How the History of Film Has Developed Term Paper

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Films and Filmmaking

As Spike Lee noted in the 25th Anniversary celebration of his film Do the Right Thing, "the only reason why my generation went to film school was we couldn't get our hands on the equipment" (Macfarlane). Do the Right Thing had an independent feel to it, largely because of Lee's hands-on oversight of production, direction, writing and editing -- but it was ultimately a Universal picture. Since its inception, the film industry had been by and for the dominant culture in society. As the technology developed (from silent shorts to silent epics to sound film and the first talkies on up to the world of independent cinema, where taboos and cultural cues were challenged and explored), so too did the face of cinema. This paper will discuss how the history of technological innovations in the filmmaking industry favored the dominant culture of the era, how social and economic aspects of an era influence film and the way it captures a story, and why technological advances are not always a good thing for film as an art form.

Filmmaking in the early days was only possible via financial backing, which came of course from the moneyed classes. Thus, the film studios represented a specific version of history and society that reflected the values and interests of that class/culture. Films such as Birth of a Nation by D. W. Griffith depicted a version of U.S. history that would be directly challenged nearly a century later by a film of the same title made by African-Americans about the Nat Turner rebellion. Whereas Griffith's story about the Southern aristocracy and the tragedy that ensued following the South's defeat in the Civil War and the freeing of the slaves projected an Anglo-Saxon, aristocratic-centric viewpoint, Nate Parker's 2016 film of the same name explores the theme of America's early days from the opposite viewpoint -- that of the slave (specifically within the context of the slave rebellion led by Nat Turner). Whereas Griffith had studio backing, Parker had to solicit funds from various backers and only received a distribution deal after premiering at Sundance in January 2016 after receiving critical praise. The technology and nature of filmmaking had changed so much over the past 100 years that Parker could create a low-budget film depicting a side of history that the dominant culture of the past had not represented before. The studio system was a closed system and only as equipment became cheaper and more affordable could filmmakers become truly independent of the studio system and create their films to represent the culture/history of their choice -- though distribution would remain an issue (unless one went the way of social media distribution, such as YouTube, which is a new option for amateur and independent filmmakers today).

Social and economic aspects of an era influence film and the way it captures a story, too. For instance, in Martin Scorsese's 1976 film Taxi Driver, the social and economic aspects of the time included the Vietnam War and the demoralized masses at home. Travis, the main hero of the film, is an anti-social, marginalized Vietnam veteran, who feels like he is dismissed by others around him. This was something that the people of that generation had to deal with: depression and isolation -- being excluded from society. Travis feels that he has honored his country but been forgotten upon his return. He drives a cab in New York but is not really part of the lives of those he moves from one spot to the next. His cab even becomes like a confessional at points, especially at the moment when the enraged and jilted lover played by Martin Scorsese himself, talks about taking violent revenge on his wife with the gun he has. Travis simply listens -- but of course the violence seeps into him and he will unleash a parade of violence on the pimps at the end of the film. The violent conclusion is a kind of purifying process of Travis, and reflects the need of the society at the time to purge itself of the bad blood and wash away its sins. The Vietnam War had produced many casualties and cost many people their sanity -- and the War itself reflected a much deeper problem within American society. There was the Watergate scandal, a deep distrust of leaders, moral questions that were not being answered, sexual liberation in the streets with pornographic theaters open to the public for the first time ever in America.

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There was revolution in the air, but at the same time the economic conditions of the time did not afford people any great sense of gaining the American Dream. This is also what Scorsese reflects in Taxi Driver -- a young man who has reached adulthood but has nothing more for himself than a cab, which he is fortunate enough to be able to drive around for work. There is no great castle waiting for him at the end of the film, no rainbow -- however, the film is not without its hint of happiness. Travis receives a grateful smile from the woman he had been attracted to earlier in the film -- and it is a moment in which he feels like a real human being, finally. His violent purge has cleansed himself and the streets of a certain evil -- and now he is open to making progress into humanity once again, even if that progress does not include economic salvation. Scorsese's film is more about spiritual salvation through social action.

However, by the time Spike Lee made Do the Right Thing, society had aged a bit more and the economic crash of 1987 was fresh in everyone's mind. Lee saw the coming cycle of gentrification that virtually every city in America has been going through for years now. This would inform his cinematic sense and be reflected in the film's tension between the races and classes and show how there was a real clash between cultures brooding and boiling on the streets. Yet Lee saw a moral code that needed to be reestablished through all of this and that is what the film ultimately reflects, as, of course, the title itself suggests.

Moreover, what both Lee and Scorsese did was to reflect a realism of the streets in film that had never really been done before. There was something authentic and defining about their filmmaking process: they wanted to be true both to the streets from where they came and to the code that they believed guided people to a higher place, to a higher truth. Maintaining that code or implementing that belief did not always come peacefully and both films have violent, climactic encounters -- but the message that underlines both films is positive and hopeful and spiritual in the sense that these people, that all people, need to do right by one another.

Today's cinematic achievements are less noteworthy in terms of achieving the kind of artistic vision that Lee and Scorsese held in those films, because the tent poles that drive cinema box office numbers today are comic book movies and re-boots. The unending litany of big-budget, special effects heavy sequels returns year after year to deliver the same story and the same narrative again and again. Batman is back, the Avengers are back, Spiderman is back -- but where are the stories, the new and challenging ideas and plots that made American cinema in the past really stand out as something important to the development of culture and society? The dependence upon technology and CGI to tell a story now is so heavy that it appears that studios are unwilling to allow anyone to really venture into the unknown with any kind of budget unless there is the promise of titillation, of big name stars, of explosions, etc. Perhaps that is why auteur director Terrence Malick tells his actors to get out of Hollywood, to make movies on their own, to do things independent of the studio system, which he claims kills creativity and stifles the artistic impulse. Critics, of course, are divided when it comes to Malick's movies -- some arguing that they themselves typically convey no story, have no plot, are just a series of pretty pictures with mute actors who stand and say nothing and barely interact with one another. Other critics are more positive and praise the director for adhering to his vision and telling a story in the same way that the old filmmakers of the silent era did -- with pictures rather than with words. Malick's stories are usually introspective and about conflicts that deal with issues in the soul, issues about right and wrong that are not always clear because in the modern world it is difficult to define what is right or wrong -- and much of what is defined subjectively and without any deference to objective truth. But that is the issue that Malick likes to explore in his films, whether this objective.....

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