Film genre
A film genre is a motion-picture category based on similarities either in the narrative elements or in the emotional response to the film. Most theories of film genre are borrowed from literary-genre criticism; each film genre is associated with "conventions, settings, narratives and actors". Standard genre characters vary according to the film genre; some actors acquire a reputation linked to a single genre, such as Fred Astaire. A film's genre will influence the use of filmmaking styles and techniques, such as the use of flashbacks and low-key lighting in film noir, tight framing in horror films, fonts that look like rough-hewn logs for the titles of Western films, or the "scrawled" title-font and credits of Se7en, a film about a serial killer; as well, genres have associated film-scoring conventions, such as lush string orchestras for romantic melodramas or electronic music for science-fiction films. The basic genres include fiction and documentary, from which subgenres have emerged, such as docufiction and docudrama.
Other examples of subgenres include the courtroom- and trial-focused drama known as the legal drama, a subtype of drama. Types of fiction which may seem unrelated can be combined to form hybrid subgenres, such as the melding of horror and comedy in the Evil Dead films. Other popular combinations include the action comedy film. Alan Williams distinguishes three main genre categories: avant-garde and documentary. Genre movies are "commercial feature films which, through repetition and variation, tell familiar stories with familiar characters and familiar situations". Genre affects how films are broadcast on television and organized in video rental stores. Films can be classified by the setting, topic, format, target audience or budget; the setting is the environment where the action take place. The theme or topic refers to the concepts that the film revolves around; the mood is the emotional tone of the film. Format refers to the manner of presentation. Additional ways of categorizing film genres may involve the target audience or by type of production.
Genre does not just refer to the type of its category. Genres are not fixed; the term "genre" was used to organize films according to type since the earliest days of cinema. By the 1950s, André Bazin was discussing the concept of "genre" by using the Western film as an example. In the late 1960s, the concept of genre became a significant part of film theory. Film genres draw on genres from other forms; the perceived genre of a film can change over time. A key reason that the early Hollywood industrial system from the 1920s to the 1950s favoured genre films is that in "Hollywood's industrial mode of production, genre movies are dependable products" to market to audiences, they are easy to produce and it is easy for audiences to understand a genre film. In the 1920s to 1950s, genre films had clear conventions and iconography, such as the heavy coats worn by gangsters in films like Little Caesar; the conventions in genre films enable filmmakers to create them in an industrial, assembly line fashion, an approach which can be seen in the James Bond spy films, which all use a formula of "lots of action, fancy gadgets, beautiful woman and colourful villains" though the actors and screenwriters changed.
Films are purely from one genre, in keeping with the cinema's diverse and derivative origins, it being a blend of "vaudeville, music-hall, photography" and novels. American film historian Janet Staiger states; the "idealist method" judges films by predetermined standards. The "empirical method" identifies the genre of a film by comparing it to a list of films deemed to fall within a certain genre; the apriori method uses common generic elements. The "social conventions" method of identifying the genre of a film is based on the accepted cultural consensus within society. Martin Loop contends that Hollywood films are not pure genres because most Hollywood movies blend the love-oriented plot of the romance genre with other genres. Jim Colins claims that since the 1980s, Hollywood films have been influenced by the trend towards "ironic hybridization", in which directors combine elements from different genres, as with the Western/science fiction mix in Back to the Future Part III. Many films cross into multiple genres.
Susan Hayward states that spy films cross genre boundaries with thriller films. Some genre films ta
Animated cartoon
An animated cartoon is a film for the cinema, television or computer screen, made using sequential drawings, as opposed to animation in general, which include films made using clay, puppets, 3D modeling and other means. Animated cartoons are still created for entertainment, commercial and personal purposes. Early examples of attempts to capture the phenomenon of motion into a still drawing can be found in paleolithic cave paintings, where animals are depicted with multiple legs in superimposed positions attempting to convey the perception of motion. A 5,200-year old pottery bowl discovered in Shahr-e Sukhteh, has five sequential images painted around it that seem to show phases of a goat leaping up to nip at a tree; the phenakistoscope and praxinoscope, as well as the common flip book, were early animation devices to produce movement from sequential drawings using technological means, but did not develop further until the advent of motion picture film. The first person to make animated movies was a French science teacher named, Charles-Emile Reynaud.
