professor and film historian, John Belton, “In the cinema, genre is a term used to designate various categories or motion picture production. Major movie genres include such types of films as musicals, comedies, action and adventure films, Westerns, crime and detective films, melodramas, science fiction and horror films, gangster films, and war films” (123). During the course of this class we have studied a majority of these genres. Recently, we took a look at the development of silent film melodramas
The genre i have studied is musicals. A musical is a film which has musical performances from the actors to express their feelings. The films from this genre that i studied are 'Singin' In The Rain' (Gene Kelly and Stanley Donen, 1952), 'Grease' (Randall Kleiser, 1978) and 'Hairspray'(Adam Shankman, 2007). I studied two characteristics of the musical genre (Breaking Into Song And Dance and The Grande Finale) that are shown in the films studied. The identifying characteristics of 'Breaking Into Song
A film concerning a futuristic universe, Pitch Black, directed by David Twohy, was scored using an arsenal of techniques that imbued a futurist connotation. The composer Graeme Revell used a wide variety of electronic tactics that screamed modern use of MIDI, as in the use of electronic drums and percussions. Much of the underscoring is as dissonant and eerie as the film itself. The only score that might have fit Pitch Black better would have been no score at all, for Revell seems to conjure silence
1960s represented the height in popularity for the Hollywood musical. With every major production proving to be box office gold, the level of critical approval was high establishing the Hollywood musical as a genre. Born with the coming of sound, the Hollywood movie musical derived from two sources: opera and operetta, brought over by European emigres, and the American tradition of vaudeville, the inspiration behind so many “backstage” musicals, the plots of which revolved around putting on a show. The
to grieve because no matter what, grief is painful, messy, and emotionally exhausting. On July 13, 2013, the hit musical-comedy show “Glee” suffered a huge loss due to the untimely death of their lead actor, Cory Monteith. “Glee” paid tribute to the beloved actor’s life and memory by airing a tribute in honor of Cory’s and his character Finn’s memory. The episode contained six musical numbers dedicated to Cory and Finn. Those six numbers were covers of “Seasons of Love” by the cast of “RENT”, “I’ll
looking down appreciatively at them. This scene is important to note because it contains the elements of a musical and, importantly, it is where the musical genre began. This film was revolutionary for many reasons, but the most important reason to mention is a statement that film historian Edwin M. Bradley wrote in his book about Hollywood musicals. He states that The Jazz
of the film. Throughout this essay I will be commenting on the filming techniques that Luhrmann uses and what affects these have on the audience, also I will be analyzing how the film is similar and different to typical Hollywood Musicals. There are many elements of film musicals, which are present in typical Hollywood, and Broadway musicals. For example the synchronized dancing can be seen in many musicals such as 'Seven Brides for Seven Brothers' and 'Cabaret'. The musical films are a
The long and intense musical undertone in the Godfather Part II serves a unique role in the flow of the film. The diegetic music sets the scene throughout many different changes in scenery as well as plays a huge part in setting the mood and tone of the characters with their different changes of emotion. In this paper, I will demonstrate how the musical score creates transitions within the film, identifies with the characters and creates underscoring for moments in the film when there is not much
photographic film. This invention was known as a “Sound Grate” the results where still far to crude to be used to public display. The cameras used to film “The Talkies” as they where known, had to be kept in enormous soundproof casing. This immediately hindered directors creativity and made movies such as Meet Me in St. Louis (1944) much more rigid. Because of the fascination with the lip-syncing that this new technology achieved less attention was played to other attributes that silent films used such
Integration Techniques in Hairspray Hairspray(2007), as many modern musical films do, integrates all of its music numbers into its story and structure in at least one way, if not more. The most obvious way that the songs are integrated is by the film being a backstage musical, one that focuses on the people who create entertainment related to music, in this case “The Corny Collins Show”. The backstage setting allows for the songs to naturally integrate into the story and diegesis.One way is for songs
