I cannot compromise..

“My pictures don’t work at all unless they work my way.”  -Orson Welles

Mirror, mirror on the..screen.

Throughout today’s screening, I kept picturing images of Chuck Bass even though it was Citizen Kane that’s playing. The protagonist bears such uncanny resemblance to the “bad boy” from Upper East Side! ( gotta say that I’ve only watched the series once or twice)

And they don’t just look alike. Charles Kane and Charles Bass (same first name!) behave in similar ways. They live with endless fortune at their disposal, leading to their narcissistic attitude – the most important people in their lives are themselves. Kane is a man of complexity whereby not even his best ( and only?) friend understands the things he do, and while I don’t know the series well, I think Chuck isn’t that far away from Kane’s multi-layered personality.

That’s not all. Fred Astaire’s Jerry Travers in Top Hat also reminds me of Jack Dawson in Titanic. Both are suave, masculine (and feminine at the same time), elegant. They are simply perfect.

Character-wise, both are in a way thrust into a world to which they do not belong. Jerry, being the free-spirited dancer who prefers having no strings attached, is evidently uncomfortable with the aristocratic lifestyle of the upper class Londoners in the beginning of the movie. Similarly, Jack finds himself panicking over which cutlery to use when dining with Rose and her fellow first class passengers. The parallel between Jerry and Jack would’ve been a lot deeper if Jack could sing. Oh well.

I wonder how many more comparison can I come across in this course. There must be a Captain America mold somewhere..

~two~

“If you’re sitting around thinking what other people think about your work, you’ll just become paralysed.”  -Steven Soderbergh

(ET 8) What is Fascism?

If it is admitted that the nineteenth century has been the century of Socialism, Liberalism and Democracy, it does not follow that the twentieth must also be the century of Liberalism, Socialism and Democracy. Political doctrines pass; peoples remain. It is to be expected that this century may be that of authority, a century of the “Right”, a Fascist century.

(Benito Mussolini, qtd. in Kreis)

Introduction

Among the most difficult tasks for modern historians is understanding fascism. Chronologically, fascism arose in the aftermath of World War I. Also known as the interwar years, it was a period of political, economical, and social imbalance. Capitalist imperial kingdoms were fast decaying. Post-revolution Russia was gaining grounds with its newfound preaching of Marxist ideology. And all these were happening throughout Europe. The feeling of being stuck between the traditional established powers and Marxist Russia among the smaller countries in the continent, together with the belief that Western Civilization had became corrupt and self-indulgent ultimately led to a new movement called fascism (Price).

This political concept rejects just about every ideology there is: conservatism, liberalism, democracy, communism. It ceases to identify itself with either end of the left-right spectrum. Worse still, “the left accused conservative anticommunists of being fascists, while the right equated communism with fascism” (Passmore 11).

Fascism’s doctrinal fluidity is precisely what makes it so hard to elucidate. Founder Benito Mussolini’s Italy strived to create a totalitarian government. Japan proclaimed itself Asia’s master race during World War II while carrying out expansive territorial conquering. Slobodan Milosevic decided to ethnically cleanse Serbia after Christian Serbs minority in Kosovo claimed they were being ill-treated by the Albanian Muslim majority. Despite the differences, it is safe to say that the primary goal of fascists is to obtain – and retain – absolute power. And recently in 2003, Dr Lawrence Britt, a political scientist outlined 14 common characteristics among fascist regimes, which would be used as the basis for analysis later in this essay.

Fascism and Third Reich Cinema

Although Italy is the birthplace, the poster boy of fascism remains Germany, or more specifically, Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Germany, albeit for all the wrong reason. The Nazis, short for the National Socialist German Workers’ Party (NSDAP), came to power in the wake of the 1929 Great Depression. Taking advantage of its predecessor, the Weimar Republic’s failure in recuperating the German economy, the Nazis succeeded in capturing the people’s hearts and in no time, Deutschland was prosperous once again.