The first animated projection was created in France, by Charles-Émile Reynaud, a French science teacher. Reynaud created the Praxinoscope in 1877 and the Théâtre Optique in December 1888. On 28 October 1892, he projected the first animation in public, Pauvre Pierrot, at the Musée Grévin in Paris; this film is notable as the first known instance of film perforations being used. His films were not drawn directly onto the transparent strip. In 1900, more than 500,000 people had attended these screenings; the first animated projection was Humorous Phases of Funny Faces by newspaper cartoonist J. Stuart Blackton, one of the co-founders of the Vitagraph Company arrived. In the film, a cartoonist's line drawings of two faces were'animated' on a blackboard; the two faces smiled and winked, the cigar-smoking man blew smoke in the lady's face. The first animated projection in the traditional sense was Fantasmagorie by the French director Émile Cohl in 1908; this was followed by two more films, Le Cauchemar du fantoche and Un Drame chez les fantoches, all completed in 1908.
One of the first successful animated cartoons was Gertie the Dinosaur by Winsor McCay. It is considered the first example of true character animation. At first, animated cartoons were silent. Felix the Cat and Oswald the Lucky Rabbit are notable examples. From the 1920s to 1960s, theatrical cartoons were produced in huge numbers, shown before a feature film in a movie theater. Disney, Warner Bros. MGM, UPA were the largest studios producing these 5- to 10-minute "shorts." Other studios included Walter Lantz, DePatie-Freleng, Van Beuren Studios, ComiColor Cartoons, Charles Mintz Studios, Famous Studios, Terrytoons. The first cartoon to use a soundtrack was in 1926 with Max Fleischer's My Old Kentucky Home; however the Fleischers used a De Forest sound system and the sound was not synchronized with the film. Walt Disney's 1928 cartoon Steamboat Willie starring Mickey Mouse was the first to use a click track during the recording session, which produced better synchronism. "Mickey Mousing" became a term for any movie action, synchronized with music.
The music used is original most of the time, but musical quotation is employed. Animated characters performed the action in "loops," i.e. drawings were repeated over and over. Although other producers had made films earlier using 2-strip color, Disney produced the first cartoon in 3-strip Technicolor and Trees, in 1932. Technicians at the Fleischer studio invented rotoscoping, in which animators trace live action in order to make animation look more realistic. However, rotoscoping made the animation look stiff and the technique was used more for studying human and animal movement, rather than directly tracing and copying filmed movements. Other movie technologies were adapted for use in animation, such as multiplane cameras with The Old Mill, stereophonic sound in Fantasia, widescreen processes with the feature-length Lady and the Tramp, 3D with Lumber Jack-Rabbit. Today, traditional animation is aided by computers in certain areas; this gives the animator new tools not available. In 1917, Italian-Argentine cartoonist Quirino Cristiani created the first animated feature made, El Apóstol, utilizing cutout animation.
In 1937, Disney created the first sound and color animated feature film, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. The name "animated cartoon" is not used when referring to full-length animated productions, since the term more or less implies a "short." Huge numbers of animated feature films were, are still, produced. Competition from television drew audiences away from movie theaters in the late 1950s, the theatrical cartoon began its decline. Tod
Videography
Videography refers to the process of capturing moving images on electronic media and streaming media. The term includes methods of video post-production, it could be considered the video equivalent of cinematography. The advent of digital video recording in the late 20th century blurred the distinction between videography and cinematography, as in both methods the intermittent mechanism became the same. Nowadays, any video work outside commercial motion picture production could be called videography; the arrival of computers and the Internet in the 1980s created a global environment where videography covered many more fields than just shooting video with a camera, including digital animation, web streaming, video blogging, still slideshows, remote sensing, spatial imaging, medical imaging, security camera imaging, in general the production of most bitmap and vector based assets. As the field progresses, videographers may produce their assets on a computer without involving an imaging device, using software-driven solutions.
Moreover, the concept of sociability and privacy are being reformed by the proliferation of cell-phone, surveillance video, or Action-cameras, which are spreading at an exceptional rate globally. A videographer may be the actual camera operator or they may be the person in charge of the visual design of a production. In social sciences, videography refers to a specific research method of video analysis, that combines ethnography with the recording of sequences of interaction that are analysed in details with methods developed on the basis of conversation analysis. One of the best known application is in workplace studies. Event videography Institute of Videography Underwater videography Video production Wedding videography Knoblauch H, Tuma R Videography: an interpretive approach to video-recorded micro-social interaction. In: Margolis E. Pauwels L; the Sage Handbook of Visual Methods. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 414–430
Video game
A video game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface to generate visual feedback on a two- or three-dimensional video display device such as a TV screen, virtual reality headset or computer monitor. Since the 1980s, video games have become an important part of the entertainment industry, whether they are a form of art is a matter of dispute; the electronic systems used to play video games are called platforms. Video games are developed and released for one or several platforms and may not be available on others. Specialized platforms such as arcade games, which present the game in a large coin-operated chassis, were common in the 1980s in video arcades, but declined in popularity as other, more affordable platforms became available; these include dedicated devices such as video game consoles, as well as general-purpose computers like a laptop, desktop or handheld computing devices. The input device used for games, the game controller, varies across platforms. Common controllers include gamepads, mouse devices, the touchscreens of mobile devices, or a person's body, using a Kinect sensor.
