through most of their career and couldn't expand to adult roles due to the restrictions of the studio, namely MGM. MGM owned both Garland and Rooney and they starred in a total of nine films together over the span of their careers. They literally had not choice, like many other actors, in what movie they wanted to star in. Imagine if that were the case today. Daniel Day-Lewis would be in way more movies and couldn't be so picky! Jim Carrey would have never done The Majestic (probably would of been a good thing) or Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind (that would of been terrible!). Fortunately for us, movie studios have stopped being so obsessive about their actors and have also learned to do more kinds of movies.

Hollywood went through several other innovations through this era of film. Color films were first seen in 1935 with the help of Technicolor, and two years later you had the premiere of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. The movie was the first fully animated film in history, and the first colored animated film. People who were used to seeing their movies in black and white and without sound quickly saw films change to colorful and full of song and dialogue.

During this era in film, many actors gained notoriety. Already named have been Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney. Both were among the most popular actors in their day. Other actors that made it during this time were such names as Humphrey Bogart, Lana Turner, Shirley Temple, Clark Gable, Claudette Colbert, Cary Grant, Jean Harlow, Jimmy Stewart, Greta Garbo, Gene Kelly, Betty Davis, and Spencer Tracy (Some of the actors are seen, left). They helped create some of the most memorable films of all time including, Gone with the Wind, Stagecoach, The Wizard of Oz, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, It's a Wonderful Life, The Philadelphia Story, It Happened One Night, You Can't Take It With You, King Kong, Top Hat, and Mutiny on the Bounty. Hollywood is most remembered for this period of movies. Seeing all the big stars on the silver screen sent many a impressionable young person to the L.A. district to pursue a career. Though many of the movie studios churned out hundreds of movies each year, they did come out with lots of memorable ones that we still enjoy today.

Thursday, March 17, 2011

Early Film: Beginnings through the Silent Era

Before we had film, we had plays and dances. These were ways of telling a story and entertaining groups of people. They involved many of the same things that go into telling a story on film. Scripts, sets, directors, actors, actresses, storyboards, and costume were all integral parts of stage productions, and made their way into being used in film.


In the 1860s, mechanisms for producing two-dimensional drawings in motion were demonstrated with devices such as the zeotrope, mutoscope and praxinscope. These machines were outgrowths of simple optical devices and would display sequences of still pictures at sufficient speed for the images on the pictures to appear to be moving, a phenomenon called persistence of vision. Naturally the images needed to be carefully designed to achieve the desired effect, and the underlying principle became the basis for the development of film animation.

The development of celluloid film for still photography made it possible to capture live motion. An 1878 experiment by English photographer Eadweard Muybridge in the United States using 24 cameras produced a series of stereoscopic images of a galloping horse, is arguably the first "motion picture," though it was not called by this name.



This technology required a person to look into a viewing machine to see the pictures which were separate paper prints attached to a drum turned by a handcrank. The pictures were shown at a variable speed of about 5 to 10 pictures per second, depending on how rapidly the crank was turned. Commercial versions of these machines were coin operated.

By the 1880's, the motion picture camera was invented and allowed the individual images to be captured and stored on a single reel. This made way for the motion picture projector, which shone light through the individual pictures, so they could be projected onto a screen. Thus the movie theater was born.















(The picture is a still frame from Roundhay Garden Scene, the world's first production shot using a
motion picture camera, 1888.)

The productions were often short, with no sound and little editing. Nevertheless, audiences were captivated by these "motion pictures" and wanted to see more. Around the turn of the 20th century, films began developing a narrative structure by stringing scenes together to tell narratives. The scenes were later broken up into multiple shots of varying sizes and angles. Other techniques such as camera movement were realized as effective ways to portray a story on film. Rather than leave the audience with noise of early cinema projectors, theater owners would hire a piano player or organist or a full orchestra to play music that would cover noises of projector. Eventually, musicians would start to fit the mood of the film at any given moment. By the early 1920s, most films came with a prepared list of sheet music for this purpose, with complete film scores being composed for major productions. If you haven't seen a silent movie before, please do. Though it is usually only a piano or organ playing, it does make the movie more enjoyable and establishes a mood. One of my favorite silent films is Nosferatu. The organ music is perfect for the movie, and it's fun to see what productions were like in the early 20th century.

Other famous Silent films are A Trip to the Moon (Le Voyage dans la Lune), Ben-Hur, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and Charlie Chaplin's famous silent film, The Kid. The silent film era basically spanned the late 1800's to the late 1920's. Vaudeville was a very popular act used in silent films, as a way of getting laughs from visual humor, pratfalls, and exaggerated movements. Vaudeville would be a continued inspiration for many films through the early 20th century.


Hollywood was born at the eve of World War I and churned out productions like D.W. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation. The Birth of a Nation began filming in 1914 and pioneered such camera techniques as deep focus, jump-cut, cut-cross and facial close-up, which are now considered integral to the industry. The film was a technical wonder at the time and was extremely successful at the box office when it came out in 1915. With a budget of $110,000, it returned $10 million. Though it is considered a staple in the study of film and film production, it is an extremely controversial film, being all about the KKK and portraying them in a good light. D.W. Griffith got so much heat from the film that he decided to make another movie the next year called Intolerance. The movie showcased four separate times in history where intolerance led to terrible things such as Christ's crucifixion. Unfortunately though, the damage had been done and The Birth of a Nation caused a new found interest in the KKK and the second era of the hate group began.

Several actors and actresses had their heydays in the silent era of film. Charlie Chaplin is probably the most recognizable, mostly playing his lovable character, the Tramp. Harold Lloyd was another well known actor during the silent era, starring in Safety Last! and Grandma's Boy usually playing his "Glasses character." Though Lloyd is not as well known, he made more money than Chaplin in the end and had his fair share of successes. If you're wondering if you have seen him somewhere, it's probably from the image of the man hanging from the clock tower hand. Buster Keaton is also bunched in with Lloyd and Chaplin for greatest silent film actors. He always played a very serious and stoic man which earned him the name, "The Great Stone Face." His most famous movie, The General, was considered by most to be one of the greatest silent films of all time and also the best on the Civil War. The movie was a comedy though and was also directed by Keaton himself. Keaton, like Chaplin was an accomplished actor and director.

The name most associated with great silent film actress is Lillian Gish. Her career spanned from the early 1910's to the late 80's, but her most prominent roles came during the silent era. She had a starring role in The Birth of a Nation and Broken Blossoms (left), which was a film done in sepia instead of the traditional black and white. But, like most silent film actors, she didn't have much work after "talkies" came around in 1927.

The beginning of film was a wonder of innovation and design and though it may seem simple to us now, it was awe-inspiring then. Seeing moving pictures is one thing we take for granted these days, but was a real treat for people living in the late 1800's.

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Film History

You are not dreaming! You are seeing another blog by Demosthenes! With the help of my sister, who knows way more about movies than I do and probably always will, I will give a broad history of film and showcase certain movies, genres, actors, actresses, and directors. Why not just include this in my other blog Histeria you ask? I feel that film is an extremely broad topic that is far too big to be a part of Histeria. It is my hope that on top of informing you on the past, I can also give you a deeper knowledge of movies and the people that bring them to life. Hope you enjoy!

-Demosthenes