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At the end of the 1800s a new artform
flickered into live.
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It looked like our dreams.
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00:00:16,913 --> 00:00:20,615
Movies are multi-billion dollar
global entertainment industry now.
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00:00:21,207 --> 00:00:25,208
But what drives them
isn't box-office or showbiz.
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00:00:25,842 --> 00:00:28,271
It's passion, innovation!
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00:00:29,832 --> 00:00:34,007
So let's travel the world
to find this innovation for ourselves.
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00:00:36,120 --> 00:00:38,926
To discover it in this man,
Stanley Donen,
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00:00:38,951 --> 00:00:40,252
who made Singing in the Rain.
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00:00:41,541 --> 00:00:43,330
And in Jane Campion in Australia.
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00:00:44,510 --> 00:00:46,361
And in the films of Ky�ko Kagawa
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00:00:46,386 --> 00:00:49,087
who was in perhaps
the greatest movie ever made.
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00:00:50,999 --> 00:00:54,697
And Amitabh Bachchan,
the most famous actor in the world.
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00:00:55,226 --> 00:00:58,435
And in the movies of Martin Scorcese
and Spike Lee,
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00:00:58,460 --> 00:01:00,664
Lars Von Trier and
Akira Kurosawa.
15
00:01:02,187 --> 00:01:05,205
Welcome to the story of film,
an odyssey.
16
00:01:05,622 --> 00:01:09,450
An epic tale of innovation
across twelve decades,
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00:01:09,475 --> 00:01:13,185
six continents
and a thousand films.
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00:01:23,068 --> 00:01:27,055
1944, World War II,
the Normandy beaches.
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A bunch of allied troops
have just plunged under water
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to stop being shot by German machine guns.
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Above the water is hell.
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00:01:53,007 --> 00:01:55,062
Bullets tinkle on iron.
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00:01:58,007 --> 00:01:59,656
The camera's all over the place.
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00:02:00,804 --> 00:02:03,865
This scene was actually shot
on a peaceful beach in Ireland.
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00:02:05,714 --> 00:02:07,530
But director Steven Spielberg
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00:02:07,555 --> 00:02:11,151
brought bullets and blood
and bombs to that beach.
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00:02:12,848 --> 00:02:14,389
A lie to tell truth.
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00:02:18,428 --> 00:02:19,970
This is filmmaking.
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00:02:22,939 --> 00:02:26,234
The art of making us
feel that we're there.
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00:02:32,299 --> 00:02:35,004
A young woman in Paris has
her eyes closed
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00:02:35,029 --> 00:02:37,697
to feel the warmth of the sun on her face.
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00:02:43,599 --> 00:02:48,625
At the same time unseen by her
this little street drama takes place.
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00:02:53,647 --> 00:02:58,489
White light floods the screen,
links the young and old woman.
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00:02:59,036 --> 00:03:01,873
We want to reach into the screen
to help the old lady.
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00:03:07,010 --> 00:03:08,596
This is filmmaking.
36
00:03:09,135 --> 00:03:11,422
Cinema as an empathy machine.
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00:03:19,760 --> 00:03:22,042
The Normandy beach scene
and the French lady
38
00:03:22,067 --> 00:03:25,778
show that, in its use
of sound and light and truth,
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00:03:25,803 --> 00:03:27,869
cinema can be great.
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00:03:29,494 --> 00:03:32,797
The story of film is the story
of that greatness.
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00:03:33,943 --> 00:03:35,994
It's a story full of surprises.
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00:03:39,579 --> 00:03:42,451
At first thought you'd guess
that the story of film would be
43
00:03:42,476 --> 00:03:45,140
about scenes like this one
from Casablanca,
44
00:03:45,165 --> 00:03:47,973
full of yearning,
story and stardom,
45
00:03:47,998 --> 00:03:50,200
because Casablanca is a Hollywood classic.
46
00:03:50,596 --> 00:03:53,049
Ingrid Bergman is lit
like a movie star.
47
00:03:53,450 --> 00:03:54,825
Highlights in her eyes.
48
00:03:55,130 --> 00:03:57,062
It's all filmed on a studio set.
49
00:04:02,612 --> 00:04:03,812
But films like Casablanca are
50
00:04:03,814 --> 00:04:06,921
too romantic to be classical
in the true sense.
51
00:04:08,278 --> 00:04:13,364
Instead, Japanese films, like this
are the real classical movies.
52
00:04:14,955 --> 00:04:18,725
Romantic films are always in a rush
but this moment
53
00:04:18,746 --> 00:04:22,625
in Record of a Tenement Gentleman
there's a pause in the story.
54
00:04:30,554 --> 00:04:35,542
A cat, a chiming clock, a kettle,
quietly coming to the boil.
55
00:04:35,948 --> 00:04:40,736
The almost square frame filled
with smaller squares and rectangles.
56
00:04:41,339 --> 00:04:46,125
Calm, emotionally restrained
like a little classical Greek temple.
57
00:04:48,580 --> 00:04:52,042
So Hollywood's not classical,
Japan is.
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00:04:59,511 --> 00:05:01,235
With all its talk of box office,
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00:05:01,237 --> 00:05:05,391
the film business would have us
believe that money drives movies.
60
00:05:10,784 --> 00:05:11,722
Ticket sales.
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00:05:13,486 --> 00:05:14,213
Marketing.
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00:05:14,383 --> 00:05:14,975
Glamor.
63
00:05:15,069 --> 00:05:15,711
Premiers.
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00:05:15,736 --> 00:05:16,568
Red carpets.
65
00:05:17,950 --> 00:05:18,896
But it doesn't.
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00:05:20,148 --> 00:05:21,962
Money doesn't drive cinema.
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00:05:22,290 --> 00:05:23,695
The money men don't know
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00:05:23,720 --> 00:05:26,721
the secrets of the human heart
or the brilliance of the medium of film.
69
00:05:28,304 --> 00:05:31,143
But if money doesn't drive movies,
what does?
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00:05:31,920 --> 00:05:34,333
Here's the answer: ideas.
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00:05:34,767 --> 00:05:38,571
Watch how a shot of bubbles
becomes an idea in movie history.
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00:05:42,050 --> 00:05:43,639
This is a scene from the British director
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00:05:43,664 --> 00:05:47,217
Carol Reed's 1946 movie
Odd Man Out.
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00:05:48,006 --> 00:05:49,268
A guy is in a mess.
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00:05:50,120 --> 00:05:53,848
He sees his troubles reflected
in the bubbles of a spilled drink.
76
00:05:54,838 --> 00:05:57,441
Now look at another close-up
of bubbles in a drink.
77
00:05:57,660 --> 00:06:01,089
Again a character is in trouble,
self-absorbed.
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00:06:03,548 --> 00:06:09,062
This film's director, Jean-Luc Godard,
knew and admired Carol Reed's work,
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00:06:09,087 --> 00:06:12,263
so he was probably thinking of
Odd Man Out when,
80
00:06:12,334 --> 00:06:14,871
20 years later, he filmed this moment.
81
00:06:18,226 --> 00:06:22,517
Now look at Martin Scorsese's
film �taxi driver� of 1976.
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00:06:27,207 --> 00:06:31,528
Scorsese loves the films of
Carol Reed and Jean-Luc Godard
83
00:06:31,553 --> 00:06:35,682
and so used the same idea,
that a character looking into bubbles
84
00:06:35,707 --> 00:06:39,947
can see their own troubles,
and also, somehow, the cosmos.
85
00:06:43,946 --> 00:06:45,888
Visual ideas, more than money or marketing,
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00:06:45,913 --> 00:06:48,992
are the real things that drive cinema.
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00:06:53,404 --> 00:06:55,065
Innovating with those ideas.
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00:06:57,614 --> 00:07:01,186
It doesn't always seem like it,
but, sitting in the dark,
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00:07:01,211 --> 00:07:05,809
it's images and ideas that excite us,
not money or showbiz.
90
00:07:06,943 --> 00:07:10,165
But if the business people don't
control film, who does?
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00:07:10,761 --> 00:07:12,973
Who knows how to get inside your head?
92
00:07:13,364 --> 00:07:14,494
David Lynch does.
93
00:07:15,697 --> 00:07:17,419
And Baz Luhrmann does.
94
00:07:18,184 --> 00:07:22,141
And, in a different way,
Samira Makhmalbaf does.
95
00:07:23,585 --> 00:07:27,449
The story of film: An odyssey
is a global road movie
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00:07:27,474 --> 00:07:30,580
to find the innovators,
the people and films
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00:07:30,605 --> 00:07:35,382
that give life to this sublime,
ineffable art form:
98
00:07:35,389 --> 00:07:37,321
Cinema!
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00:07:39,727 --> 00:07:41,376
And here's a third surprise.
100
00:07:42,157 --> 00:07:45,415
In the 70s you'd guess that
moments like this -
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00:07:47,370 --> 00:07:50,864
the camera racing through space
like a bullet, the scream of tires
102
00:07:50,870 --> 00:07:55,247
on the road as a car chases a train -
will be the big story.
103
00:07:59,231 --> 00:08:03,840
New American cinema was wonderful
but Dakar in Senegal
104
00:08:03,865 --> 00:08:07,121
was as exciting as Los Angeles
in the 70s movie-wise.
105
00:08:09,846 --> 00:08:11,266
A surprise indeed.
