Word: abstraction
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...they are supposed to do, and yet his actors are known to prefer their roles in his films more than others. But to make non-directing an asset is extremely difficult. It demands not only a strong intuitive sense of the potentials of the actors, but also a clear abstract idea of what is wanted from them. Many established directors-Godard, Bunuel, Bresson-feel at a disadvantage using name actors, since they tend to have preconceived ideas of what they are supposed to do and therefore lack spontancity and authenticity...
...values are inherently material. That is why, for example, we have come to laugh at religion. Religion seems to fulfill no role in the market-place or its mirror in the mind, the arena of rational discourse. Religious ritual can be important only to those who need to have abstract, transcendent belief acted out on a concrete level. For those without the need religion is without purpose. I am Jewish, but I can not watch the Communion or the Elevation without feeling my spirit begin to escape. It is all the better, when the service is in Latin...
After analyzing one film this way, one can usually apply one's conclusions to a director's other works. Hitchcock, however, tailors his shooting style to each film. One can't even abstract a typical Hitchcock shot that shows how his characters fit into his world. His dramatic structures are just as varied. A strict analysis cannot attempt any more than a one by-one description of his films...
...these explicit qualities: their latest songs are casually, almost sloppily, put together, composed of elements that are determinedly unadventurous and unpretentious to the point of seeming derivative. So why do we nevertheless like the Beatles so extravagantly? It is worth, I think, the effort to try and understand the abstract roots of the Beatles' superiority, a superiority that is evident from beginning to end of Abbey Road...
What the four stories do have in common on an abstract level is an extraordinary sensitivity to social setting, so that the deaths ending three of them carry a huge sense of social downfall and unite personal with common tragedy. Griffith opens each story with mass scenes revealing the heart of each society-an elite ball and a company dance in modern times, the wedding at Cana for the Biblica lera. His portrayal of each society is entirely different in dramatic action and shooting style; a unique flavor of each way of life reaches the viewer. Each character is completely...