week 4

Films: Vampyr (Carl Theodor Dreyer, 1932)

The Vanishing Lady (Georges Melies, 1896)

Le Melomane (Georges Melies, 1903)

El Hotel Electrico (Segundo De Chomon, 1908)

Reading Due:  

 1. Tom Gunning, “Now You See It, Now You Don’t”: The Temporality of the Cinema of Attractions (TSCR)

2. “Approaches to Early Cinema” (EC) 

This week's film Vampyr (Carl Theodor Dreyer, 1932) was an interesting one. Adding on the past week's discussion about how silent films have the ability to add narrative through visuals, I found a hard time doing that with this film. This mostly silent film had great visuals, great sound effects, but I still had a difficult time distinguishing between a dream and reality. The film makes great use of shadows and imagery to give the viewers a distorted, dreamlike feel.  

It seems like whenever the film is shot from inside the house, the visuals are pretty clear to make out but once it shot from outside the house, the visuals are blurry and hazy. This is most likely done intentionally to challenge the viewers perception of if these actions are actually taking place. I think this film really goes in hand with the reading on the cinema of attraction (even though this film comes after that time period), how early weren't focused on telling a story but rather to give the viewers something shocking to see. Vampyr (Carl Theodor Dreyer, 1932) in addition to the other small clips that we saw takes a nonlinear approach to narration and introduces spectacle through experimental film.