Players view the game on a display device such as a television or computer monitor or sometimes on virtual reality head-mounted display goggles. There are game sound effects and voice actor lines which come from loudspeakers or headphones; some games in the 2000s include haptic, vibration-creating effects, force feedback peripherals and virtual reality headsets. In the 2010s, the commercial importance of the video game industry is increasing; the emerging Asian markets and mobile games on smartphones in particular are driving the growth of the industry. As of 2015, video games generated sales of US$74 billion annually worldwide, were the third-largest segment in the U. S. entertainment market, behind broadcast and cable TV. Early games used interactive electronic devices with various display formats; the earliest example is from 1947—a "Cathode ray tube Amusement Device" was filed for a patent on 25 January 1947, by Thomas T. Goldsmith Jr. and Estle Ray Mann, issued on 14 December 1948, as U. S.
Patent 2455992. Inspired by radar display technology, it consisted of an analog device that allowed a user to control a vector-drawn dot on the screen to simulate a missile being fired at targets, which were drawings fixed to the screen. Other early examples include: The Nimrod computer at the 1951 Festival of Britain; each game used different means of display: NIMROD used a panel of lights to play the game of Nim, OXO used a graphical display to play tic-tac-toe Tennis for Two used an oscilloscope to display a side view of a tennis court, Spacewar! used the DEC PDP-1's vector display to have two spaceships battle each other. In 1971, Computer Space, created by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney, was the first commercially sold, coin-operated video game, it used a black-and-white television for its display, the computer system was made of 74 series TTL chips. The game was featured in the 1973 science fiction film Soylent Green. Computer Space was followed in 1972 by the first home console. Modeled after a late 1960s prototype console developed by Ralph H. Baer called the "Brown Box", it used a standard television.
These were followed by two versions of Atari's Pong. The commercial success of Pong led numerous other companies to develop Pong clones and their own systems, spawning the video game industry. A flood of Pong clones led to the video game crash of 1977, which came to an end with the mainstream success of Taito's 1978 shooter game Space Invaders, marking the beginning of the golden age of arcade video games and inspiring dozens of manufacturers to enter the market; the game inspired arcade machines to become prevalent in mainstream locations such as shopping malls, traditional storefronts and convenience stores. The game became the subject of numerous articles and stories on television and in newspapers and magazines, establishing video gaming as a growing mainstream hobby. Space Invaders was soon licensed for the Atari VCS, becoming the first "killer app" and quadrupling the console's sales; this helped Atari recover from their earlier losses, in turn the Atari VCS revived the home video game market during the second generation of consoles, up until the North American video game crash of 1983.
The home video game industry was revitalized shortly afterwards by the widespread success of the Nintendo Entertainment System, which marked a shift in the dominance of the video game industry from the United States to Japan during the third generation of consoles. A number of video game developers emerged in Britain in the early 1980s; the term "platform" refers to the specific combination of electronic components or computer hardware which, in conjunction with software, allows a video game to operate. The term "system" is commonly used; the distinctions below are not always clear and there may be games that bridge one or more platforms. In addition to laptop/desktop computers and mobile devices, there are other devices which have the ability to play games but are not video game machines, such as PDAs and graphing calculators. In common use a "PC game" refers to a form of media that involves a player interacting with a personal computer conne
Christian film industry
The Christian film industry is an umbrella term for films containing a Christian themed message or moral, produced by Christian filmmakers to a Christian audience, films produced by non-Christians with Christian audiences in mind. They are interdenominational films, but can be films targeting a specific denomination of Christianity. Popular mainstream studio productions of films with strong Christian messages or Biblical stories, like Ben-Hur, The Ten Commandments, The Passion of the Christ, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, The Book of Eli, Machine Gun Preacher and Silence, are not part of the Christian film industry, being more agnostic about their audiences' religious beliefs; these films also have a much higher budget, production values and better known film stars, are received more favourably with film critics. Many films from the Christian film industry are produced by confessing Christians in independent companies targeting a Christian audience; this has been on the rise since the success of Sherwood Pictures' Fireproof, the highest grossing independent film of 2008.
