How Film Will Get a Profitable Afterlife - Research Paper Example

The films of the 1920s were silent but had musical accompaniment to express their moods. The soundlessness was a limiting factor in the mass acceptance of this medium. When sound cinema evolved, this hurdle was crossed but that divided the world into linguistic markets as well. It was during this same period that West saw the emergence of the Hollywood studio system. The early sound cinemas were also films made solely in studios. Hollywood was virtually a cinema factory and the earlier filmmakers and actors enjoyed no such a privileged position as artists.

They were considered technicians rather than artists, by studio owners and they worked eight or ten hours daily.  To the studios, films were mere commercial products but to a major chunk of the audience, they were valued as artistic expressions.  Edwin.S.Porter’s ‘The Great Train Robbery’ made in 1903 was considered as the first narrative film.  William.S.Hart’s ‘Hell’s Hinges’ came out in 1916. D.W.Griffith made his ‘Musketeers of Pig Alley’ in 1912.

Orsen Welles directed the legendary film, ‘Citizen Kane’ in 1941. New technologies like deep focus cinematography and special effects were used in this film. Robert Wiene’s The Cabinet of Dr.Kaligari which reflected the psychological trauma of the post-first World War period through its violent and dislocated imagery and emotions was another notable product of early 20th century. But it must be kept in mind that far away in the Eastern Soviet Union, another cinema movement developed simultaneously which was guided by the ‘montage’ techniques and loaded with a different kind of ideological underpinnings and organizational structure.

In the Soviet Union, the memorable year in film history was 1926 when ‘Battleship Potemkin’ directed by Sergei Eisenstein came out.