Great Train Robbery Lecture & Discussion
On the Set
In this lesson, we’ll be covering the technological basics of moviemaking: light, and the lenses that capture and control it; filmstock, which records the light; and the camera that exposes the stock. After that, we’ll take an initial look at the source of that light—the subjects in front of the camera—and talk a little about the relationship between the subjects and the technology. Finally, we’ll spend a few minutes discussing the categories, or genres, we use to organize different types of subject matter.
In Lesson 2, we laid the foundations for understanding this technology. Now, let’s investigate the technology itself before moving on, in Lesson 4, to examine the philosophy of moving pictures and the movie techniques, such as montage and mise-en-scène, that the technology enables filmmakers to create.
Most of the topics covered in this lesson could apply just as well to stage drama as to film. The singular difference between the two is the technology of the camera (including its lens and the filmstock on which the image is recorded). This was the key that greatly expanded the possibilities of the theatrical stage.
Lights! (and Lenses)
As you’ve hopefully gleaned from the reading for this lesson, film is about painting with light. The emotional force of the light and shadow in a film frame is at least as great as in still photos or paintings.
Lighting is the most underrated element of the film art—perhaps because its history extends back before film into 19th-century theatre. Sir Goldsworthy Gurney invented the “limelight” in the 1820s. Its extraordinarily intense white light (produced by burning lime in an oxygen-hydrogen flame) revolutionized theatrical production as it replaced the old-fashioned oil lamp. Theatergoers in London in the 1820s and 1830s were probably more shocked by limelight than moviegoers of the 1930s were by Technicolor or audiences of the 1950s were by Cinerama.
Before limelight, the only function of theatrical lighting was to provide a modicum of illumination so that audiences could see what was happening on the stage. After limelight, theatrical lighting became an art. For the first time, a producer or director could modify our sense of the staged scene through lighting.
This was the seed from which movies would grow.
But the earliest filmstocks required more intense light than even Gurney’s limelight could provide. So, for the first few years, movies were shot in bright daylight. Thomas Edison built the Black Maria to move the set so that it stayed correctly lit by the traveling sun.
The invention of the carbon-arc lamp allowed movies to come back indoors, and by the late 1910s and early 1920s, filmmakers were intent on building cavernous indoor stages where they could control all aspects of the lighting and escape the tyranny of nature’s sun. (They weren’t yet called “soundstages”—but they soon would be.)
If you asked the average moviegoer what a cinematographer does, she’d probably reply, “He runs the camera.” But running the camera is the easy part of the job. Lighting the set and the scene is where the art comes in. Indeed, in the UK, the cinematographer is still referred to as the “Lighting Cameraman”—in other words, the cameraman who is in charge of lighting is the boss.
Classic Hollywood style calls for three main sources of light on the set: key, back, and fill. The main light is the key light. The back light illuminates the background. The fill light fills in areas where the key light is weak. But the number of combinations of this trio is infinite, and cinematographers are still devising ways to orchestrate their lights more than 100 years after it all began. (You’ll read more about lighting schemes and the specific applications of these lights later in the course.)
The other key job for a cinematographer is to choose the lens. If you aren’t yet clear about the striking difference between the images captured by telephoto, normal, and wide-angle lenses, please take another look at the diagrams in your book on p. 81.
Lights, lenses, and filmstock are interlocked in an intimate triangle. It’s all about light, but the light that you can use depends on the ability of the lens to transmit it and the stock to record it. As lenses improved (mainly after 1960) and filmstocks increased their speed, whole new styles of lighting were opened up for filmmakers to exploit. For example, the less light you need (because you have faster filmstocks and lenses), the easier it is to capture fast-moving action. Alternatively, you can use this extra capability either to shoot your subject more naturally (because you don’t need very bright key lights) or to increase your depth of field (because you can open up your lens further).
The key example here is probably Kubrick’s Barry Lyndon (1975). Kubrick, always the technophile, used a unique lens developed for NASA to shoot a scene by the light of a few candles. His aim was to re-create the feel of the 18th century. With that NASA lens, he could have shot the film 200 years ago before the invention of the limelight.
You are probably yawning. “Who doesn’t shoot their kid’s birthday party using ‘the light of a few candles’?!” Yes, for the last 20 years or so, everyone can do this. But 30 years ago, it was a cinematographer’s feat equivalent to flying to the moon (which actually happened earlier). If you are going to appreciate film history before the 1980s, it is important to understand how difficult this was at the time and how great was the thirst for light throughout the first 90 years of film history.
The art of lighting a film depends heavily on the technology of lenses. As that technology has improved, the “palette” of artistic techniques that a cinematographer wields has grown considerably.
Camera! (and Filmstock)
Just as important as the lights and the lenses are the camera and the filmstock that runs through it. The basic mechanism of a film camera hasn’t changed for a hundred years. What has changed is its size. Size—or portability—is the key evolutionary factor in the history of the camera.
