Bauer Silent Films and Early Reading

I was interested to learn that the French dominated films in the early 20th century. As an American, the absence of a dominance in the movie industry by Hollywood just does not seem possible. Granted, this was early on before Hollywood became the juggernaut of the film industry. Still, I have difficulty imagining myself as an early 20th century Frenchman feeling pride in the fact that my countrymen were making the best films.

The readings claimed that movies were associated with cities and provided audiences with a means of escape. This makes perfect sense to me due to World War I - which people really must have wanted to forget about for awhile - and the convenience of placing theatres in cities as opposed to farm fields. The masses loved the movies and were able to access them easier from where they lived in urban areas.

The Film Factory particularly discussed the notion of movies as a form of art. I was surprised to learn that the elite often looked down upon movies. Logically, I would have assumed that the educated would have seen the new art form as intellectually stimulating and progressive. These were apparently some of the sentiments that the so-called "Futurists" came to embrace in Russia. I found the arguments of Mayakovsky for cinema as a form of art to be compelling. In the comparison he drew between photographers and painters and the stage and cinema Mayakovsky highlighted that they were capable of doing many of the same things with the inclusion of artistic ability. His opinion made - in my opinion - a great deal of sense. Even though machines were being utilized in photography and cinema they were both still reliant on the artistic abilities of the people involved.

In the three Bauer films that we watched today in class I was particularily interested in how he created three female characters that were 'strong'. They were manipulative, clever, and exerted a high degree of power over their male counterparts. These three women were not merely content to be lead around by the men in their lives. In America, I think we still see women as being slightly vulnerable. Clearly, these women acted vulnerable at times but only in order to achieve their desires. Judging from these movies I think Russians view women as having comprable abilities and strength in comparison with men. I am fairly certain that the Russian army in WWII - and maybe in WWI as well although I'm not sure - had female soldiers which only reinforces my opinion that the Russians do not see women as being somewhat vulnerable.