106
00:08:12,346 --> 00:08:15,125
Much of what we assume
about the movies is off the mark.
107
00:08:17,718 --> 00:08:19,651
It's time to redraw
the map of movie history
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00:08:19,653 --> 00:08:22,295
that we have in our heads.
109
00:08:23,921 --> 00:08:27,676
It's factually inaccurate
and racist by omission.
110
00:08:32,146 --> 00:08:33,993
The story of film: An odyssey
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could be an exciting,
unpredictable one.
112
00:08:37,119 --> 00:08:40,385
Fasten your seatbelts.
It's going to be a bumpy ride.
113
00:09:10,551 --> 00:09:12,516
New Jersey, East Coast, America.
114
00:09:14,432 --> 00:09:17,489
A mum and two daughters are
going to the movies.
115
00:09:19,264 --> 00:09:20,182
Why are we here?
116
00:09:20,924 --> 00:09:23,405
Because something extraordinary
happened here.
117
00:09:24,054 --> 00:09:27,498
In the 1890s movies were born here.
118
00:09:30,678 --> 00:09:32,150
Lyon, France.
119
00:09:34,249 --> 00:09:36,126
Two college friends are going
to the movies.
120
00:09:39,424 --> 00:09:43,504
Movies were born here too.
Maybe even more so than in New Jersey.
121
00:09:47,405 --> 00:09:50,210
So what's there to discover
about movies in New Jersey?
122
00:09:52,092 --> 00:09:58,428
We find this man, Thomas Edison.
Edison was a manic, passionate inventor.
123
00:09:59,711 --> 00:10:03,002
Here's his office where he
invented the light bulb
124
00:10:03,027 --> 00:10:04,513
and the phonograph.
125
00:10:05,580 --> 00:10:08,697
Here's his desk,
full of compartments, full of detail.
126
00:10:09,134 --> 00:10:11,053
Obsessive, like he was.
127
00:10:12,621 --> 00:10:14,327
Here is Edison's factory.
128
00:10:16,353 --> 00:10:20,010
The beauty of Victorian engineering,
the care and detail.
129
00:10:24,833 --> 00:10:27,035
Look at this quotation
on the wall of the factory
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00:10:27,060 --> 00:10:28,835
from the painter Joshua Reynolds.
131
00:10:29,134 --> 00:10:31,901
'There is no expedient
to which a man will not resort
132
00:10:31,926 --> 00:10:35,027
to avoid the real labor of thinking.'
133
00:10:35,988 --> 00:10:38,605
Edison loved it and moved
it around the factory
134
00:10:38,630 --> 00:10:42,515
so that his colleagues wouldn't get used
to seeing it in one place.
135
00:10:43,706 --> 00:10:46,359
So Edison's factory was an ideas factory.
136
00:10:51,455 --> 00:10:53,042
Before Edison, there had been
137
00:10:53,067 --> 00:10:58,499
funfairs, circuses,
magic lantern shows, magicians acts.
138
00:11:05,092 --> 00:11:09,340
Still images were reflected on
mirrors or spun in a box.
139
00:11:23,493 --> 00:11:26,306
This happened not in fancy cities
in the world,
140
00:11:27,790 --> 00:11:32,352
but places like this:
Leeds in England.
141
00:11:35,621 --> 00:11:39,489
The American George Eastman
came up with the idea of film on a roll.
142
00:11:43,240 --> 00:11:46,186
Edison and his colleague W.K.L. Dickson
egged each other on
143
00:11:46,211 --> 00:11:51,658
to find that if you spin
these images in a box,
144
00:11:51,683 --> 00:11:54,063
they give the illusion of movement.
145
00:11:55,734 --> 00:12:00,838
And then look at this, invented by Edison.
It's called the black Maria.
146
00:12:04,248 --> 00:12:09,313
Edison and many of the other
manic, ideasy inventors of cinema,
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00:12:09,338 --> 00:12:13,382
realized that beyond
the equipment and machines,
148
00:12:13,407 --> 00:12:16,843
what you needed most
for movies was light.
149
00:12:18,621 --> 00:12:22,257
It probably didn't occur to them that
cinema would become the art of light.
150
00:12:24,969 --> 00:12:27,978
But, somehow, in building
this box on wheels
151
00:12:28,003 --> 00:12:29,754
that turned to follow the sun,
152
00:12:30,628 --> 00:12:33,665
whose roof opened by turning this wheel,
153
00:12:33,690 --> 00:12:36,784
Edison took the first steps
in that direction.
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00:12:38,018 --> 00:12:42,676
He had a hunch that cinema was a
dark room, where light mattered.
155
00:12:43,652 --> 00:12:45,382
He shot little movies here.
156
00:12:47,760 --> 00:12:49,567
This couple kissing, for example.
157
00:12:49,988 --> 00:12:52,532
A little moment that everyone
could understand.
158
00:12:56,900 --> 00:12:58,696
But to see these films you had
159
00:12:58,721 --> 00:13:02,710
to look inside something like this.
That wasn't enough.
160
00:13:02,920 --> 00:13:06,867
It was too private and small.
Cinema had to be bigger.
161
00:13:07,445 --> 00:13:08,485
And it became so.
162
00:13:09,733 --> 00:13:11,304
Here in Lyon.
163
00:13:12,133 --> 00:13:13,209
In this house.
164
00:13:13,998 --> 00:13:18,911
In the minds of these passionate men:
Louis Lumi�re and his brother Auguste.
165
00:13:20,657 --> 00:13:22,829
The brothers were as ideasy as Edison.
166
00:13:23,371 --> 00:13:25,990
Louis in particular was
technically brilliant.
167
00:13:26,516 --> 00:13:30,399
He realized that the grab-advance
mechanism of a sewing machine
168
00:13:30,424 --> 00:13:34,634
would allow the strip of film
to be advanced, paused, exposed,
169
00:13:34,659 --> 00:13:37,014
advanced, paused, exposed.
170
00:13:38,794 --> 00:13:41,257
This is one of the very first
Lumi�re cameras.
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00:13:41,790 --> 00:13:45,497
Open its back, shine a light
through it and it becomes a projector.
172
00:13:46,355 --> 00:13:48,175
Count Leo Tolstoy called the result
173
00:13:48,177 --> 00:13:52,253
'the clicking machine,
like a human hurricane.'
174
00:13:54,156 --> 00:13:57,479
One of the first films the
Lumi�res shot was this one.
175
00:14:03,939 --> 00:14:06,098
A short documentary
of everyday life.
176
00:14:06,123 --> 00:14:10,072
Their workers leaving a factory.
The Lumi�re factory.
177
00:14:11,092 --> 00:14:15,263
This is the factory today.
The place of the first movie.
178
00:14:15,265 --> 00:14:16,676
The Source of the Nile.
179
00:14:24,844 --> 00:14:28,350
But it wasn't enough for the
Lumi�re's to make such home movies.
180
00:14:28,652 --> 00:14:30,405
They wanted to show them,
181
00:14:30,430 --> 00:14:35,177
not just in a box to one person
at a time like Edison, but to groups.
182
00:14:39,746 --> 00:14:42,335
On the 28th of December 1895,
183
00:14:42,360 --> 00:14:45,802
in this building on the Boulevard Capucines
in Paris,
184
00:14:45,827 --> 00:14:48,036
the Lumi�re brothers projected film.
185
00:14:50,776 --> 00:14:55,661
Light shone through it, onto a screen,
bigger than life.
186
00:14:58,938 --> 00:15:02,389
It's hard for us today
to picture how enchanting it was.
187
00:15:08,561 --> 00:15:12,080
This is one of the very first films
the Lumi�re's shot and showed
188
00:15:12,148 --> 00:15:13,715
on the Boulevard Capucines.
189
00:15:15,269 --> 00:15:17,291
It's said to have
unnerved the audience.
190
00:15:17,316 --> 00:15:19,455
They thought the train
was coming at them.
191
00:15:19,939 --> 00:15:22,730
This is laughable today.
But look at this...
192
00:15:26,878 --> 00:15:30,435
Light projected on a building
in 21st century Lyon.
193
00:15:30,843 --> 00:15:32,345
The effect is startling.
194
00:15:32,735 --> 00:15:35,542
Digital imagery of a type
we haven't seen before.
195
00:15:35,994 --> 00:15:39,401
The shock of the new
just like the Lumi�re train.
196
00:15:40,603 --> 00:15:44,728
Something that had already happened,
light from a distant star
197
00:15:44,753 --> 00:15:47,858
came back to life for
the very first time.
198
00:15:59,959 --> 00:16:01,650
Neither the Lumi�re brothers, nor Edison,
199
00:16:01,675 --> 00:16:04,523
nor the other inventors of cinema,
200
00:16:04,548 --> 00:16:07,293
could have known how big
the movies would become.
201
00:16:08,709 --> 00:16:15,140
How they'd make us want to escape,
play with our erotic imaginations,
202
00:16:15,165 --> 00:16:17,793
failed to film the Nazi gas chambers.
203
00:16:18,223 --> 00:16:21,371
Make us want to be a Princess or
a hero or a cowboy.
204
00:16:25,743 --> 00:16:28,494
Neither the Lumi�re's nor Edison
could foresee that the movies
205
00:16:28,519 --> 00:16:29,916
would invent flashbacks.