Along with political and economic transformations, the German film industry also began to respond to Hitler’s totalitarian ruling, often as a direct result of the Nazi’s oppression. Any film produced must be in accordance with Nazi ideologies. Filmmaking was then made even more rigid with the introduction of the 1934 Reich Film Law which introduced the pre-censorship system in addition to the existing, standard post-production censorship (“The 1934 Film Law”). It is clear what the Nazi’s cinematic policy was: inculcation of ideas and mobilization of the masses for the Nazi movement. In short, the Third Reich cinema became a cinema of propaganda.

The Triumph of Nazi Fascism

Joseph Goebbels, the Minister of Propaganda announced, “Films should have a political tendency but that tendency could not be separated from artistic quality” (qtd. in Hake 68). Leni Riefenstahl’s Triumph of the Will is particularly relevant here. A sophisticated account of the 1934 Nuremberg Rally, Triumph is an explicit piece of propaganda just as it is an impressive work of art. Until today, Triumph is widely regarded as one of the best films ever made. Riefenstahl’s use of camera and editing techniques were almost unparalleled at her time, yet beneath the blanket of cinematography brilliance, the film is but a blueprint of Nazi ideologies.

One of Triumph’s most prominent motives is the military. The film’s beginning features high-angle shots from the plane looking at thousands of miniature figures marching on the streets. There are guard-of-honor greeting Hitler’s arrival at the airport and hotel. And everywhere he goes, the roads are lined with soldiers. The loaded displays of the military serve to exert its might and dominance on the audience and the reason it works so successfully is the psychological response it triggers in viewers. Riefenstahl knew that repetition combined with big crowds is the ultimate potion: soldiers are always pictured in massed troops and never as an individual. Furthermore, there are times when the military appears to outnumber the general public. Just imagining the amount of resources allocated for the military is thought-provoking when one considers the fact that it had only been less than two years since the German economic downfall. Then again, Germany was now under Nazi control, which meant that domestic needs would invariably play second fiddle to the army (Britt).

Fascist regimes often use “prominent displays of flags . . . lapel pins . . . catchy slogans . . . [and] military . . .” (Britt) to exhibit strong feelings of nationalism. Triumph provides ample evidences to this. The primary Nazi symbol, the swastika, is featured everywhere in the film: on the military armbands, on building banners, on the backdrops of the stages where the Führer gives his speeches. A 1991 documentary, The Occult History of the Third Reich: The Enigma of the Swastika suggests the use of the symbol as “a sign of a new and powerful force, a deepening fascination with the arcane, the esoteric, and the occult” (qtd. in Kingsepp 34); obviously, the force in question is the Nazis. Then there are the national flags, one tricolour and another bearing the swastika in the middle. During the Third Reich, flags were to Germans what Christmas trees are to Christians. They were the must-have ornaments be it for homes, work places, or even a memorial service, as shown in the movie. As for slogans, some of the more powerful ones are found at the end of the film during Hitler’s closing speech for the rally. He concluded with the words “Long live Germany!” and it was followed by thunderous applause from the crowd. This prolonged sequence of cheer radiates the people’s undying faith and pride in their leader and the Nazi cause to the audience. In retrospect such acts may seem atrocious, but in 1935, they made perfect sense because, as the Reich Labor Service (RAD) proclaim in Triumph, there was only “ein Volk, ein Führer, ein Reich” (“Triumph”). The most convincing piece of paraphernalia, however, is the Nazi insignia. Known as the Reichsadler, it is shaped like an aggressive-looking black eagle with its claws grasping an oak wreath with a swastika at the centre. Why the eagle? Throughout the film, the emblem is shot almost exclusively from low angles, empowering it to the extent that it appears to be an object of worship, something manifested best during Hitler’s speech on the third night of the rally:

Even the airplane in the opening segment is implied to the insignia which is the very first image to appear in the film. Given that the eagle symbolises Nazi Germany, a composite of the insignia and the plane acts as an analogy for the regime’s saving of Germany.

