Movie history timeline: from Czitrom

1
Movie history time-line (from Czitrom) mid-17th
century primitive slide projectors or magic
lanterns invented early 19th century principle
of persistence of vision, basis of moving
pictures, developed by Peter Mark Roget 1870s
and 1880s time and motion studies using
photography are developed in France and US, and
represent a kind of proto-cinema this inspires
inventors worldwide to create a true
motion-picture medium 1892 invention of first
movie camera (the kinetograph or action-writer)
by W.K.L. Dickson, an employee of Thomas
Edison 1893 invention of kinetoscope, a
portable machine for viewing movies 1894 silent
film era begins rapid spread of kinetoscope
parlours by the end of 1894 also have
projection in temporary structures like
travelling shows, penny arcades, etc. 1895-7
development of three competing formats for
shooting and projecting movies (vitascope,
biograph, and cinematograph) 1896 first
nickelodeon or nickel theatre (i.e., admission
was 5 cents) opens, allowing for effective
projection of films in permanent structure
dedicated to films, and can be regarded as the
immediate ancestor of the modern movie
theatre 1905-1918 audience growth mushrooms due
to transition from one-reel (10-15 minute
westerns, comedies, romances, etc.) to multi-reel
movies, and because of the proliferation of
nickelodeons.
2
1909 formation of the Motion Picture Patents
Company to exert patent control over camera and
projection technology (due to the fact that a
black market had developed for film technology
had developed, and many patented technologies had
been manufactured illegally and sold) 1909
basic industrial parameters of film industry
established in its three distinct phases
production, exhibition, and distribution 1914
end of the Motion Picture Patents Company in
1914, when independent film companies challenge
the virtual monopoly established by Edison and
Biograph 1914 the U.S. had 18,000 theatres,
with 7 million daily admissions, totalling about
300 million annually 1915 D.W. Griffiths The
Birth of a Nation is released film attains its
modern form in Griffiths revolutionary
techniques 1927 first commercial talking film,
The Jazz Singer, released sources Daniel
Czitrom, Early Motion Pictures, Jib Fowles,
Mass Media and the Star System, and Scott
Eyman, Movies Talk (all from Crowley and Heyer)
3
When we discussed print culture, we noted that
books and newspapers were amongst the first mass
produced commodities cultural products made
to be sold on a mass scale. These commodities,
born of an incipient capitalism, pale in size,
impact and capital resources to the Hollywood
film industry, however. The Hollywood film
industry is an industrial machine churning out
products involving massive capital investments
and spinning off into major industries supplying
industrial inputs, distribution and
marketing. The model of cultural production
pioneered in film is reproduced in
radio, television and the new media industries we
will look at in the weeks to come, so it is
important to understand not just the nature of
the industrys organization, but also its social,
cultural, and political implications. The status
of film as a commodity raises some central
questions that have been the focus of debate in
cultural and communication studies for
decades, such as
4
What are the broader implications of the
standardization of culture and human expression
in this format of turning culture into a
mass-consumed commodity? Do these mass-produced
films really have an impact on those watching
them can they control audience reception? Is
there such a thing as a mass audience that
consumes mass culture? Is film a form of
propaganda? Does the distribution of Hollywood
films around the world support and maintain
American Imperialism? (Hollywood films are
distributed internationally by the
1910s). Hollywood also brings the notion of
celebrity into its mature phase with the birth
of the Hollywood star system. The spectacular
spread of film as a cultural form also creates
moral panic as middle class moral and cultural
authorities worry about the effect
5
of film on middle class audiences, and seek to
shut down or police the nickelodeons that are
seen as a source of moral degeneracy. Lets
begin taking a look at these questions by
examining the history of early Hollywood. Moving
pictures are based on a system developed in the
early 19th century called the persistance of
vision the idea that an image persists or
remains in the eye for a fraction of a second
after it has disappeared from view. This
principle was illustrated by the zoetrope, if
images are spun or scrolled rapidly past the eye
at an appropriate speed, the eye is tricked into
believing that it is seeing a continuous
sequence of events rather than a series of
individual images. Thus, in contrast to
photographs, films seem more lifelike, which
makes them seem infinitely more real.
6
Zoetrope
7
The first Nickelodeon, Pittsburgh Pennsylvania
8
It is this lifelike quality that leads to
concerns over films impact on audiences. From
the time movies were first shown in penny arcades
(1894-96) to the first permanent homes known as
nickelodeons (1896) where they co-existed with
vaudeville acts, to todays mega-cinema
experience, people have worried that film has a
negative moral effect on those watching. In
cinemas early history, churches, governments,
and community organizations saw film as a grave
cultural threat. Because they were initially
viewed alongside live vaudeville acts which were
often lewd and difficult to regulate, and because
they were initially directed at a poor or working
class audience (including new immigrants) nickelod
eons were considered low-status and morally
suspect. They were subjected to middle class
moral policing and regulation who were concerned
they were a source of social instability.
9

• Silent and Talking Films
• When talking film began in the 1920s with the
  production of The
• Jazz Singer, a different genre of film making
  evolved. Critics such as
• Eyman argue that silent film and talkies used
  different styles of acting,
• different aesthetics and had different responses
  from their audiences.
• Differences between silent film and sound film.
• In both genres, however, the Star System was a
  prominent feature of
• the film making process.
• The star system refers to a program of
  cultivating new faces used by
• Hollywood film companies. Actors were started in
  B films and if they
• appealed to audiences, they moved into long term
  contracts on A films

10

• One of the reasons that film spread so rapidly in
  the late 19th and early 20th
• centuries is that the United States was being
  rapidly urbanized at this time.
• - Relationship between the star system,
  urbanization, and modernization.
• In the clip that follows, Charlie Chaplins
  Modern Times, there are a few
• things to note. First, try to decide whether
  this mostly silent film is of a
• different genre than the films you see today.
  Next, note the social
• commentary involved particularly the clock and
  Mumfords notion of
• the megamachine.