206
00:16:30,137 --> 00:16:32,106
There are no flashbacks
in Shakespeare.
207
00:16:33,508 --> 00:16:35,057
That they'd glamorize war.
208
00:16:37,102 --> 00:16:39,381
Capture the horror of the D-day landings.
209
00:16:44,958 --> 00:16:47,654
Give us an image bank
to flick through in our heads,
210
00:16:47,679 --> 00:16:50,213
when we're bored, or happy, or sad.
211
00:16:54,423 --> 00:16:58,662
Movies would become the world's
greatest mirror and, sometimes,
212
00:16:58,687 --> 00:17:02,084
a hammer too, that
would bash reality into shape.
213
00:17:06,677 --> 00:17:09,485
By the end of 1896,
much of the globe
214
00:17:09,510 --> 00:17:12,050
knew about this new invention:
movies.
215
00:17:13,593 --> 00:17:17,516
But almost at once it was seen
as lowbrow for the working classes.
216
00:17:18,040 --> 00:17:24,082
Its jokes and jolts were unsophisticated
and soon became boring.
217
00:17:24,953 --> 00:17:28,994
So, from about 1898
the earliest filmmaker inventors
218
00:17:29,019 --> 00:17:33,575
turned their minds from the machinery
of cinema to shots and cuts.
219
00:17:34,052 --> 00:17:35,891
Things started to get exciting.
220
00:17:38,698 --> 00:17:42,983
In Paris, for example,
a theatre illusionist called George M�lies,
221
00:17:43,008 --> 00:17:48,137
who'd been at the Boulevard Capucines
that first night, filmed on a street.
222
00:17:48,921 --> 00:17:51,599
The film's now lost but here's
what happened.
223
00:17:53,387 --> 00:17:55,958
His camera jammed, than started again.
224
00:17:56,466 --> 00:18:00,471
When he looked at the results,
streetcars seemed to disappear.
225
00:18:01,456 --> 00:18:03,460
Just like these people seem to disappear.
226
00:18:06,925 --> 00:18:09,022
Cinema's first magic trick.
227
00:18:12,514 --> 00:18:15,777
In this scene he used the same technique
to make a man appear,
228
00:18:15,802 --> 00:18:17,722
rather than a streetcar, disappear.
229
00:18:21,658 --> 00:18:27,845
Innovation by accident, you could say,
but it drove the medium forward.
230
00:18:31,231 --> 00:18:34,328
Where the Lumi�re's
were cinema's first documentarists,
231
00:18:34,353 --> 00:18:37,763
M�lies was its first special
effects director.
232
00:18:38,896 --> 00:18:42,272
His film The moon at one Meter,
astonished people too.
233
00:18:42,753 --> 00:18:47,387
In Lyon today, in the festival of lights,
a moon rises over the city
234
00:18:47,412 --> 00:18:49,412
as if in tribute to M�lies.
235
00:18:53,793 --> 00:18:56,708
Lumiere, the name of the brothers,
means �light� of course.
236
00:18:58,710 --> 00:19:02,485
And where other countries saw movies
as a sideshow in these years,
237
00:19:02,510 --> 00:19:04,147
France took them seriously.
238
00:19:04,567 --> 00:19:06,543
Film historian Jean-Michel Frodon:
239
00:19:06,668 --> 00:19:09,306
'France had been doing
something completely different
240
00:19:09,331 --> 00:19:12,555
with cinema because
of the French revolution
241
00:19:12,580 --> 00:19:16,343
and because of this dream
to project something
242
00:19:16,368 --> 00:19:19,938
to the world and to itself.
243
00:19:19,963 --> 00:19:22,296
Like what we call "le Lumi�re"
244
00:19:22,321 --> 00:19:26,453
and this is Lumi�re invents cinema
but before they were �le Lumi�re�
245
00:19:26,455 --> 00:19:29,935
in the sense of the
French revolution,
246
00:19:29,960 --> 00:19:33,487
of the encyclop�die, of Kant, et cetera.'
247
00:19:34,412 --> 00:19:37,360
In the decades to come,
France believed that cinema
248
00:19:37,385 --> 00:19:40,347
was such a beacon, almost an element
of foreign policy,
249
00:19:40,372 --> 00:19:45,232
that it funded French filmmaking like
no other country in the world.
250
00:19:48,046 --> 00:19:51,205
Also in France, the world's first female director,
251
00:19:51,230 --> 00:19:55,547
Alice Guy Blach�, became
as interested in magic as M�lies.
252
00:20:00,569 --> 00:20:04,392
And Brighton in England was
a buzzing place in Victorian times too.
253
00:20:06,267 --> 00:20:09,715
Maybe the buzz and the light
explains why local photographer
254
00:20:09,740 --> 00:20:13,928
George Albert Smith became
one of the movies' early innovators.
255
00:20:20,162 --> 00:20:23,184
He was one of the first to film
from the front of a train,
256
00:20:23,209 --> 00:20:26,285
creating a ghostly tracking shot,
which became known
257
00:20:26,310 --> 00:20:27,753
as the �phantom ride.�
258
00:20:28,444 --> 00:20:30,586
As if a ghost was
floating through the air.
259
00:20:39,643 --> 00:20:41,621
There was a magic in such shots.
260
00:20:42,735 --> 00:20:46,692
In this great documentary
about the holocaust, Claude Lanzmann,
261
00:20:46,717 --> 00:20:51,417
filmed shots on the same train lines
that took the Jews to the gas chambers.
262
00:20:51,872 --> 00:20:55,106
The �phantom ride� at
its most morally serious.
263
00:20:58,682 --> 00:21:02,055
And, in a completely different way,
director Stanley Kubrick
264
00:21:02,055 --> 00:21:06,114
used a �phantom ride� scene near the end
of 2001: A space odyssey.
265
00:21:06,675 --> 00:21:10,012
The camera seems to zoom
through the coloured light of the cosmos,
266
00:21:10,012 --> 00:21:13,536
as if the main character,
or the film itself,
267
00:21:13,561 --> 00:21:17,336
is tripping or having
an out of body experience.
268
00:21:20,103 --> 00:21:24,325
In 1900, Smith used one
of the first close-ups in cinema.
269
00:21:26,715 --> 00:21:29,011
Filmmakers usually kept their camera wide
270
00:21:29,011 --> 00:21:31,106
because they hadn't considered other options,
271
00:21:31,106 --> 00:21:33,278
or assuming that if they went close
272
00:21:33,303 --> 00:21:36,101
it would confuse or disrupt the audience.
273
00:21:37,046 --> 00:21:40,171
But then G.A. Smith did this:
274
00:21:40,196 --> 00:21:43,685
he wanted to show us
the cat eating in more detail.
275
00:21:43,686 --> 00:21:48,320
The cut between wide and close
not only worked, it seemed natural.
276
00:21:48,850 --> 00:21:50,752
And so close-ups were born.
277
00:21:53,902 --> 00:21:55,490
The films of some of the greatest directors
278
00:21:55,490 --> 00:21:57,517
are hard to imagine without them.
279
00:21:58,627 --> 00:22:01,711
In this incredible moment
in Sergei Eisenstein's film,
280
00:22:01,736 --> 00:22:04,805
October, the government
raises a bridge to stop
281
00:22:04,830 --> 00:22:07,181
revolutionary workers storming a city.
282
00:22:07,576 --> 00:22:10,755
But it's the close-ups
of a dead woman's hand and hair
283
00:22:10,755 --> 00:22:12,700
being pulled off the raising bridge
284
00:22:12,725 --> 00:22:16,217
that give the real sense
of movement and tragedy.
285
00:22:21,476 --> 00:22:24,064
In Sergio Leone's
Once upon a Time in the West,
286
00:22:24,064 --> 00:22:28,792
it's only when Charles Bronson looks,
in big close-up, into the eyes
287
00:22:28,817 --> 00:22:33,007
of Henry Fonda, that he realizes
that Fonda is the murderer
288
00:22:33,032 --> 00:22:35,441
he's been searching for all his life.
289
00:22:58,714 --> 00:23:03,143
Back in America, Enoch J. Rector
extended film in another way.
290
00:23:03,665 --> 00:23:07,259
He filmed a boxing match,
not with the standard size of film,
291
00:23:07,259 --> 00:23:12,194
35 millimeters, but with a negative
that was 63 millimeters wide.
292
00:23:12,940 --> 00:23:15,722
The broader image showed
more of the action.
293
00:23:16,465 --> 00:23:18,645
Widescreen cinema was born.
294
00:23:19,312 --> 00:23:24,195
It's the norm now but it would
not become commercially so until 1953.
295
00:23:26,628 --> 00:23:28,749
Film had already come far.
296
00:23:29,104 --> 00:23:31,369
It was born as a sideshow.
A novelty.
297
00:23:31,394 --> 00:23:33,761
Quick fun, like fast-food.
298
00:23:35,682 --> 00:23:39,450
But almost at once it became
clear that it was also a language.
299
00:23:43,474 --> 00:23:44,927
A new language.
300
00:23:44,952 --> 00:23:46,995
A language of ideas.
301
00:24:07,089 --> 00:24:10,448
The early 1900s were
a remarkable time to be alive.
302
00:24:11,419 --> 00:24:12,992
The first airplane flight.