The earliest cameras were portable enough to be set up quickly outdoors to capture reality scenes (or staged scenes) in full sunlight. Early filmmakers needed bright sun because they had slow filmstock. With the advent of sound (coupled with the advancement of lens technology), movies moved indoors for an extended stay. Filmmakers, at this time, needed the controlled environment of the soundstage. The huge Mitchell camera dominated the films of the 1930s and 1940s. Moving it was difficult, time-consuming, and expensive.
By the late 1950s, handheld cameras like the Arriflex and the 16-mm Bolex had arrived on the scene. These had originally been developed to shoot news footage on the go, but feature filmmakers immediately saw that the cameras would have advantages for their purposes as well. Once again, moviemakers moved outdoors and now the camera (which controls our point of view) was free to fly. Instead of constructing a railroad of tracks to move a heavy Mitchell, filmmakers could now put the cameraman with the Arriflex in a wheelchair and “track” with ease.
The next important development for the camera involved not its size but the way it was mounted. Garrett Brown’s invention of the Steadicam was revolutionary. Now, the camera could track the subject with the same freedom that the human cameraman had. (Brown’s other invention, the Skycam, is equally revolutionary, but has found far fewer applications.)
As the camera was evolving, so was the film that it exposed. We moved from orthochromatic to panchromatic, from nitrate to acetate, from black-and-white to three-strip Technicolor to one-strip Eastmancolor (an evolution that was tracked in detail in your reading for this lesson). All the while, the speed of the filmstock was increasing, allowing filmmakers increasing freedom in lighting and lens choices.
The seismic shift in camera and film technology took place in the late 1990s, when electronic digital cinematography finally came of age. The lenses and lights are the same for digital cinema—the camera and “filmstock” are radically different.
Most filmmakers still prefer the quality and range of the analog mechanical-chemical system that has pertained for more than 100 years. Analog film still has the edge in dynamic contrast range, color, and tone. But the handwriting is on the wall. The future is electronic and digital.
Interestingly, the political ramifications of digital cinema are more important than the artistic potential of this new medium. For a feature filmmaker, shooting digitally mainly means you get to see dailies earlier (moments after the shot) and you have to be more careful with your lighting (because digital cameras are more sensitive). But digital cinema also allows us to shrink the size of the camera by another magnitude or two. Now, a camera can be almost invisible. And it allows us to multiply the number of pictures we record. The result is that no one is safe from being photographed, anytime, anywhere. Think about that. The button on the lamp in your hotel room might be recording your every move. You have no way to know.
Artistically, digital cinema is just about on par with analog. But, in terms of its ability to capture life, undetected, digital cinema is light years ahead of analog filmmaking. It’s easy to see some of its applications―documentary filmmaking, hidden camera shows, and reality TV. But even more uses will be uncovered by inventive filmmakers as time goes on and technology evolves even further.
Action! (and Dialogue)
Most films are about people. For the moment, forget all the wonderful tricks you can perform with lighting and lenses, cameras and filmstock. The bottom line is people: the way they look, the way they move, and (since sound was applied to film) the way they speak. One of the keys to capturing this lies in the relationship between director and actor.
The director of a film has to deal with the cast as well as the crew. As you might expect, there are some directors who are known for their effective work with actors―and other directors who think that “actors should be treated like cattle” (as Alfred Hitchcock once—jokingly?—said).
John Ford and John Wayne were almost partners, making more than 20 films together: Stagecoach (1939), The Quiet Man (1952), The Searchers (1956), and Donovan’s Reef (1963) among them. It’s hard to think of one John without the other.
More recently, Christopher Guest has made a series of remarkable “actor’s movies”―Waiting for Guffman (1996), Best in Show (2000), and A Mighty Wind (2003)—gentle satires that have a uniquely modern ring to them. Although Guest is credited as director and writer, he’s made clear that these films are communal efforts of his small band of actors. The model for this style was This Is Spinal Tap (1984), a rock mockumentary written by Guest but directed by Rob Reiner. Reiner is another “actor’s director” (as are most actors-turned-directors!).
On the other hand, there are the Hitchcocks, the Kubricks, the Antonionis: directors whose interest lies more with the camera than with the cast in front of it, who are more excited by a new light or type of filmstock than by working with fresh new talent.
After many years spent on the advancement of technology, the world of filmmaking is returning now, full circle, to the world delineated by staged drama: the way actors look, the way they move, the way they speak. One of the roles of the director is to coax these elements, these performances, out of the actors. Their other role is to find the best, most effective way to capture those elements on film. These are the essential dramatic factors, along with the set.
It’s so important for directors and actors to hit the mark on capturing looks, movements, and lines, because film greatly magnifies these dramatic elements. A “look” that is 20 feet high is a portrait beyond the reach of Michelangelo or Rembrandt. The power of a movement is multiplied when it can be intercut, and repeated from different angles. Because it is recorded and infinitely reproducible, dialogue in film is raised to an iconic level.