was stronger than that of maybe any other film I've ever seen. It shook me, stirred my emotions, made me think and reflect, it disturbed me in the most positive sense of the word and it still does. Its radical make, boldness and consistency exceeds all expectations and probably everything that's come before. This is the perfect example of a director's vision uncompromisingly realized. To be fair, I have to say that "Dancer in the dark" is one of those films that people either deeply admire and love
attended the musical called Urinetown by Mark Hollmann and Greg Kotis. Urinetown was held in Rowand-Johnson Hall, at the Marian Gallaway Theatre. As I quickly walked in the entrance, I noticed that people were wearing casual attire. I gave the usher my ticket and walked to my seat. This time my seat was located up at the front so I had a great view of the stage. This particular theatre is my favorite, it is very open and you can see from every seat. This musical is known to be a musical comedy which
adaptation of Maurine Watkins 1926 musical of the same name. The story took place in the roaring 20’s based on the concept of femme fatale and commercialized criminals. The plot of the movie revolves around ambition and the fickle nature of fame, and breaks the boundaries of stereotypical musicals in its unique theatricality and stagecraft. The success in the cinematic, theatrical, and editing elements aid in the creation of wonderful movie that is Chicago. To analyze a film requires the understanding of
Berkeley’s Contributions to Film Berkeley’s creations were not meant to focus on dance. He envisioned an overall moving pattern, which he created by using moving bodies. He made the art of choreography a technique of design and visual mathematics, and combined this with his knowledge of film to bring his vision to life on the big screen. The skill of this multi-talented man brought Hollywood musicals to their full potential, creating a high demand for dance in films. William Berkeley Enos was
Wise and Jerome Robbins and ‘Flash Dance’(1983) dir. Adrian Lynn, are musicals with a narrative focused on love, romance and the struggles that comes with relationships, however it is not the narrative that makes a musical work, a key part to musicals unsurprisingly are the songs and dance numbers executed within the films. “Far from simply providing an alternative to silence – as does background music in other Hollywood films – the musical’s music (as well as dance) enters into a process of signification
The use of choreography and music in a musical is not only entertaining, but can illustrate the social issues present in society. Dance in musical theatre has changed dramatically. Until 1936 dance was used as a diversion from the story line. Agnes DeMille was the first notable female choreographer to use dance as a major plot device and central role in as musical. Since then choreographers such as Bob Fosse, Gower Champion and Jerome Robbins use dance to portray symbolism and add depth to the music
Musicals are here to stay no matter how old or how new it is, it will always be accepted by the people. Musicals began being produced on stage with theatre actors along with musical bands and musical directors. It takes a bunch of people to create a musical and back then these were only shown in theatres if you were lucky enough to get a ticket with its limited seating in one show. However, with it being a hit Hollywood took part into bringing musicals into the big screen. One of the most successful
When you think “The Phantom of the Opera,” you think a brilliant musical, on Broadway but the story begins way before then. The well-loved story went through many different stages before it became a musical. Shall we look at the various ways this timeless tale has been told over the years? It first was a novel by Gaston Leroux. In 1909, the complete “Le Fantôme de l’Opéra” was published as a book. Though the book did not sell very well. Leroux said he was inspired to write the novel after a trip
‘Changed for Good’. This book observes the roles of women in Broadway and how musical theatre’s history has changed massively from the 1950’s to the twenty first century by analysing, inspecting and listening to what women actually did on the Broadway stage through every chapter. It argues that ‘gender and genre are inseparable’ (Wolf. S. 2011. P. 20) the representations and performances by women radically changed in the musical from the 1950’s; from Anita in West Side Story to Adalaide in Guys and Dolls
although most story lovers recall the musical of the same name by Andrew Lloyd Webber or the motion picture adaption. Although this story has been entertaining people for over a century, in this new era have prerecorded voices and movements begun to overshadow the talented performers of live theater? Although “The lavish screen adaptation of Andrew Lloyd Webber's Phantom of the Opera (2005) only deepened the damage” of the dislike of musicals made into film “with non-stars in the leads and an unimaginative