303
00:24:13,493 --> 00:24:17,379
Albert Einstein announced that light,
the flickering stuff of cinema,
304
00:24:17,404 --> 00:24:19,853
is the only constant in the universe.
305
00:24:20,807 --> 00:24:24,830
Here in Copenhagen,
other physicists expanded his ideas.
306
00:24:25,997 --> 00:24:27,459
The Titanic sank.
307
00:24:28,522 --> 00:24:30,036
World War I began.
308
00:24:31,555 --> 00:24:34,631
Compared to all this,
the changes in movies might seem tiny.
309
00:24:35,278 --> 00:24:36,275
But they aren't.
310
00:24:37,939 --> 00:24:42,248
By 1903, filmmakers had developed
many of the key elements of the shot,
311
00:24:45,546 --> 00:24:50,407
but they still had to learn
how to do this: CUT!
312
00:24:51,181 --> 00:24:52,780
Editing made cinema.
313
00:24:56,194 --> 00:24:59,169
To see how, look at
The Life of an American Fireman,
314
00:24:59,194 --> 00:25:04,784
made in 1903 by a Pennsylvanian dynamo
of a man, called Edwin Stanton Porter.
315
00:25:08,644 --> 00:25:13,477
A fireman arrives outside a blazing house
to rescue a mother and her child.
316
00:25:15,894 --> 00:25:17,674
We see the street action first.
317
00:25:34,211 --> 00:25:37,659
Then the same action again from inside.
318
00:25:48,950 --> 00:25:52,172
Some years later, Porter recut the film.
319
00:25:52,761 --> 00:25:55,474
This time, after the fireman arrives,
320
00:25:55,499 --> 00:25:58,641
we cut inside the house
to see the first rescue,
321
00:25:58,666 --> 00:26:02,215
then outside again to
see her being brought down the ladder,
322
00:26:02,240 --> 00:26:05,767
then inside again,
to see him rescuing the child,
323
00:26:05,767 --> 00:26:07,705
then back outside again.
324
00:26:08,304 --> 00:26:11,367
The audience follows the story
of the rescue despite the fact
325
00:26:11,367 --> 00:26:15,568
that one space, the street,
suddenly disappears
326
00:26:15,568 --> 00:26:20,274
from the screen and is magically replaced
by another space, the room.
327
00:26:21,300 --> 00:26:23,222
This could never happen in theatre.
328
00:26:24,708 --> 00:26:28,266
The earlier version of the film,
which you could call the theatrical version,
329
00:26:28,266 --> 00:26:33,540
doesn't fragment the space,
but repeats the time like an action replay.
330
00:26:33,976 --> 00:26:37,427
The intercut version
has a continuous time line.
331
00:26:37,598 --> 00:26:40,042
We see everything in the order
in which it was done,
332
00:26:40,067 --> 00:26:42,369
but the space is fragmented.
333
00:26:42,838 --> 00:26:46,993
Cinema was learning,
experimenting, thinking even.
334
00:26:48,300 --> 00:26:52,531
It can now show the flow
of the action from one space to another.
335
00:26:53,924 --> 00:26:56,113
This made chase sequences possible.
336
00:26:56,769 --> 00:26:58,344
It liberated movies.
337
00:26:58,532 --> 00:27:00,180
It emphasized movement.
338
00:27:00,742 --> 00:27:04,637
Nearly every scene in the story
of film will in some way use
339
00:27:04,637 --> 00:27:08,930
this most basic of storytelling devices:
continuity cutting.
340
00:27:09,336 --> 00:27:12,390
The editing equivalent of the word �then.�
341
00:27:13,156 --> 00:27:14,585
This was a landmark.
342
00:27:15,244 --> 00:27:18,973
Theatrical cinema was giving way
to action cinema.
343
00:27:19,627 --> 00:27:21,776
And Porter? He lost everything
344
00:27:21,753 --> 00:27:26,324
in the Wall Street crash of the 20s
and died, forgotten, in 1941.
345
00:27:31,386 --> 00:27:35,069
It's easy to forget
what a conceptual jump editing was,
346
00:27:35,069 --> 00:27:38,313
but 21 years after
The Life of an American Fireman
347
00:27:38,313 --> 00:27:43,088
the comic genius Buster Keaton
shot a scene using double exposure
348
00:27:43,088 --> 00:27:44,793
which reminds us.
349
00:27:45,401 --> 00:27:47,234
Keaton plays a film projectionist.
350
00:27:47,529 --> 00:27:48,550
He falls asleep.
351
00:27:49,065 --> 00:27:50,604
Dreams of the cinema.
352
00:27:51,116 --> 00:27:52,368
Climbs into a film.
353
00:28:01,307 --> 00:28:02,662
And then, bam!
354
00:28:02,880 --> 00:28:03,708
A cut.
355
00:28:04,045 --> 00:28:07,023
The world around him is suddenly
replaced by another world.
356
00:28:07,337 --> 00:28:08,229
Instantly.
357
00:28:08,620 --> 00:28:09,302
Magically.
358
00:28:32,738 --> 00:28:36,083
In 1907, cinematic innovation
went up a gear.
359
00:28:37,818 --> 00:28:41,602
Look at The Horse that Bolted,
by Frenchman Charles Path�.
360
00:28:41,960 --> 00:28:44,440
A man leaves his horse
on the street
361
00:28:44,473 --> 00:28:47,232
as he delivers food
to an upstairs customer.
362
00:28:47,557 --> 00:28:50,089
The horse spies something
to eat, and tucks in.
363
00:28:52,134 --> 00:28:54,308
Cut to the man climbing the stairs.
364
00:28:57,263 --> 00:29:01,018
Then cut back to the horse,
which isn't doing a new thing.
365
00:29:01,699 --> 00:29:02,691
It's still eating.
366
00:29:03,768 --> 00:29:06,292
Then back to the man
just a second later.
367
00:29:15,451 --> 00:29:16,924
Then back to the horse.
368
00:29:17,942 --> 00:29:22,033
In The Life of an American Fireman,
the cuts showed what happened next.
369
00:29:22,791 --> 00:29:26,208
Here, they're showing what
is happening at the same time.
370
00:29:26,839 --> 00:29:28,592
This isn't continuity editing.
371
00:29:28,789 --> 00:29:30,481
It's parallel editing.
372
00:29:30,919 --> 00:29:33,812
It doesn't say �then�,
it says �meanwhile.�
373
00:29:35,660 --> 00:29:39,017
Great filmmakers have used
this �meanwhile� editing ever since
374
00:29:39,017 --> 00:29:44,378
to contrast events, build tension
or advance two storylines at once.
375
00:29:46,416 --> 00:29:49,824
And soon after continuity
and parallel editing were invented,
376
00:29:49,824 --> 00:29:52,975
another remarkable editing technique was born.
377
00:29:53,605 --> 00:29:56,935
This woman is looking towards us,
as if she's on a stage
378
00:29:56,937 --> 00:29:58,221
and we are in the audience.
379
00:29:58,604 --> 00:30:00,271
But what if she does this?
380
00:30:01,010 --> 00:30:04,151
In the earliest movies,
people seldom turned their backs
381
00:30:04,151 --> 00:30:05,376
to the camera like this.
382
00:30:06,408 --> 00:30:10,242
This film, made in 1908, was one of
the first in which this was done.
383
00:30:11,738 --> 00:30:13,900
But if directors were
to give actors the freedom
384
00:30:13,925 --> 00:30:16,184
to turn their backs to the camera like this...
385
00:30:16,882 --> 00:30:20,116
Then, it occurred to them,
they could point the camera
386
00:30:20,116 --> 00:30:23,546
in the opposite direction
to see what would eventually
387
00:30:23,546 --> 00:30:25,624
be called the �reverse angle shot�.
388
00:30:26,597 --> 00:30:29,262
Directors were putting
their cameras into the action,
389
00:30:29,262 --> 00:30:32,503
freeing themselves to film from any angle.
390
00:30:34,345 --> 00:30:37,809
This new freedom was
an exhilarating break with theatre,
391
00:30:37,834 --> 00:30:39,875
and seemed entirely natural to cinema.
392
00:30:40,231 --> 00:30:41,330
Central to it.
393
00:30:42,073 --> 00:30:45,075
So, in the 60s in France,
when Jean-Luc Godard
394
00:30:45,100 --> 00:30:49,442
refused to bring his camera round
to show the face of Anna Karina
395
00:30:49,467 --> 00:30:53,853
at the start of Vivre sa Vie,
the effect was shocking.
396
00:31:02,063 --> 00:31:05,882
Combine this with this,
G.A. Smith's close-up,
397
00:31:05,907 --> 00:31:10,700
and the actor, rather than the set,
began to be the thing that was filmed.
398
00:31:16,044 --> 00:31:19,378
And just as the movie buildings
were changing, the movies themselves
399
00:31:19,380 --> 00:31:21,658
took another leap forward.
400
00:31:22,776 --> 00:31:23,401
A look back at
401
00:31:23,426 --> 00:31:26,057
The Life of an American Fireman
shows why.
402
00:31:26,629 --> 00:31:30,504
Audiences watching this film felt
concern for the safety of this woman.
403
00:31:33,226 --> 00:31:35,746
But they knew nothing
about the actress who played her,
404
00:31:35,746 --> 00:31:36,927
not even her name.
