Avant-Garde Cinema Quiz

Avant-Garde Cinema

• Experimental cinema that challenges conventional filmmaking, focusing on innovation, abstraction, and symbolic representation.
• Core characteristics include non-conformist and anti-narrative approaches, prioritizing emotion, ideas, and visuals over linear storytelling.
• Key forms include abstract (focusing on visuals like colors, shapes, and movements), associational (juxtaposing unrelated images to create emotional resonance), narrative deconstruction (non-linear and fragmented storytelling), and structural (focusing on the materiality of the medium).

Key Films Examples

• Film No. 3: Interwoven (Harry Smith, 1947-49, USA): Abstract animations with vibrant colors and patterns.
• By Night with Torch and Spear (Joseph Cornell, 1940s, USA): Surrealist montage of found footage.
• Meshes of the Afternoon (Maya Deren, 1943, USA): Pioneering feminist and dreamlike narrative.
• Hamfat Asar (Lawrence Jordan, 1965): Layered, collage-like imagery with mythological themes.
• Fog Line (Larry Gottheim, 1970): Minimalist landscape film emphasizing stillness and subtle changes.

Eisenstein's "Montage of Attractions"

• Sequence of images designed to provoke emotional and intellectual responses through juxtaposition.
• Types of montage include metric (fixed cutting rhythm), rhythmic (matching editing pace to movement), tonal (using mood and emotion to guide editing), and intellectual (combining images to convey abstract ideas).
• Example: Juxtaposing workers being massacred with slaughterhouse imagery to create symbolic impact.

Art Cinema

• Emerged post-WWII as an alternative to Hollywood cinema, emphasizing ambiguity, character psychology, and stylistic expression.
• Key movements include Italian Neorealism (on-location shooting, non-professional actors, e.g., Bicycle Thieves) and French New Wave (1959-1964).

Key Film Techniques

• Mise-en-scène: Arrangement of visual elements in the frame (setting, costume and makeup, lighting).
• Cinematography: Art of capturing visuals (close-ups, tracking shots, chiaroscuro lighting).
• Editing: Continuity editing (ensuring spatial and temporal consistency), montage (creating meaning through juxtaposition), diegetic sound (within the story world), and non-diegetic sound (external to the story).

Weekly Highlights and Screenings

• Specific titles and themes for each week, ranging from Run Lola Run, Moonrise Kingdom, Rope, Ocean's Eleven to more contemporary films like Sound of Metal, Grizzly Man, Double Indemnity, and Chungking Express.

Experimental Films

• Discussion of films like I AM CUBA, Koyaanisqatsi, and Ballet Mécanique highlighting their revolutionary themes, artistic cinematography, and non-narrative storytelling, often critiquing modernity.