Exam 3 Chapter 6 A short history of the movies - Eadweard Muybridge o Racehorse Experiment(1877) - Thomas Edison o Oversaw development of kinetoscope - Louis and Auguste Lumiere (France) o Cinematograph- a combined camera and projection system o December 28, 1895- first public movies shown with technology o Led to Edison’s Vitascope - George Melies o A Trip to the Moon (1902) - Edwin S. Porter o The Great Train Robbery (1903) - Explosion of nickelodeons and factory studios between 1905 and 1908 - D.W. Griffith o The Birth of a Nation (1915)  Cost $125,000  3 hours long and admission was $3  Created a significant buzz and gave D.W. a name for himself  Intolerance- bomb - This failure led to a change in funding by studios. They realized they cant just invest thousands of dollars in a movie because of the possibility of it being a bust. - Thomas Edison formed the Motion Picture Patents Company (the Trust) in 1908 (based in New Jersey) o The Trust was pretty much the governing body of all motion pictures, ideas and patents o Help virtually all movie-making patents o Control - Independent filmmakers move to Southern California o Many advantages to “Hollywood”  Weather  Space  Scenery- beach, desert, mountains, ect. - Trust broken up in 1917, essentially replaced with the Hollywood movie system o Factory-like production of movies o The studio owned everything- sets, technology, contracts to the actresses/actors/ screen writers, ect. o Vertical integration  Control of production, actors, distribution and sometimes theatres - Monopoly that bypassed the government for about 20 yearsChange comes to Hollywood - The Talkies o Don Juan(1926)- synchronized sound o The Jazz Singer(1927)- sound and speaking scenes o Lights of New York(1928) 1. Made musicals possible 2. Performance improved 3. Made production more complicated and expensive - 1930- 90 million moviegoers per week - By 1940, Hollywood was producing 76% of all U.S. movies, collecting 86% of total box office - Scandal o What was the impact of movies on culture? o Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks, Fatty Arbuckle o Hollywood responded, creating MPPDA in 1922  Headed by Will H. Hays  1934- MPPC released- imposed strict rules on movie content - Hollywood survives the Great Depression o Creatively  Displayed their movies differently, adjusted prices, scaled back movie distribution o Size, power, and operating model of the industry - Television- a fierce competitor o CONVENIENT - Paramount Decision o Supreme Court ended the studios’ hold over the industry o Block Booking- - Red Scare and the Hollywood Ten (1947) o Investigations of communist ties of Hollywood  Conducted by the House of Unamerican Activites Committee (HUAC)  Names were named; eventually 10 were subpoenaed  9 screenwriters, 1 director refused to testify, held in contempt of congress and jailed - All were blacklisted after being released from jail - Refused to sell old features and movies to television (a missed opportunity) - Innovation o Greater attention to special effects and over-the-top sets and star filled cast o The Ten Commandments (1956) and Spartacus Scope and Nature of the Film Industry - 1946- peak of ticket sales (4 billion sold) o (difference b/w 1946 and 2011= ticket sales! Huge deal back then but not such a big deal anymore. There are more ways to make money on movies than just ticket sales now) Only 1.4 billion in 2008 - Production o About 900 movies produced in the U.S. annually o Technology can have positive and negative effects o Cost of average Hollywood film is $100 Million - Distribution o Advertising and promotion equals 50% of the production budget o Promotional representatives have major role in green light process (the decision to make the film or not) - Exhibition o Over 38,000 movie screens in the U.S.  Half owned by the studios, the majority of the remainder owned by chains - Studios o Major studios and their partners account for 80-90% of annual box office revenue o Remainder comes from independent studios Trends and convergence in moviemaking - Blockbuster mentality- filmmaking characterized by reduced risk taking and a formulated approach - Business concerns are more important than artistic ones - Concept films- movies than can be described in one line - Audience research o Allows studios to test plot, character and even different endings o - Franchise films- films produced with the intent of future sequels - Merchandise tie-ins- toy and product tie-ins equal about 2 billion for studios each year - Convergence reshapes the movie business o 70% of studio production is for TV o 1947- ticket sales accounted for 95% of studios revenues, today is less than 20% o Profits obtained through DVD sales o Microcinema- used digital cameras and common software to produce movies o Changes in distribution (Netflix and Apple TV) and production (Digital is the standard by 2015) o Simultaneous, multiple platform release (theatre, DVD and cable video demand all at once) Chapter 7 Radio, Recording, and popular music A short history of radio and sound recording - Guglielmo Marconi o Father of radio o Moved from Italy to England to work on radio research- Reginald Fessenden o Invented the liquid barretter- a device that permitted reception of wireless voices o 1906- Christmas Eve- broadcast music and poetry - Lee Deforest o Invented the Audian tube, a device that improved and amplified wireless signals o Had the idea of radio broadcasting, instead of radio as just a tool for ship-to-ship and ship-to-shore communication - Early sound recording o 1977- Thomas Edison patented the phonograph o Rotating cylinder powered by hand crank (had drawbacks though) - Emile Berliner o Develops gramophone in 1887 o Utilized flat disks that rotated o Disks could be copied o One of the first to come up with royalties (% of $ when an artists song is played) o Also developed microphone and helped import European recordings into U.S. - Two sided disks developed by Colombia Phonograph Company The Beginnings of broadcasting - David Sarnoff o Saw the radio as entertaining and useful o American Marconi employee o Wrote the “radio music box memo” in 1961 - U.S. military takes control over all radio