405
00:31:38,032 --> 00:31:41,302
If they'd known about her life
or recognized her from other films,
406
00:31:41,327 --> 00:31:42,900
they'd care even more.
407
00:31:44,939 --> 00:31:48,760
Then, enter into the movies,
this actress dressed in white,
408
00:31:48,760 --> 00:31:49,887
wearing a hat.
409
00:31:51,370 --> 00:31:55,647
She was known,
semi-anonymously, as the imp girl,
410
00:31:55,672 --> 00:32:00,770
but in 1910 her producer, Carl Laemmle,
announced in the press that she had died.
411
00:32:01,308 --> 00:32:02,233
She hadn't.
412
00:32:02,907 --> 00:32:06,161
And when she miraculously
showed up in a scene like this,
413
00:32:06,161 --> 00:32:09,125
very much alive, anxious
and looking around,
414
00:32:09,125 --> 00:32:13,698
Laemmle then told the newspapers
that the crowds were so hysterical
415
00:32:13,698 --> 00:32:15,249
that they tore her clothes off.
416
00:32:16,881 --> 00:32:20,532
This wasn't true either,
but the furore burnt her name
417
00:32:20,532 --> 00:32:22,691
into the public consciousness:
418
00:32:22,716 --> 00:32:24,524
Florence Lawrence.
419
00:32:25,025 --> 00:32:26,581
Lawrence became famous.
420
00:32:26,827 --> 00:32:32,193
She earned $80,000 in 1912.
Then her career fizzled out.
421
00:32:32,570 --> 00:32:38,993
In 1938, aged 48, she committed
suicide by eating ant poison.
422
00:32:40,586 --> 00:32:44,725
Florence Lawrence was the first movie star,
and set a pattern for stardom.
423
00:32:45,034 --> 00:32:47,430
Hype, fame, tragedy.
424
00:32:48,787 --> 00:32:53,720
Here in Denmark this actress,
Asta Nielsen, became even more famous.
425
00:32:54,914 --> 00:32:58,752
There was less censorship in Europe.
Actors could be more sexual.
426
00:33:01,635 --> 00:33:02,796
He's tied up.
427
00:33:02,966 --> 00:33:05,843
She's hip grinding
in her slinky black dress.
428
00:33:08,585 --> 00:33:14,872
Hollywood learnt from Nielson's fame
and, instead of sex,
429
00:33:14,897 --> 00:33:21,267
as this reveal of Gloria Swanson shows,
it trowelled on the luxury and costuming.
430
00:33:22,477 --> 00:33:25,649
Hollywood was adding an element
of sublime to stardom.
431
00:33:28,656 --> 00:33:32,348
Almost every aspect of cinema
was affected by the star system.
432
00:33:32,896 --> 00:33:35,363
As the adoring public
became more and more interested
433
00:33:35,363 --> 00:33:38,138
in Lawrence, Nielsen or Swanson,
434
00:33:38,163 --> 00:33:41,837
so moviemakers started to show
their faces more clearly.
435
00:33:42,339 --> 00:33:45,643
Except it wasn't really their faces,
it was their thoughts
436
00:33:45,643 --> 00:33:47,937
that audiences became interested in.
437
00:33:50,069 --> 00:33:54,639
The star system meant that psychology
became the driving force of films,
438
00:33:54,639 --> 00:33:56,919
especially American ones.
439
00:33:58,485 --> 00:34:02,697
And through these years,
1907, 8, 9 and 10
440
00:34:02,697 --> 00:34:06,548
small movie theatres,
places for working class people emerged.
441
00:34:07,439 --> 00:34:09,842
In America they were called nickelodeons.
442
00:34:10,699 --> 00:34:14,503
This one, Tally's,
was on Spring Street in L.A.
443
00:34:14,528 --> 00:34:16,418
This is the same spot now.
444
00:34:18,664 --> 00:34:22,500
This little cinema, built in 1914,
is in Leeds in England.
445
00:34:25,796 --> 00:34:30,344
And on this famous corner,
the first nickelodeon in New York was built.
446
00:34:58,323 --> 00:35:01,919
In the early 1910s,
the best filmmaking in the world
447
00:35:01,919 --> 00:35:04,218
was taking place here, in Scandinavia.
448
00:35:05,103 --> 00:35:07,790
Maybe it was the northern light,
how it changed.
449
00:35:08,303 --> 00:35:11,011
Or maybe it was the sense
of destiny and mortality
450
00:35:11,011 --> 00:35:15,115
in Scandinavian literature
that made Danish and Swedish movies
451
00:35:15,115 --> 00:35:17,250
more graceful and honest.
452
00:35:19,875 --> 00:35:24,011
By 1912, for example,
the most innovative use of film light
453
00:35:24,011 --> 00:35:27,150
in the world was in the work
of Benjamin Christensen.
454
00:35:33,311 --> 00:35:36,490
Christensen studied
at this theatre in Copenhagen.
455
00:35:36,515 --> 00:35:41,072
Then made this film,
The Mysterious X, in 1913.
456
00:35:49,872 --> 00:35:54,265
Gorgeous photography, cross cutting
and a dream drawn on film.
457
00:35:54,656 --> 00:35:57,457
One of the most daring debuts
in film history.
458
00:36:04,458 --> 00:36:09,167
Later he built a vast studio
here in Hellerup, in the suburbs of Copenhagen.
459
00:36:09,341 --> 00:36:14,225
To make H�xan, a masterpiece
about witchcraft through the ages.
460
00:36:17,531 --> 00:36:20,693
The light sources were multiple,
the effects complex.
461
00:36:20,834 --> 00:36:23,350
Christensen himself
played the naked devil.
462
00:36:36,146 --> 00:36:38,937
This telegram in the Danish film archive says:
463
00:36:38,962 --> 00:36:43,470
�your masterful film, H�xan,
had its first screening to a full house,
464
00:36:43,495 --> 00:36:45,165
with a standing ovation.�
465
00:36:46,647 --> 00:36:51,218
In Sweden, director Victor Sj�str�m
was just as great an early director,
466
00:36:51,218 --> 00:36:53,658
and was more influential than Christensen.
467
00:36:56,711 --> 00:37:00,651
Sj�str�m started by selling donuts
but soon found himself here:
468
00:37:00,676 --> 00:37:04,083
Svenska Bio,
Sweden's first major film studio.
469
00:37:05,393 --> 00:37:10,123
His 1913 film Ingeborg Holm
had naturalism and grace.
470
00:37:10,619 --> 00:37:13,504
But, seven years later, still at Svenska,
471
00:37:13,529 --> 00:37:16,810
Sj�str�m made one
of the great multilayered films
472
00:37:16,835 --> 00:37:20,042
of the silent era, The Phantom Carriage.
473
00:37:22,059 --> 00:37:25,777
It had stories within stories,
moods within moods.
474
00:37:26,144 --> 00:37:29,821
In tinted blue evening light,
an alcoholic, David Holm,
475
00:37:29,846 --> 00:37:32,618
tells a drunken story
about a phantom carriage
476
00:37:32,643 --> 00:37:36,372
which arrives at New Year,
to collect the souls of the dead.
477
00:37:38,293 --> 00:37:41,220
Here on the right, Sj�str�m
plays Holm himself.
478
00:37:42,858 --> 00:37:45,424
Later in the story David dies.
479
00:37:45,651 --> 00:37:50,709
Sj�str�m re-exposes the film to show
the separation of his body and soul.
480
00:37:52,784 --> 00:37:57,039
The carriage driver arrives and shows
him how horrible his life has been.
481
00:37:57,245 --> 00:38:00,100
A wasted life wrapped
in a haunted myth.
482
00:38:03,052 --> 00:38:05,444
And Sj�str�m was brilliant at women.
483
00:38:07,541 --> 00:38:09,845
His strong mother died when he was young.
484
00:38:10,493 --> 00:38:15,356
Sj�str�m ended his days in this
cottage by the sea, west of Stockholm.
485
00:38:19,558 --> 00:38:20,968
Christensen and Sj�str�m
486
00:38:20,993 --> 00:38:25,953
became star directors and, as was to become
the pattern for European talents,
487
00:38:25,978 --> 00:38:29,017
they were seduced by what would be,
in the years to come,
488
00:38:29,042 --> 00:38:33,045
the center of the movie world.
A place called Hollywood.
489
00:38:34,407 --> 00:38:38,690
They sailed there, as a certain Swedish
movie star, called Greta Garbo, did.
490
00:38:39,059 --> 00:38:42,191
And, later, another,
called Ingrid Bergman did.
491
00:38:44,351 --> 00:38:48,185
As a result of their departures,
Scandinavia would not be central
492
00:38:48,185 --> 00:38:51,300
to the story of film again until the 1950s.
493
00:40:07,017 --> 00:40:12,044
A long time ago in a galaxy
far, far away from Scandinavia,
494
00:40:12,069 --> 00:40:15,836
there was a garden that didn't know
what was about to hit it.
495
00:40:16,587 --> 00:40:18,457
Sagebrush in the rain.
496
00:40:18,870 --> 00:40:20,898
The eucalyptus in the rain.
497
00:40:22,178 --> 00:40:25,802
You see, the spring was such
a marvellous thing there.
498
00:40:37,723 --> 00:40:40,894
The garden was about to be invaded.
Built upon.