Perhaps the heaviest theme overall is religion. In keeping true to its propagandistic nature, the film portrays the Nazis – specifically Hitler – in mythical manners. Consider the opening sequence again: Hitler, in an airplane, emerges from the clouds overlooking the city of Nuremberg before landing. Riefenstahl’s choice of images (aerial views, thick clouds) suggests that the Führer is a saviour from heaven descending to his followers on earth. This complies with Britt’s analysis whereby the fascist ruling elites frequently identify themselves as spiritual defenders of a religion (Britt). It could be a manipulation of one of Karl Marx’s view of religion being the masses’ addiction – by ‘becoming’ the religion itself, the Nazis were now the ‘addiction’ of the German people. The theme is also reflected in the speeches, including the prologue. Terms like ‘rebirth’, ‘holy’, ‘purity’, and ‘sacred’ cast a theistic overtone in the film, which further exemplifies the regime’s intent on restoring traditions and order in Deutschland.

The fuel in every religion is the devotees and observers. In Hitler’s case, it is the millions of party faithful. The film’s ‘rally’ format is really a metaphor for ritualized meetings and assemblies, from which Hitler and his Nazi companions draw their powers. Hitler’s writing in Mein Kampf explains best:

            Mass assemblies are also necessary for the reason that, in attending them, the individual . . . now begins to feel isolated and in fear of being left alone as he acquires for the first time the picture of a great community which has a strengthening and encouraging effect on most people . . . and only a mass demonstration can impress upon him the greatness of this community. (371)

Notice how the crowd size steadily increases as the movie progresses, from the gathering at the airport to the 52,000 men at the Labor Service’s outdoor rally to the ‘carpet’ of military men at the memorial service. This is yet another of Riefenstahl’s trick in wielding Hitler’s greatness as a leader (Valasek 369). With that, the Nazis’ establishment is now complete.

If a ‘storyline’ of political beliefs isn’t convincing enough to reflect the totalitarian administration’s attitude, the film’s production certainly is. The director was chosen by Hitler himself. It was made by the Nazis; it starred the Nazis; and it was meant to glorify the Nazis. One can already count the film as controlled mass media even before watching it. The custom-built sets and huge funding from the NSDAP clearly illustrates what Britt calls “access of resources” and “economic pressure” (Britt). Moreover, the party’s heavy involvement in the production phase hints at a suppression of the freedom of expression and the arts. Its supervision of even the screenplay meant that only orthodox ideas that promote the national interest had the right to exist (Britt).

From Glory to Guilt

Despite its stellar power and solid support, the Nazis’ reign was destined to be short-lived. Oblivious to the people back then, Triumph of the Will was in fact a misleading prelude to what Hitler had in store for the country – and the world.

Anyone who watches Triumph is bound to wonder what the magic word is that managed to rally the entire nation behind a man so evil. The key lies in the construction of the film itself. Its power of persuasion is evident right from the opening intertitles: Audience are reminded of the devastating World War (“20 years after the outbreak of the World War”), the subsequent trauma and humiliation inflicted on the Germans (“16 years after the beginning of German suffering”), and finally of Hitler’s heroic ride to the people’s rescue (“19 months after the beginning of the German rebirth / Adolf Hitler flew again to Nuremberg to review the columns of his faithful followers”). The intended audience’s compliance and ideological commitment to the regime are also crucial elements in strengthening the film’s hypnotic effect (Kolker 226). Furthermore, shots of human anatomy are frequently incorporated in the movie, especially during the communal shower scene at an outdoor rally. Clean-shaven chins, neatly parted hair, attractive facial dimensions, masculine body frames – these signify the Nazis’ fixation on the human body cult. Germans, or rather the Aryans, are pictured so perfectly to align viewers to the notion that the Aryan race is the most superior of all. Ironically, it was this ideal that spelled out the Third Reich’s self-destruction.

Fast forward 20 years and viewers are presented with Night and Fog, a 1955 documentary by French director Alan Resnais. The cinematic (and mental) experience in watching Triumph and Night and Fog are polar opposites of each other in every respect. Pride becomes shame, support becomes blame. It is tough to imagine human beings like you and me committing those heinous acts in Auschwitz, Struthof, and Dachau, but the very doctrines illustrated in Triumph were nothing if not lessons for the glorious Nazis. Racial minorities in Germany were demoted to a subhuman level as depicted in Night and Fog – inmates were forced to become guinea pigs for medical experiments; corpses were skinned to produce drawing blocks; and the wooden bunks looked more like dog kennels than sleeping beds. And how were these ‘taught’ in Triumph? Julius Streitcher’s (a prominent Nazi official) rally ‘lecture’ sums it all: “A people that does not protect its racial purity will perish” (“Triumph”).

