Ethics and Social Criticism in the Hollywood Films of Erich Von Stroheim, Ernst Lubitsch, and Billy Wilder PDF Download

Author: Nora Henry
Publisher: Praeger
ISBN: 0275964507
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Detailed analyses of their individual styles of filmmaking and readings of selected films reveal how they put their philosophies into practice and to what extent they influenced one another. Films analyzed include The Merry Widow, The Wedding March, Heaven can Wait, To Be or Not To Be, Sunset Boulevard, and The Fortune Cookie among others. By delineating their contributions to the development of modern film, this research explores the filmmakers impact on film and cultural history."

Author: Nora Henry
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Motion pictures
Languages : en
Pages : 874

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Book Description

Author: Nora Henry
Publisher: Praeger
ISBN:
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
Detailed analyses of their individual styles of filmmaking and readings of selected films reveal how they put their philosophies into practice and to what extent they influenced one another. Films analyzed include The Merry Widow, The Wedding March, Heaven can Wait, To Be or Not To Be, Sunset Boulevard, and The Fortune Cookie among others. By delineating their contributions to the development of modern film, this research explores the filmmakers impact on film and cultural history."

Author: Karen McNally
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 0786485205
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 255

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Book Description
Billy Wilder's work remains a masterful combination of incisive social commentary, skilled writing and directing, and unashamed entertainment value. One of Hollywood's foremost emigre filmmakers, Wilder holds a key position in film history via films that represent a complex reflection of his European roots and American cultural influences. This wide-ranging collection of essays by an international group of scholars examines the significance of Wilder's filmmaking from a variety of original perspectives. Engaging with issues of genre, industry, representation and national culture, the volume provides fresh insights into Wilder's films and opens up his work to further exploration.

Author: Tony Shaw
Publisher: Univ of Massachusetts Press
ISBN: 9781558496125
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 356

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Book Description
Examines the role of American filmmakers in the ideological struggle against communism

Author: Gerd GemŸnden
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231166788
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 298

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Book Description
Hundreds of German-speaking film professionals took refuge in Hollywood during the 1930s and 1940s, making a lasting contribution to American cinema. Hailing from Austria, Hungary, Poland, Russia, and the Ukraine, as well as Germany, and including Ernst Lubitsch, Fred Zinnemann, Billy Wilder, and Fritz Lang, these multicultural, multilingual writers and directors betrayed distinct cultural sensibilities in their art. Gerd Gemünden focuses on Edgar G. Ulmer’s The Black Cat (1934), William Dieterle’s The Life of Emile Zola (1937), Ernst Lubitsch’s To Be or Not to Be (1942), Bertold Brecht and Fritz Lang’s Hangmen Also Die (1943), Fred Zinneman’s Act of Violence (1948), and Peter Lorre’s Der Verlorene (1951), engaging with issues of realism, auteurism, and genre while tracing the relationship between film and history, Hollywood politics and censorship, and exile and (re)migration.

Author: John J. Gladchuk
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135914982
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 238

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Book Description
This work concentrates on tracing the evolution of the so-called "red menace" phenomenon as a means of demonstrating the correlation between growing American paranoia and the success of the anticommunist campaign (1935-1955). The House Committee on Un-American Activities 1947 investigation of Hollywood, the nation's most visible industry, served a critical role in conjuring up anti-red hysteria and fanning the flames of virulent anticommunism. Using conveniently unjust tactics, the Committee "painted" targeted Hollywood personalities red and established the infamous blacklist - certified proof in the minds of many that "subversives" were indeed conspiring from within. A failed attempt on behalf of the "Hollywood Ten" to demonstrate the Committee’s undemocratic nature allowed HUAC to forge ahead with its investigation and establish the anticommunist foundation upon which Joseph McCarthy would construct his campaign. Hollywood and Anticommunism stands as an important contribution to McCarthy-era literature and should appeal to all interested in the early Cold War and the impact that unwarranted hysteria has had and continues to have on the growth and development of the nation.

Author: Joseph McBride
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231546645
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 590

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Book Description
Orson Welles called Ernst Lubitsch (1892–1947) “a giant” whose “talent and originality are stupefying.” Jean Renoir said, “He invented the modern Hollywood.” Celebrated for his distinct style and credited with inventing the classic genre of the Hollywood romantic comedy and helping to create the musical, Lubitsch won the admiration of his fellow directors, including Alfred Hitchcock and Billy Wilder, whose office featured a sign on the wall asking, “How would Lubitsch do it?” Despite the high esteem in which Lubitsch is held, as well as his unique status as a leading filmmaker in both Germany and the United States, today he seldom receives the critical attention accorded other major directors of his era. How Did Lubitsch Do It? restores Lubitsch to his former stature in the world of cinema. Joseph McBride analyzes Lubitsch’s films in rich detail in the first in-depth critical study to consider the full scope of his work and its evolution in both his native and adopted lands. McBride explains the “Lubitsch Touch” and shows how the director challenged American attitudes toward romance and sex. Expressed obliquely, through sly innuendo, Lubitsch’s risqué, sophisticated, continental humor engaged the viewer’s intelligence while circumventing the strictures of censorship in such masterworks as The Marriage Circle, Trouble in Paradise, Design for Living, Ninotchka, The Shop Around the Corner, and To Be or Not to Be. McBride’s analysis of these films brings to life Lubitsch’s wit and inventiveness and offers revealing insights into his working methods.

Author: Philip C. DiMare
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 1598842978
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 1505

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Book Description
This provocative three-volume encyclopedia is a valuable resource for readers seeking an understanding of how movies have both reflected and helped engender America's political, economic, and social history. Movies in American History: An Encyclopedia is a reference text focused on the relationship between American society and movies and filmmaking in the United States from the late 19th century through the present. Beyond discussing many important American films ranging from Birth of a Nation to Star Wars to the Harry Potter film series, the essays included in the volumes explore sensitive issues in cinema related to race, class, and gender, authored by international scholars who provide unique perspectives on American cinema and history. Written by a diverse group of distinguished scholars with backgrounds in history, film studies, culture studies, science, religion, and politics, this reference guide will appeal to readers new to cinema studies as well as film experts. Each encyclopedic entry provides data about the film, an explanation of the film's cultural significance and influence, information about significant individuals involved with that work, and resources for further study.

Author: Joseph McBride
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231554117
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 414

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Book Description
The director and cowriter of some of the world's most iconic films—including Double Indemnity, Sunset Blvd., Some Like It Hot, and The Apartment—Billy Wilder earned acclaim as American cinema's greatest social satirist. Though an influential fixture in Hollywood, Wilder always saw himself as an outsider. His worldview was shaped by his background in the Austro-Hungarian Empire and work as a journalist in Berlin during Hitler's rise to power, and his perspective as a Jewish refugee from Nazism lent his films a sense of the peril that could engulf any society. In this critical study, Joseph McBride offers new ways to understand Wilder's work, stretching from his days as a reporter and screenwriter in Europe to his distinguished as well as forgotten films as a Hollywood writer and his celebrated work as a writer-director. In contrast to the widespread view of Wilder as a hardened cynic, McBride reveals him to be a disappointed romantic. Wilder's experiences as an exile led him to mask his sensitivity beneath a veneer of wisecracking that made him a celebrated caustic wit. Amid the satirical barbs and exposure of social hypocrisies, Wilder’s films are marked by intense compassion and a profound understanding of the human condition. Mixing biographical insight with in-depth analysis of films from throughout Wilder's career as a screenwriter and director of comedy and drama, and drawing on McBride's interviews with the director and his collaborators, this book casts new light on the full range of Wilder's rich, complex, and distinctive vision.