The success of Fireproof may have been due in part to a door opened by the box office success of The Passion of the Christ. Before the invention of the movie projector, European audiences gathered in darkened rooms to watch magic lantern presentations. Catholic priest Athanasius Kircher promoted the magic lantern by publishing the book Ars Magna Lucis et Umbrae in 1680. Controversy soon followed as priests and masons used the lanterns "to persuade followers of their ability to control both the forces of darkness and enlightenment" and temperance groups used the lanterns to fight alcoholism. In the 1800s, missionaries such as David Livingston used the lanterns to present the Gospel in Africa. After movie theaters emerged, magic lanterns disappeared from the public. Throughout the late 19th and into the 20th century, there was much dispute among Christians as to "Christian film". Many thought motion picture was creating a graven image, shunned having anything to do with the film industry. Through the years, many Christians began to utilize motion picture for their own purposes.
Herbert Booth, as part of the Salvation Army, claimed to be the first user of film for the cause of Christianity, in 1899. The Protestant Church encouraged film from the early 20th century, with Congregational minister, the Reverend Herbert Jump writing his influential pamphlet, The Religious Possibilities of the Motion Pictures, in 1910. By the 1940s a renaissance of Christian filmmaking occurred as recorded by Andrew Quicke and Terry Lindvall in Celluloid Sermons: The Emergence of the Christian Film Industry, 1930-1986, the sequel to Sanctuary Cinema. In the 1940s, Christian film libraries emerged. Christian businessmen interested in renting audio visual materials started libraries to rent films to churches. Harvey W. Marks started the Visual Aid Center in 1945. Circa 1968, Harry Bristow launched Christian Cinema in a small theater in the Germantown area of Philadelphia, in the early'70s, the ministry moved to a theater in Ambler, Pennsylvania. Christian Cinema operated a movie theater that showed only Christian films, but closed down in the mid 1990s.
The growth of Christian film libraries led to the Christian Film Distributors Association being formed in 1974. The CFDA began holding a conference each year for Christian distributors; the Christian Film and Video Association gave out Crown Awards for films that "gloried Jesus Christ."In 1949 Ken Anderson, editor for a Youth for Christ magazine, decided to form a small Christian film studio. An old shut-down dancehall was purchased and moved onto some donated land to become the first home for Gospel Films, which grew into the largest Christian film distributor. Seeing the potential of Christian films, the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association created World Wide Pictures as a subsidiary in 1951 to produce and distribute Christian films. Throughout the'50s and'60s Christian films were produced with increasing professionalism and ads for Christian films appeared in magazines such as Christianity Today. A year earlier, the Protestant Film Commission began a series of non-theatrical feature films intended for rental to churches and other, related organizations.
Chapel Films, servicing Catholic interests with feature and short subjects dated back to the 1930s. Since The Great Commandment opened in movie theaters in 1941, many Christian filmmakers have attempted to pursue theatrical releases. World Wide Pictures was a pioneer in partnering with churches to bring Christian films to the cinema. Gateway Films was "formed with the express purpose of communicating the Christian Gospel in the secular motion picture theaters" and released The Cross and the Switchblade in 1972. In 1979, the Jesus film appeared in theaters across the United States; this film, based on the Gospel of Luke, was made for $6 million by Campus Crusade for Christ. Many Christian films have been released to theaters since that time, such as The Omega Code, Megiddo: The Omega Code 2, Jonah: A VeggieTales Movie, The Passion of the Christ, Facing the Giants, The Ultimate Gift, Amazing Grace, The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything: A VeggieTales Movie, The Secrets of Jonathan Sperry, To Save a Life, Preacher's Kid, Letters to God, What If...
The Grace Card, Soul Surfer, October Baby, Home Run, Grace Unplugged, I'm in Love with a Church Girl, Son of God, God's
Julie Andrews
Dame Julie Andrews, is an English actress and author. Andrews, a child actress and singer, appeared in the West End in 1948 and made her Broadway debut in The Boy Friend. Billed as “Britain’s youngest prima donna”, she rose to prominence starring in Broadway musicals such as My Fair Lady playing Eliza Doolittle, Camelot playing Queen Guinevere. In 1957, Andrews starred in the premiere of Rodgers and Hammerstein's written-for-television musical Cinderella, a live, network broadcast seen by over 100 million viewers. Andrews made her feature film debut in Mary Poppins, won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in the title role, she starred in The Sound of Music, playing Maria von Trapp, won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Motion Picture Comedy or Musical. Between 1964 and 1986, she starred in The Americanization of Emily, Torn Curtain, Thoroughly Modern Millie, Star!, The Tamarind Seed, 10, Victor/Victoria, That's Life! and Duet for One. In 2000, Andrews was made a Dame by Queen Elizabeth II for services to the performing arts.