So far in this essay, Triumph is only regarded as ‘film’ and ‘movie’. Note the missing keyword. Not because it isn’t one, but because it isn’t one in the traditional manner. Recall that Triumph was made by the Nazis to glorify the Nazis. This way, it was guaranteed to present the party exactly how they wanted, which is in direct contrast to the nature of documentaries. A documentary is fundamentally realist, meaning it serves to capture and present events in ways that are as real as possible. While the Nuremberg Rally was artificially reconstructed for filming purposes, the camps and gas chambers in Night and Fog were actual sites. They were the ruins of the Nazis’ atrocities, left to rot away from civilization. There were no guards or prisoners to orchestrate the terrors inside the incinerator. Audience are provided only with a narration by a camp survivor, who is forced to recall his nightmares unlike Hitler who proudly re-enacted (and refurnished) his speeches. Nevertheless, Triumph remains a documentary in its own rights. Viewers ought to keep in mind the context in which it was made. In 1935 the Nazis gave the people a sense of purpose. And there wasn’t the faintest sign of a second World War, much less the Holocaust. These are enough reasons to justify Triumph’s chauvinistic disposition. No doubt it is vastly different from Night and Fog, but look closer and suddenly they appear eerily similar. One documents the birth of the Thousand Year Reich, the other its ghostly remains.

Conclusion

Hitler’s model of Germany provides an accurate testimony that fascism is in fact a double-edged sword. Although its initial appearance unleashed unity and security among the people, the Führer’s hopes of creating an Aryan utopia soon transformed his followers from fascists into fanatics. Riefenstahl’s expressionist approach in Triumph effectively enables viewers to delve into how the conversion took place, such as through the choreographed movements and subjective cinematography. For contemporary audience, however, it is easy to spot the ideals presented in Triumph as a recipe for disaster, which in turn leads to the ultimate paradox of Hitler’s ruling: Instead of carrying out his messianic duties, Hitler ended up a Nazi version of Perses (Titan god of destruction). Unintentional, of course, since his idea of the future stemmed from a “distorted view” (Mackenzie 175) of his present.

 

Works Cited

Britt, Lawrence W. “Fascism Anyone?” Free Inquiry 23.2 (2003). Council for Secular Humanism. Web. 14 Oct. 2012. <http://www.secularhumanism.org/library/fi/britt_23_2.htm>.

Hake, Sabine. German National Cinema. Great Britain: Routledge, 2008. Print.

Hitler, Adolf. Mein Kampf. Trans. James Murphy. London: Hurst and Blackett Ltd., 1939. Web. 16 Oct. 2012. < http://mk.christogenea.org/_files/Adolf%20Hitler%20-%20Mein%20Kampf%20english%20translation%20unexpurgated%201939.pdf>.

Kingsepp, Eva. “Hitler as Our Devil?: Nazi Germany in Mainstream Media.”Monsters in the Mirror: Representations of Nazism in Post-War Popular Culture. Ed. Sarah Buttsworth & Maartje Abbenhuis. California: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2010. 29-52. Web. 16 Oct. 2012. <http://books.google.com.my/books?id=L2baV57lS1QC&pg=PA34&lpg=PA34&dq=Reichsadler+%2B+nazi+germany&source=bl&ots=dZfVQiKNK1&sig=LoDYdQScUiGwSbeHfgQuJxPo7K0&hl=en&sa=X&ei=ZDV8UPevCczhrAez5IGgDg&ved=0CCwQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=Reichsadler%20%2B%20nazi%20germany&f=false>.

Kolker, Robert. Film, Form, & Culture. Indiana: McGraw-Hill, 2005. Print.

Kreis, Steven. “Mussolini, Doctrine of Fascism (1932).” The History Guide, 13 May 2004. Web. 13 Oct. 2012. < http://www.historyguide.org/europe/duce.html>.

Mackenzie, Scott. “From Cinema to History: Kracauer’s Shifting Philosophical Historiography.” European Film Theory. Ed. Temenuga Trifonova. New York: Routledge, 2009. 165-179. Print.