The celebratory anthologies of the 1970s and after (such as That’s Entertainment [1974], which summarized 70 years of film history) were powerful scrapbooks of looks, movements, and speeches. These films evoked our nostalgia, not with wide-angle shots, highkey lighting, or “calendar montages,” but with the human stuff of film that happens in front of the camera.
These are the nuggets of movies that stick with us, together with the stories and the settings. For hundreds of years, theatre had concentrated on dialogue offered against simple, abstract settings. Theatrical audiences were too far away from the actors to appreciate all but the most exaggerated movements and looks. (Notice that we still call them “audiences,” not “viewers.”)
Film brought audiences up close (and personal). Now, for the first time, theatrical excitement could be generated by looks, gestures, and simple movements as well as by dialogue. And almost as important, the scenery was real. In fact, there is a whole class of documentary (the travelogue) that depends entirely on scenery. Film takes us to strange places. Then it shows us interesting faces and bodies, doing and saying interesting things.
In theatrical theory, the term for these interesting looks and movements is “gest” (the root of “gesture,” pronounced “guest”). Bertolt Brecht, among others, developed elaborate theories of the “gest” in the early 20th century.
We remember dialogue first:
I’ll be back … Of all the gin mills … I have a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore … Rosebud! … D’oh! … Top o’ the world, Ma! … Just singin’ in the rain … Not that there’s anything wrong with that … Dave! I can feel it! … Frankly, Scarlet … Make my day.
If these snippets don’t resonate with you, you can probably come up with a massive list of your own. The point is that if all existing filmstock suddenly turned to dust, we would still remember the great movies for their words. Film is, in part, a literary medium.
But it is much more. We also remember the “gests”:
- John Wayne clasping his arm in The Searchers
- Audrey Hepburn turning her back to dress in Breakfast at Tiffany’s
- Lillian Gish’s longing gaze in Broken Blossoms
- Elizabeth Taylor’s voluptuous look in Cleopatra
- Dustin Hoffman’s drag in Tootsie
- Renée Zellweger’s pout in Chicago
You get the idea. Now, enlarge the look to the movement:
- Robert DeNiro’s turn in Taxi Driver (“You talkin’ to me?!”)
- Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers dancing in any of their movies
- Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper riding down the road on their motorcycles in Easy Rider
- The space station revolving around the earth in 2001
- Kramer’s slapstick entrances into Jerry’s apartment in Seinfeld
- Laurence Olivier demanding homage in Richard III
In fact, there’s no better way to understand how movies work than to keep your own notebook listing notable bits of dialogue, looks, actions, gestures, and backgrounds. That’s what it is all about.
When he was editor of the magazine Movietone News in the 1970s, critic Richard Jameson would compile annual lists of his favorite bits of dialogue, looks, gestures, movements, and the like. He called these “moments out of time.” You could say that these lists truly were the distilled essence of film criticism. It’s memories of the little things that nourish film fans the world over.
Style! (and Genre)
Put all these elements together—lights, lenses, camera, stock, action, and dialogue—and the results will often be different. Focus on the scenery and you have a western, like The Great Train Robbery. Focus on the lighting and you have a downbeat film noir, or maybe a horror film. If it is movement that obsesses you, well, you’re making a musical. These types are called genres: films that share certain characteristics with their siblings.
Of course there’s a lot more to genres than the way the basic elements of film technique are emphasized. You need more than just scenery for a western: cowboy hats are probably just as necessary! And just because scenery dominates your film doesn’t mean it’s a western—road films are dominated by scenery, too. But then, aren’t road films sort of like modern westerns—a celebration of the countryside? Is Thelma and Louise that much different from Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid? How about Midnight Cowboy? They are all buddy films with significant road-film and western elements.
Genre is beyond the scope of this course. But you should be aware of these basic patterns. You should also take note that genres are just that―patterns, not rules. As the examples above demonstrate so well, great films are often genre mixtures and are difficult to categorize.
There are two basic stylistic approaches to film; you are either a realist or an expressionist. These artistic styles long predate the movies but they have informed film history for 100 years. Either you are fascinated with the power of film to capture reality (like the Lumière brothers) or you are attracted by the power of film to create imaginary worlds (like Georges Méliès).
Beyond that basic differentiation, there are numerous patterns that we refer to as genres. You know a western when you see one, and obviously a movie with a lot of songs is a musical, and a scary movie is a horror film. But a film noir may not be so easy to distinguish. That’s a downbeat movie with dark lighting. Many film noirs are also detective movies. So you see that genres can mix and meld.
The important point to remember is that over the last hundred years, numerous styles of filmmaking have developed and every new film has to be viewed through the prism of that spectrum of styles. But it is the tools―lighting and lenses, camera and stock, action and dialogue―that, when combined with the editing we will discuss in the next lesson, provide filmmakers with the ability to create such a vast range of styles.
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