In 2002, she was ranked #59 in the BBC's poll of the 100 Greatest Britons. In 2003, she revisited her first Broadway success, this time as a stage director, with a revival of The Boy Friend. From 2001 to 2004, Andrews starred in The Princess Diaries and The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement. From 2004 to 2010, she lent her voice to the Shrek animated films and Despicable Me. Andrews has won an Academy Award, a BAFTA, five Golden Globes, three Grammys, two Emmys, the Screen Actors Guild Lifetime Achievement Award, the Kennedy Center Honors Award, the Disney Legends Award. Apart from her musical career, she is an author of children's books and has published an autobiography, Home: A Memoir of My Early Years. Julia Elizabeth Wells was born on 1 October 1935 in Walton-on-Thames, England, her mother, Barbara Ward Wells was born in Chertsey and married Edward Charles "Ted" Wells, a teacher of metalwork and woodwork in 1932. However, Andrews was conceived as a result of an affair. Andrews discovered her true parentage from her mother in 1950, although it was not publicly disclosed until her 2008 autobiography.
With the outbreak of World War II, Barbara and Ted Wells went their separate ways and were soon divorced. Each remarried: Barbara to Ted Andrews, in 1943, Ted Wells in 1944, to Winifred Maud Birkhead, a war widow and former hairstylist working a lathe at a war work factory that employed them both in Hinchley Wood, Surrey. Ted Wells assisted with evacuating children to Surrey during the Blitz, while Barbara joined Ted Andrews in entertaining the troops through the Entertainments National Service Association. Andrews lived with Ted Wells and her brother John in Surrey. In 1940, Ted Wells sent young Julia to live with her mother and stepfather, who the elder Wells thought would be better able to provide for his talented daughter's artistic training. According to her 2008 autobiography Home, while Julie had been used to calling Ted Andrews "Uncle Ted", her mother suggested it would be more appropriate to refer to her stepfather as "Pop", while her father remained "Dad" or "Daddy" to her. Julie disliked this change.
The Andrews family was "very poor and we lived in a bad slum area of London," Andrews recalled, adding, "That was a black period in my life." According to Andrews, her stepfather was violent and an alcoholic. Ted Andrews twice, while drunk, tried to get into bed with his stepdaughter, resulting in Andrews fitting a lock on her door; as the stage career of Ted and Barbara Andrews improved, they were able to afford to move to better surroundings, first to Beckenham and as the war ended, back to the Andrews' hometown of Hersham. The Andrews family took up residence at the Old Meuse, in West Grove, Hersham, a house where Andrews' maternal grandmother had served as a maid. Andrews' stepfather sponsored lessons for her, first at the Cone-Ripman School, an independent arts educational school in London with concert soprano and voice instructor Madame Lilian Stiles-Allen. "She had an enormous influence on me", Andrews said of Stiles-Allen, adding, "She was my third mother – I've got more mothers and fathers than anyone in the world."
In her memoir Julie Andrews – My Star Pupil, Stiles-Allen records, "The range and tone of Julie's voice amazed me... she had possessed the rare gift of absolute pitch", though Andrews herself refutes this in her 2008 autobiography Home. According to Andrews, "Madame was sure that I could do Mozart and Rossini, but, to be honest, I never was". Of her own voice, she says, "I had a pure, thin voice, a four-octave range – dogs would come from miles around." After Cone-Ripman School, Andrews continued her academic education at the nearby Woodbrook School, a local state school in Beckenham. Beginning in 1945, for the next two years, Julie Andrews performed spontaneously and unbilled on stage with her parents. "Then came the day when I was told I must go to bed in the afternoon because I was going to be allowed to sing with Mummy and Pop in the evening," Andrews explained. She would stand on a beer crate to sing into the microphone, sometimes a solo or as a duet with her stepfather, while her mother played piano.
"It must have been ghastly, but it seemed to go down all right."Julie Andrews gained her big break when her stepfather introduced her to Val Parnell, whose Moss Empires controlled prominent venues in London. Andrews made her professional solo debut at the London Hippodrome singing the difficult aria "J