Passmore, Kevin. Fascism: A Very Short Introduction. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. Web. 13 Oct. 2012. < http://www.revalvaatio.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/passmore-fascism-a-very-short-introduction.pdf>.

Price, R. G. “Fascism Part I: Understanding Fascism and anti-Semitism.” rationalrevolution.net, 23 Oct. 2003. Web. 13 Oct. 2012. < http://www.rationalrevolution.net/articles/understanding_fascism.htm>.

“The 1934 Film Law.” filmportal.de. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Oct. 2012. <http://www.filmportal.de/en/topic/the-1934-film-law>.

Triumph of the Will, 1935. [Film] Directed by Leni Riefenstahl. Nazi Germany: Universum Film AG.

Valasek, Thomas E. Frameworks: An Introduction to Film Studies. Iowa: Wm. C. Brown Publishers, 1992. Print.

~one~

“What is a cult? It just means not enough people to make a minority.”  -Robert Altman

Red Bull Gives You Wiiiiings!

This is totally unrelated to FILM101, but it made my weekend a splendid one! (apart from completing my first ET)

Seb won in Suzuka! And Red Bull would’ve gotten an even better outing here if not for Grosjean’s antics (again). Anyhow, it was a great race and the remainder of the season is all to play for now.
And yes, this is how the title of this blog came about. Lady Luck’s been eluding RBR for a great deal of 2012 but not once have they shown signs of giving up. I love them, and always will.

Oh, and RBR, just please don’t pull a 2010 Finale again. Not sure the fans can still take it. :X

Tragically beautiful.

So far in class, we’ve seen the beginning of Nazi Germany and its aftermath. More often than not films offer the vantage point of “outside” people, or those who weren’t directly involved in the process like you and me. Just before summer semester started this year, I came across this movie called Before the Fall (German: Napola – Elite für den Führer), and it was very different to others. It tells the story of Friedrich, a skilled young boxer who against his father’s wishes joins a Nazi elite school in search for a brighter future. At the academy, he befriends the local governer’s son, Albrecht, and from there on the storytelling job alternates between them. But Albrecht’s life took a drastic turn when one night, they were sent to capture a group of Russian POWs who turn out to be unarmed youths. In the end, he committed suicide, prompting his father to label him as “too weak.”

I share one of the comments to the video above: Albrecht is not too weak, but he is passionate in his belief for humanity, something we are losing. He didn’t just take his own life but he went against every ideal he was raised to believe in. His death dealt a huge blow to Friedrich (with whom by now he shared a strong bond) which culminated when he aborted his fight in the boxing championship (a reference to Albrecht’s remark earlier in the film).

I don’t find the cinematography particularly outstanding but the soundtrack, yes. Like those oblivion, innocent German youths in the movie, the music is “tragically beautiful”.

(ET 4) Birth of a Nation: Lincoln’s Assassination

Mention the name D. W. Griffith and immediately The Birth of a Nation comes to mind, not because it was his only piece of work, but because it was his landmark production that would go on to redefine film as a form of art. The American director is widely credited for transforming motion pictures into something more than just an imitation of the theater. With The Birth of a Nation, he elevated realism in a narrative to a whole new level. As Seymour Stern explains, “It (The Birth of a Nation) introduced an important new use for the motion picture: namely, the dramatic teaching and dramatization of history. It was the forerunner, and in some cases the inspiration, technical, exploitative or otherwise, of many historical and spectacle films which followed…” (qtd. in Valasek 268).

One of the most realistic sequences in The Birth of a Nation is the Lincoln assassination at Ford’s Theater. The temporal proximity between the year the film was produced and the year the incident took place – only 50 years apart – made it all the more relatable for the audience. Griffith’s sophisticated use of the camera and editing induced a diverse range of cinematic experience for the audience; instead of making them sit through another history lecture, he manipulated the medium of film to reconstruct the Ford’s Theater and place the audience inside it. In other words, he made them witnesses to Lincoln’s horrific killing. The following analysis of this “historical facsimile” will reveal some of the techniques employed by Griffith which made the composition come alive for viewers.