499
00:40:41,656 --> 00:40:44,103
It was about to bring in
artists and business people
500
00:40:44,128 --> 00:40:48,697
from around the world to paint clouds
to look like real clouds.
501
00:40:52,502 --> 00:40:55,082
To create people to
look like real people.
502
00:41:03,941 --> 00:41:07,121
The sort of place you'd wear costume
and jewellery in the daytime.
503
00:41:07,585 --> 00:41:10,722
The sort of place
that invented youth and glamor.
504
00:41:12,018 --> 00:41:14,266
Where Marlena Dietrich
could wear black feathers
505
00:41:14,266 --> 00:41:18,709
and be framed in a train window
and be lit in a lattice of shadows.
506
00:41:19,405 --> 00:41:21,208
And, somehow, look believable.
507
00:41:23,336 --> 00:41:26,420
Youth and glamour came out
of its test tubes.
508
00:41:27,015 --> 00:41:29,074
No one was supposed
to be plain here
509
00:41:29,099 --> 00:41:33,762
or sad or old or racially equal
or sexually different.
510
00:41:34,215 --> 00:41:35,378
What denial.
511
00:41:35,757 --> 00:41:37,102
What eugenics.
512
00:41:39,164 --> 00:41:46,062
And yet it attracted: people, selves,
ideas, styles, shape shifters.
513
00:41:46,741 --> 00:41:51,283
It became a bauble this place:
shiny, perfect, brittle.
514
00:41:51,631 --> 00:41:53,510
Something you could see yourself in.
515
00:41:57,198 --> 00:41:59,953
Movies started to be in the air here.
516
00:42:07,570 --> 00:42:10,057
Of course this place is called Hollywood.
517
00:42:11,665 --> 00:42:16,731
A fantasy name because one of the things
that won't grow here is this: holly.
518
00:42:22,040 --> 00:42:26,324
Why did the movie people come here?
Because of the weather, sunlight.
519
00:42:28,349 --> 00:42:31,895
And because, on the East Coast,
New Jersey and New York.
520
00:42:32,588 --> 00:42:36,004
The film process had been patented, copyrighted.
521
00:42:37,521 --> 00:42:39,412
Take this example of copyright.
522
00:42:40,409 --> 00:42:43,313
For years, film running through
viewing machines
523
00:42:43,338 --> 00:42:46,247
had snapped because
of the tension in the spool.
524
00:42:46,794 --> 00:42:49,863
Then the Latham brothers
and people around Thomas Edison
525
00:42:49,863 --> 00:42:52,667
had the brain wave
of creating this simple loop,
526
00:42:52,667 --> 00:42:56,514
which created a bit of slack,
which would allow the machine to stop,
527
00:42:56,543 --> 00:43:00,395
project an image, then move on again
without tearing the film.
528
00:43:01,200 --> 00:43:05,657
This so called �Latham loop� was
patented by its East Coast inventors.
529
00:43:06,191 --> 00:43:09,179
You had to pay people to use it
and other discoveries.
530
00:43:09,572 --> 00:43:13,439
But California was very far away
from those rights owners.
531
00:43:13,683 --> 00:43:15,351
So, you could break the law there.
532
00:43:25,248 --> 00:43:28,221
This is South Spring Street in 1897.
533
00:43:29,998 --> 00:43:31,669
Here is the same spot today.
534
00:43:32,813 --> 00:43:34,166
Things moved quickly.
535
00:43:34,541 --> 00:43:39,874
The first studio was built in 1911,
it was like an outdoor tent.
536
00:43:41,617 --> 00:43:42,747
It was built here.
537
00:43:47,469 --> 00:43:50,982
The first feature length movie ever made,
The Story of the Kelly Gang,
538
00:43:50,982 --> 00:43:52,282
had been filmed in Australia.
539
00:43:52,624 --> 00:43:55,596
Outdoors, available light,
head-on framing.
540
00:43:59,614 --> 00:44:04,175
Seven years later, Cecil B. Demille
shot the first Hollywood feature here.
541
00:44:06,990 --> 00:44:08,901
Here it is: The squaw Man.
542
00:44:09,397 --> 00:44:12,204
In it we can see another
crucial element of filmmaking
543
00:44:12,229 --> 00:44:14,277
that fell into place in these years.
544
00:44:15,647 --> 00:44:18,960
A decent man is trying to decide
whether to do a good deed.
545
00:44:19,482 --> 00:44:22,328
He looks right, through a window
and sees a young woman
546
00:44:22,344 --> 00:44:23,642
who'll benefit from the deed.
547
00:44:32,413 --> 00:44:34,311
Their eyes meet for a second.
548
00:44:34,544 --> 00:44:38,583
He feels her pain,
and decides to do the good deed.
549
00:44:40,178 --> 00:44:42,546
But imagine if Demille
and his camera person
550
00:44:42,571 --> 00:44:44,632
had lifted their camera from here,
551
00:44:44,657 --> 00:44:46,479
brought it around
to the far side of this room
552
00:44:46,504 --> 00:44:48,884
and filmed the young woman
from over there?
553
00:44:52,144 --> 00:44:54,468
The shot of her would
have looked something like this...
554
00:44:57,826 --> 00:45:00,997
As if she was looking away
from the man, rather than towards him.
555
00:45:02,133 --> 00:45:05,061
And the scene wouldn't
have the same power.
556
00:45:05,086 --> 00:45:08,237
It's because their eyes match,
across the cut,
557
00:45:08,262 --> 00:45:12,441
Him looking right, her looking left,
that they connect emotionally.
558
00:45:14,887 --> 00:45:17,287
Filmmakers in these years
were discovering
559
00:45:17,337 --> 00:45:19,895
that to make it look like people
in different shots
560
00:45:19,920 --> 00:45:23,245
were looking at each other,
or that armies were marching
561
00:45:23,270 --> 00:45:27,744
towards each other,
the camera had to stay on the same side
562
00:45:27,769 --> 00:45:32,297
of an invisible 180 degree line,
drawn between the two people,
563
00:45:32,322 --> 00:45:34,862
looking at or talking to each other.
564
00:45:37,238 --> 00:45:40,828
Because this rule was new,
filmmakers in the late 1910s
565
00:45:40,853 --> 00:45:42,645
sometimes broke it by mistake.
566
00:45:44,768 --> 00:45:48,064
Later in The squaw Man,
Demille made such a mistake.
567
00:45:48,758 --> 00:45:50,370
A man is dangling from a cliff.
568
00:45:50,782 --> 00:45:51,905
He's looking right.
569
00:45:52,086 --> 00:45:53,604
The cliff is on the right.
570
00:45:54,232 --> 00:45:56,486
But then Demille goes
to the bottom of the cliff
571
00:45:56,486 --> 00:45:58,007
to show the man's fall.
572
00:46:01,628 --> 00:46:02,994
But he films from the wrong side
573
00:46:02,994 --> 00:46:05,131
of the man, so it looks
like the cliff has switched
574
00:46:05,131 --> 00:46:06,525
to the left of the screen.
575
00:46:07,415 --> 00:46:10,782
The shot would have been
more spatially clear if it was like this...
576
00:46:17,005 --> 00:46:21,521
And to make matters worse, his friends
come to the rescue, leaving screen left
577
00:46:21,546 --> 00:46:26,532
but entering the next shot screen right,
as if they'd taken a detour to the pub.
578
00:46:29,641 --> 00:46:33,705
Once this discovery was made,
it was used throughout mainstream cinema.
579
00:46:34,519 --> 00:46:39,860
This scene from The Empire strikes back,
an old style movie made 60 years later,
580
00:46:39,885 --> 00:46:42,465
shows how enduring the discovery was.
581
00:46:43,039 --> 00:46:45,893
Darth Vader is on the left
of the screen looking right.
582
00:46:46,197 --> 00:46:51,080
His underling, to whom he's speaking,
is in a separate shot looking left.
583
00:46:51,417 --> 00:46:54,938
Because of the 180-degree rule
we completely believe that
584
00:46:54,938 --> 00:46:56,311
they're looking at each other.
585
00:47:03,930 --> 00:47:07,900
Crucial to the inventiveness
of American cinema before the 1920s
586
00:47:07,900 --> 00:47:09,767
was how female it was.
587
00:47:10,237 --> 00:47:12,547
Film historian Cari Beauchamp:
588
00:47:12,547 --> 00:47:16,864
'Hollywood was built
by women, immigrants and Jews.
589
00:47:17,188 --> 00:47:21,022
People who would not be accepted
in any other profession at the time.
590
00:47:21,355 --> 00:47:26,226
So Hollywood became this magnet
for people who wanted to work,
591
00:47:26,251 --> 00:47:30,500
who were incredibly creative, but
wouldn't be accepted in other professions.
592
00:47:30,701 --> 00:47:34,259
Well half of all films written
before 1925 were written by women.
593
00:47:34,798 --> 00:47:38,767
So that shows you how, just, comfortable,
women were in the business then.
594
00:47:40,625 --> 00:47:44,913
Perhaps the first woman to direct a film,
and the first female studio boss
595
00:47:44,913 --> 00:47:46,527
was Alice Guy Blach�.
596
00:47:47,574 --> 00:47:50,513
Most of the film companies
focused on the machinery
597
00:47:50,513 --> 00:47:53,641
and Gaumont started to make actual films.