The sequence starts with an ornate intertitle stating the time, act, and scene of the play Our American Cousin. Besides telling the audience that it is a gala performance to celebrate the surrender of General Lee, it doubles as a historical fact, that it was the fateful night of April 14, 1865 when the first successful assassination of the American president took place. It is an excellent usage of nondiegetic elements to help develop the plot (“Narrative Analysis”). This establishing shot is followed by a long shot of the Ford’s Theater which is limited to the upper floor gallery. But why the iris shot? Wouldn’t it make more sense for Griffith to reveal the entire theater rather than focus on one corner of it? It would appear as if he wanted viewers to keep in mind this particular setting, almost foreshadowing that subsequent events would emerge from there. Indeed, the camera cuts to a medium shot of Elsie and Phillip Stoneman, with Elsie pointing to a mysterious figure at the gallery and asking who he is before the second title card reveals his identity: John Wilkes Booth.

Notice how Griffith shifts the view around after introducing Booth, to the Stonemans, to the gallery, to the stage play, to Lincoln in his box, and finally to the guard at the gallery. Repeated images of Elsie’s earlier point of view of Booth in this chain of shots reinforces him as a central character, but Griffith possibly had a different agenda. Perhaps he wanted to create a sense of alarm in the audience by implicitly implying that “they” actually noticed Booth that night without knowing he was a soon-to-be murderer. Viewers are further absorbed into the sequence here by gaining several different perspectives in the theater, achieved through precise crosscutting of scenes. It is through such narrative rhythm that their attention can be maintained, unlike in lengthy continuous shots which would likely bore the audience instead (Kolker 85). Amidst the jumping of shots, one minor detail stands out, that is when the president suddenly feels a draught and draws his shawl tighter around his shoulders. Again, the current of cool air seems to foreshadow Booth’s coming to Lincoln’s box, except there was no “shawl” to protect Lincoln from his impending demise.

Next, the opening long shot of the theater is shown again, this time with the iris slowly opening up as viewers watch Booth heads for the door against an oblivious full house. Just as the audience attempts to examine the man for the first time, the camera closes in on his pistol, drawing attention away from the owner and to his weapon. By equipping the audience from the beginning with multiple angles of the theater, they now know the lion is waiting to leap at its prey while the occupiers of Lincoln’s box do not. It doesn’t matter that the hunt is written in history because there is, in the words of Samuel Coleridge, “that willing suspension of disbelief for the moment” (“Suspension of Disbelief”). Booth then bursts into Lincoln’s box, takes his aim, and pulls the trigger before jumping onto the stage to escape. The ensuing panic and chaos, together with intercutting shots of the stage from the spectators’ viewpoint, make this train of events the most effective; it has accomplished Griffith’s goal of making his audience feel like they are present for the assassination. For the more careful observers, however, the tempo here deserves just as much credit as its editing counterpart does in heightening the conflict and tension. As the actions near the climax (the gunshot), the crosscutting accelerates, albeit very slightly. This is akin to a 400m dash where athletes use the first 300 meters to flex their muscles and only start to sprint when they enter the final quarter of the distance. Like how the fans cheer in joy the moment their favorite runner crosses the finishing line, Griffith stirs up the same delight with an eerie pinch in his audience as they watch the president gets shot.

Russian director Vsevolod Pudovkin once said, “Editing is the basic creative force, by power of which the soulless photographs (the separate shots) are engineered into living, cinematographic form” (qtd. in Bordwell & Thompson 223). As explained earlier, the parallel editing here is far ahead of its time. While a solitary scene usually doesn’t signify much, a new – and greater – idea can be created by juxtaposing the scene with another scene (Bone & Johnson 84). For example, the scene where Elsie looks through her binoculars simply implies that she is looking at something while an iris portrait shot of Booth striking a still pose makes the audience curious of him. However, when these two seemingly unrelated shots are positioned back-to-back, the resulting effect is that Elsie is watching Booth closely and hence, “we” are doing the same, too. Additionally, it makes “us” wonder why “we” are keeping tabs on this particular person.

The segment depicting Lincoln’s assassination remains one of the best historical accounts ever made for film. Not only did Griffith deliberately cast a Lincoln-lookalike to portray the president, he orchestrated the moment of Booth’s fatal gunshot to coincide with the exact, actual moment in Our American Cousin (Beaver). And just when one may think that is the end to the sequence’s accuracy, historian/writer Mark Reinhart further elaborates that by noticing the lips of the actors in the stage play in the film version, the audience will notice that their lines are similar to those spoken in the real play half a century ago (58). The audience now feels as if they really “attended” the gala performance. Then again, this surely wasn’t why Griffith made this film – just so people can time-travel back to 1865. Again, the editing comes under the spotlight. Revealing the events through several regards gives viewers a greater range of knowledge as opposed to that of when seeing only through the eyes of, say,  the Stonemans. But more importantly, it compels viewers to feel helpless. They watch Booth’s every step that night – and possibly even hurling “watch out!” to the screen – but the inability to prevent the murder from taking place leaves a bitter taste in their mouths. They have become something more than just witnesses to the killing. They become a part of the killing, as did their friends and relatives before them.

As shown through this sequence of the Lincoln assassination, the camera and editing are not merely instruments, passively recording and cutting images to be compiled into a narrative. Quite the contrary, they carry an active, integral role in determining the structure of the storyline. Different camera angles, movements, and positions together with creative assembling of the shots all contribute to the mise en scene. The resulting effect, as Panofsky believes, is that despite having fixed seats in a movie theater, spectators are aesthetically “in permanent motion, as his eye identifies itself with the lens of the camera which permanently shifts in distance and direction” (qtd. in Goehr 211). Chairman Rey’s idea that “all pleasure is tension and release” fits Griffith’s narration of the assassination perfectly. Griffith slowly tightens a noose around his audience’s necks, only letting go moments before they reach hypoxia; the violent bout of exhalation is the director’s interpretation of cinematic pleasure.

Works Cited

Beaver, Frank. “Abe Lincoln on Film.” Michigan Today, 11 May 2011. Web. 2 Oct. 2012. <http://michigantoday.umich.edu/2011/05/story.php?id=7984#.UGrX8k0snB1>.

Bone, Jan & Johnson, Ron. Understanding the Film: An Introduction to Film Appreciation. Illinois: NTP/Contemporary Publishing Group, 1996. Print.

Bordwell, David & Thompson, Kristin. Film Art: An Introduction. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. Print.

Goehr, Lydia. Elective Affinities: Musical Essays on the History of Aesthetic Theory. New York: Columbia University Press, 2011. Web. 6 Oct. 2012. < http://books.google.com.my/books?id=Mt7HPiTqBVgC&pg=PA211&lpg=PA211&dq=erwin+panofsky+%2B+in+permanent+motion+as+his+eye+identifies&source=bl&ots=fNPj3TiTdH&sig=5xQi-UClfPJ4-HIEUXSfd0rQuCA&hl=en&sa=X&ei=oBxvUK_eH4PtrQfJt4GwBw&ved=0CDEQ6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=erwin%20panofsky%20%2B%20in%20permanent%20motion%20as%20his%20eye%20identifies&f=false>.

Kolker, Robert. Film, Form, & Culture. Indiana: McGraw-Hill, 2005. Print.

“Narrative Analysis.” Film110. N.p., n.d. Web. 2 Oct. 2012. < https://film110.pbworks.com/w/page/12610268/Narrative%20Analysis>.

Reinhart, Mark S. Abraham Lincoln On Screen: Fictional and Documentary Portrayals on Film and Television. North Carolina: McFarland, 2008. Web. 2 Oct. 2012. <http://books.google.com.my/books?id=Zio49y0tiE0C&pg=PA56&lpg=PA56&dq=abraham+lincoln+joseph+henabery&source=bl&ots=VKmYfYbZtL&sig=ZHP-XpIQHTYbROva0RASIQn4CSg&hl=en&sa=X&ei=bepqUNq3MIHJrQeo5oHgCQ&ved=0CFoQ6AEwCQ#v=onepage&q=abraham%20lincoln%20joseph%20henabery&f=false>.

“Suspension of Disbelief.” The Phrase Finder. N.p., n.d. Web. 2 Oct. 2012. <http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/suspension-of-disbelief.html>.

Valasek, Thomas E. Frameworks: An Introduction to Film Studies. Iowa: Wm. C. Brown Publishers, 1992. Print.