598
00:47:53,641 --> 00:47:55,602
And Alice Guy was a secretary there.
599
00:47:55,627 --> 00:47:58,253
And they let her play
with the cameras after hours
600
00:47:58,253 --> 00:48:00,255
as long as she'd gotten
her secretarial work done.
601
00:48:00,632 --> 00:48:03,404
And Alice Guy was not only
one of the first female directors,
602
00:48:03,429 --> 00:48:05,043
she was one of the first directors.
603
00:48:05,272 --> 00:48:10,663
She was one of the first to actually put
film together into a story with an arc.
604
00:48:11,044 --> 00:48:14,297
Up until then we'd had
�the sneeze,� �the wave.�
605
00:48:15,576 --> 00:48:17,140
Individual actions.
606
00:48:17,297 --> 00:48:21,329
But Alice created some dramatic arc films,
for the very first time.
607
00:48:21,618 --> 00:48:24,816
Here's an example
of Guy Blach�'s touching poetics.
608
00:48:25,188 --> 00:48:28,686
A little girl overhears a doctor say
that her sister will die
609
00:48:28,711 --> 00:48:31,173
before the leaves fall from the trees.
610
00:48:31,766 --> 00:48:35,193
So she goes outside and starts
to tie them back on.
611
00:48:46,824 --> 00:48:50,040
One of the most innovative directors
of the time was Lois Weber.
612
00:48:50,773 --> 00:48:54,113
Here she also plays the lead
in her film, Suspense.
613
00:48:54,869 --> 00:48:56,727
A woman is at home with her child.
614
00:48:57,172 --> 00:48:58,685
She hears an intruder.
615
00:48:59,113 --> 00:49:01,756
Looks out the window, sees him
616
00:49:01,781 --> 00:49:03,863
in this remarkable sideways
pov (Point Of View) shot.
617
00:49:04,580 --> 00:49:05,717
She calls her husband.
618
00:49:06,547 --> 00:49:08,150
Weber uses a split screen
619
00:49:08,150 --> 00:49:12,249
to show the husband, the intruder
and herself, all in the same moment.
620
00:49:13,201 --> 00:49:16,459
The husband jumps in a car
and tries to race to save his wife.
621
00:49:24,180 --> 00:49:25,729
He's chased by the police,
622
00:49:25,729 --> 00:49:29,312
who Weber shows in this inventive shot
of the wing mirror.
623
00:49:30,490 --> 00:49:32,547
The intruder climbs the stair.
624
00:49:36,540 --> 00:49:40,956
And again Weber's camera position
emphasizes the approach, the threat.
625
00:49:41,822 --> 00:49:45,354
In the end, the police
and husband arrive and save the day.
626
00:49:50,215 --> 00:49:53,869
The film was, for years,
credited to a male director,
627
00:49:53,894 --> 00:49:54,943
D.W. Griffith.
628
00:49:56,350 --> 00:49:59,402
Frances Marion was
an even more significant figure.
629
00:49:59,743 --> 00:50:02,362
'Well, Frances Marion
was the highest paid screenwriter,
630
00:50:02,387 --> 00:50:06,108
male or female, from 1915 to 1935.
631
00:50:06,439 --> 00:50:08,469
That's an incredible accomplishment
right there.
632
00:50:08,603 --> 00:50:11,685
She also is the only woman ever
to win two Oscars for writing.
633
00:50:12,142 --> 00:50:15,307
And she won her Oscars
for The big House,
634
00:50:15,293 --> 00:50:17,265
the seminal prison film,
635
00:50:17,290 --> 00:50:20,357
and The Champ ,
the classic boxing film.
636
00:50:20,534 --> 00:50:22,989
And what I love about that
is that it just right there
637
00:50:22,989 --> 00:50:26,424
puts the lie to the idea that
these women writers were writing
638
00:50:26,424 --> 00:50:29,438
the "matinee weepies" or the "women's films",
639
00:50:29,438 --> 00:50:30,177
quote/unquote.
640
00:50:30,414 --> 00:50:33,935
No. They were writing
every conceivable genre of film.
641
00:50:34,247 --> 00:50:39,066
Women like Frances, Adela Rogers St. Johns,
Bess Meredyth, Anita Loos.
642
00:50:39,066 --> 00:50:43,026
I mean, these were the cr�me de la cr�me
of the writers.
643
00:50:43,051 --> 00:50:46,322
The ones that the Thalberg�s
and the Mayer�s went to
644
00:50:46,322 --> 00:50:49,331
when they had big productions
they knew they needed to count on.'
645
00:50:49,825 --> 00:50:52,140
Marion's screenplay for the film
The Wind
646
00:50:52,165 --> 00:50:54,107
was about a woman living in a shack.
647
00:50:54,132 --> 00:50:57,084
The wind is incessant.
Sand's everywhere.
648
00:50:57,829 --> 00:51:00,028
It seems to blast the visual image.
649
00:51:02,021 --> 00:51:04,415
An aggressive man forces himself on her.
650
00:51:04,897 --> 00:51:07,902
She shoots him,
then buries him in the sand.
651
00:51:08,615 --> 00:51:12,831
But the wind blows the sand away,
the corpse is exposed.
652
00:51:13,219 --> 00:51:14,513
Just like her fear.
653
00:51:14,831 --> 00:51:17,224
Just like her unconscious mind.
654
00:51:18,129 --> 00:51:20,440
The wind was an epic tone poem.
655
00:51:20,825 --> 00:51:23,427
Cut like a thriller,
but filmed like a dream.
656
00:51:25,550 --> 00:51:27,182
Hollywood films like it,
657
00:51:27,182 --> 00:51:31,815
showed female audiences things
they'd probably felt but never seen.
658
00:51:37,350 --> 00:51:40,561
'Most people in America did not go further
than 20 miles from their home
659
00:51:40,561 --> 00:51:43,076
from when they were born
until they died.
660
00:51:43,418 --> 00:51:47,952
So you have this incredible
country that really only lives
661
00:51:47,952 --> 00:51:50,086
in this bell-jar of their own community.
662
00:51:50,562 --> 00:51:54,394
And as films start coming out,
as movie theatres are being built,
663
00:51:54,438 --> 00:51:58,260
by 1920, there's over
15,000 theatres in this country.
664
00:51:59,009 --> 00:52:01,733
So all of a sudden you can go
around the corner,
665
00:52:01,758 --> 00:52:04,135
put down your nickel or your dime
or your quarter
666
00:52:04,135 --> 00:52:06,930
and have this entire world open up to you.
667
00:52:07,523 --> 00:52:10,446
And it's not just
they're seeing Paris for the first time.
668
00:52:10,446 --> 00:52:12,629
They're seeing New York City
or San Francisco.
669
00:52:12,930 --> 00:52:14,206
They are seeing women's fashions.
670
00:52:14,231 --> 00:52:19,255
They are seeing women acting
in ways that nobody would dare do.
671
00:52:19,338 --> 00:52:23,731
With talking films, the price
of making movies skyrocketed
672
00:52:23,756 --> 00:52:26,467
and so with talking films
Wall Street really entered
673
00:52:26,467 --> 00:52:27,963
the business for the first time.
674
00:52:28,330 --> 00:52:31,965
And when money entered into it
the jobs starting paying more...
675
00:52:31,989 --> 00:52:36,790
It was taken seriously as a business
and men wanted those jobs.
676
00:52:44,675 --> 00:52:48,799
If the great women filmmakers
of the 1910s are under-remembered,
677
00:52:48,799 --> 00:52:52,903
you could say that this man, Lanky,
here in a stagy family scene
678
00:52:52,903 --> 00:52:56,101
with a painted skyline, is over-remembered.
679
00:52:56,497 --> 00:53:01,401
People say that D.W. Griffith invented
close-ups or editing, which isn't true.
680
00:53:03,287 --> 00:53:06,469
But he did something far more valuable
for the art of cinema.
681
00:53:06,551 --> 00:53:11,064
He said it needs to show this:
the wind in the trees.
682
00:53:25,567 --> 00:53:31,547
Before Griffith, film had a tendency
to be stagey like this: airless.
683
00:53:31,572 --> 00:53:33,972
He brought the wind in
the trees to cinema.
684
00:53:37,386 --> 00:53:39,361
A sense of the outside world.
685
00:53:40,513 --> 00:53:43,087
The delicacy of Lillian Gish's
performance here matches
686
00:53:43,087 --> 00:53:44,679
the delicacy of the light.
687
00:53:45,549 --> 00:53:46,886
The visual softness.
688
00:53:52,040 --> 00:53:55,072
Decades later, the critic,
Roland Barthes,
689
00:53:55,097 --> 00:54:00,234
said that some images have unplanned,
natural details in them that move us.
690
00:54:00,947 --> 00:54:05,476
Barthes called this the �punctum�.
The thing that pricks our feelings.
691
00:54:05,707 --> 00:54:09,347
Griffith's work is full of the �punctum�,
the wind in the trees.
692
00:54:15,870 --> 00:54:20,087
This scene from Way Down East,
is set on a treacherous thawing river.
693
00:54:20,321 --> 00:54:23,524
Griffith could never have planned
that Lillian Gish's right arm
694
00:54:23,524 --> 00:54:26,770
would push ice off the adjacent ice flow.
695
00:54:27,754 --> 00:54:29,582
But we notice the realness of the moment.
696
00:54:32,440 --> 00:54:34,952
Griffith worked with
one of the best cinematographers
697
00:54:34,952 --> 00:54:36,803
in the business, Billy Bitzer.
698
00:54:37,028 --> 00:54:39,584
Bitzer disliked the hard edge
of the film image,
699
00:54:39,609 --> 00:54:42,311
so put a collar around
the lens hood
700
00:54:42,311 --> 00:54:44,409
to make the edge of the image
go slighter darker.
701
00:54:44,832 --> 00:54:48,336
�Adding class to the picture,�
as Bitzer himself put it
702
00:54:48,361 --> 00:54:52,294
and influencing the look of film
in America for a generation.
703
00:54:53,035 --> 00:54:57,001
Griffith and Bitzer understood
the psychological intensity of a lens.
704
00:54:57,272 --> 00:55:00,829
They used visual softness
and back lighting, which gave
705
00:55:00,854 --> 00:55:05,024
a halo to hair and made actors
stand out against backgrounds.
706
00:55:08,964 --> 00:55:12,446
What Griffith and Bitzer
did in 1914 and 1915,
707
00:55:12,471 --> 00:55:14,938
with all their talents, their haloed imagery,
708
00:55:14,938 --> 00:55:18,316
their splendid tracking shots
and feel for the outdoors,
709
00:55:18,316 --> 00:55:21,368
is one of the great shocks
in the story of film.
710
00:55:21,780 --> 00:55:24,892
They made this deceitfull
state of the nation movie,
711
00:55:24,917 --> 00:55:30,866
that raised a racist flag which showed
the power of cinema and its danger.
712
00:55:31,350 --> 00:55:32,177
The birth of a nation
713
00:55:32,202 --> 00:55:35,156
looks like it was shot
in Griffith's native Kentucky.
714
00:55:38,256 --> 00:55:41,392
But it was actually filmed here,
near Los Angeles.
715
00:55:45,662 --> 00:55:47,448
It showed the American civil war.
716
00:55:48,624 --> 00:55:51,217
Griffith mixed the epic with the intimate.
717
00:55:52,202 --> 00:55:55,865
A Southern officer returns home.
He goes to his mother.
718
00:55:56,051 --> 00:55:59,062
Her arms come out of the doorway
to enfold him.
719
00:56:06,676 --> 00:56:07,972
We don't see the rest of her.
720
00:56:09,583 --> 00:56:13,008
Such subtlety made the racism
all the more dangerous.
721
00:56:13,781 --> 00:56:17,129
Black senators were shown
as drunk and unclean.
722
00:56:18,396 --> 00:56:21,390
In this scene Griffith
used Wagner music.
723
00:56:21,944 --> 00:56:25,106
The Cameron family are being
attacked by black soldiers.
724
00:56:25,548 --> 00:56:27,393
They're rescued by the Klan.
725
00:56:27,418 --> 00:56:29,184
Heroic and thrilling.
726
00:56:37,201 --> 00:56:41,629
After some screenings, black audience
members were attacked with clubs.
727
00:56:42,553 --> 00:56:46,012
The Ku Klux Klan
had been disbanded in 1869,
728
00:56:46,012 --> 00:56:50,859
but by the mid-1920s,
its membership was back up to 4 million.
729
00:56:52,141 --> 00:56:54,288
Talk about the wind in the trees.
730
00:56:55,122 --> 00:56:58,896
More than 80 years later,
D.J. Spooky sampled and played
731
00:56:58,921 --> 00:57:01,333
with the toxic scenes
from The Birth of a Nation,
732
00:57:01,358 --> 00:57:03,422
almost as if he was scribbling on them.
733
00:57:09,735 --> 00:57:11,722
The year after The Birth of a Nation
734
00:57:11,722 --> 00:57:15,485
Griffith saw this,
the epic Italian film Cabiria.
735
00:57:15,741 --> 00:57:19,511
He was stunned,
particularly by these moving Dolly shots.
736
00:57:20,343 --> 00:57:23,839
Inspired by these moves
and production design such as this,
737
00:57:23,864 --> 00:57:26,991
using elephants to suggest scale
738
00:57:27,016 --> 00:57:29,784
and also by the novels
of Charles Dickens,
739
00:57:29,784 --> 00:57:33,520
he made a three and a half hour film,
Intolerance
740
00:57:33,520 --> 00:57:35,946
about �love's struggle through history.�
741
00:57:40,506 --> 00:57:42,835
The film showed human intolerance
in Babylon,
742
00:57:44,819 --> 00:57:48,763
in the life of Jesus Christ,
tinted in sepia.
743
00:57:49,556 --> 00:57:51,725
In the massacre of Saint Bartholomew
744
00:57:51,856 --> 00:57:55,697
in medieval ages, violent scenes,
tinted blue.
745
00:57:57,287 --> 00:58:01,624
And in modern gangsterism,
all shiny cars and jazz outfits.
746
00:58:03,683 --> 00:58:05,804
And then inter-cut these.
747
00:58:07,013 --> 00:58:10,412
Griffith said:
�Dickens inter-cuts, so, so will I�.
748
00:58:11,221 --> 00:58:15,929
He took storyline A so far,
then jumped to storyline B,
749
00:58:15,954 --> 00:58:19,898
advanced it a certain amount,
then went back again to A
750
00:58:19,898 --> 00:58:21,762
and picked up where he had left off.
751
00:58:23,086 --> 00:58:25,662
Previously, a cut
from one shot to the next
752
00:58:25,687 --> 00:58:29,429
meant, as we've seen:
�Then� or �meanwhile.�
753
00:58:32,589 --> 00:58:35,836
Griffith's cutting between time periods
wasn't saying either.
754
00:58:37,104 --> 00:58:39,895
It was saying: �look, these very
different events,
755
00:58:39,920 --> 00:58:43,258
from different eras,
all show the same human trait.�
756
00:58:44,184 --> 00:58:46,895
Intolerance, or the failure of love.
757
00:58:47,617 --> 00:58:50,262
Editing as an intellectual signpost.
758
00:58:51,063 --> 00:58:52,606
Asking people to notice
759
00:58:52,606 --> 00:58:54,889
not something about action or story
760
00:58:54,914 --> 00:58:57,386
but about the meaning of the sequence.
761
00:58:59,310 --> 00:59:02,440
Soviets such as Eisenstein,
wrote about this editing.
762
00:59:02,896 --> 00:59:06,108
And as far away as Japan in 1921,
763
00:59:06,133 --> 00:59:10,116
Minoru Murata made this film,
Souls on the Road.
764
00:59:10,712 --> 00:59:12,906
Two storylines intertwine.
765
00:59:12,931 --> 00:59:15,016
In the end of the film,
they come together.
766
00:59:15,382 --> 00:59:17,973
Two ex-convicts from one storyline
767
00:59:17,998 --> 00:59:21,680
here find a son from the other storyline,
in the snow.
768
00:59:23,530 --> 00:59:27,219
Their story has been one of hope
but the son has died.
769
00:59:27,649 --> 00:59:30,834
A pioneering use
of parallel editing in Asia.
770
00:59:32,148 --> 00:59:35,859
This made Souls on the Road
the first great Japanese film.
771
00:59:43,409 --> 00:59:46,398
In L.A. today, a shopping mall
on Hollywood boulevard,
772
00:59:46,398 --> 00:59:48,027
where the Oscars take place,
773
00:59:48,027 --> 00:59:52,307
has partially rebuilt the massive
Babylonian gate from Intolerance.
774
00:59:55,575 --> 00:59:58,907
The original was here,
a mile away from the shopping mall.
775
01:00:02,453 --> 01:00:06,750
It was demolished when Hollywood
didn't care much about its own history.
776
01:00:08,817 --> 01:00:10,429
But what history!
777
01:00:10,454 --> 01:00:11,723
What ideas!
778
01:00:11,821 --> 01:00:14,643
Filmed with a Dolly on a crane,
and even on a balloon,
779
01:00:14,668 --> 01:00:19,189
to get high enough, up into the wind,
that flaps these vast hangings.
780
01:00:22,596 --> 01:00:26,080
Cinema was just 20 years old
when this shot was filmed.
781
01:00:27,599 --> 01:00:29,566
A new art form had been born.
782
01:00:29,912 --> 01:00:32,888
Scandinavian directors
had made it an art of light.
783
01:00:39,330 --> 01:00:42,173
Nickelodeons had given way
to movie palaces.
784
01:00:43,061 --> 01:00:49,973
Places built like cathedrals
785
01:00:49,998 --> 01:00:56,123
or Egyptian temples
or Chinese pavilions.
786
01:01:03,535 --> 01:01:09,005
A garden called Hollywood started
to pump fantasies out into the world.
787
01:01:11,702 --> 01:01:15,852
Film editing captured
the fragmented experiences of modern life.
788
01:01:19,220 --> 01:01:23,410
New creatures, called movie stars,
became the most famous people in the world.
789
01:01:24,738 --> 01:01:27,485
They lived in places of rapture and escape.
790
01:01:30,151 --> 01:01:33,615
The story of film seemed
to have reached its climax.
791
01:01:40,518 --> 01:01:43,454
But, in fact, it was only just beginning.
792
01:02:05,000 --> 01:02:10,919
Subtitles corrected and synced
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