Lecture Notes

CTCS 200
11.22.10

I. Working in the Studio System: Howard Hawks & The Big Sleep (1946)
A. Warner Bros., studio
B. Hawks-Feldman Productions, independent production company
C. Howard Hawks, director
1. Exceptional case in studio system, as many of the great directors of the
era were, with autonomy granted by clauses and contracts
2. Worked in multiple genres: war films, screwball comedy, gangsters --
typical
3. Independent productions
4. Worked for multiple studios: Columbia, RKO, MGM, etc.
a. Short-term contracts, often overlapping
b. More freedom in properties, writers, talent available to him
c. Also let him be more demanding in frequent contract
renegotiations
5. Directs Sergeant York (1941) for Warner Bros. (Jesse Lasky Prod.)
6. Forms independent production company (Hawks-Feldman) -- deal with
WB (financing and distribution) -- To Have and Have Not (1945), first film
a. Hawks: directorʼs salary, control over production, 50% of net
profits
b. Hawks-Feldman Production co.
c. Stars: Bogart (& Bacall)
D. Humphrey Bogart & Lauren Bacall, stars
1. Bogart
a. 7 year option-contract with WB
b. Starring roles in B-movie productions or co-starring or lesser
roles in major productions
c. Both Hawks and producer seeking to work with him
d. Breakthrough roles: High Sierra (1940), The Maltese Falcon
(1941), Casablanca (1942) -- studio exec at WB more proactive in
promoting him than his agent or himself
e. New contract in 1942: salary increase, stronger increase on
roles, and less productions
2. Bacall
a. Film debut in To Have and Have Not (1945)
b. Signed to Hawks-Feldman Company (later sell company to WB)
c. Confidential Agent (1945) immediately follows To Have and Have
Not -- film and her performance receive terrible reviews
E. Charles Feldman, agent to Hawks & Bacall
1. Not only represents the artists but collaborates, with vested interest in
the artistic quality of the production
2. Goes into rescue mode after Confidential Agent, felt The Big Sleep
would also receive terrible reviews
 3. Letter to Jack Warner -- protecting his client and appealing to interests
of Warner, and the scenes were indeed reshot (ie horse racing dialogue)
F. Raymond Chandler, and the screenwriters
G. Individual artists & systems of support:
1. Studio: production budget, marketing, distribution, exhibition
2. Other artists (collaborators)
3. Ancillary participants: agents, etc.
H. Could argue that after WWII, with resurrection of number of national film
industries, their relationship to Hollywood changes
1. Respect of French film critics and filmmakers for Hollywood
2. Inspiration of American films for Japanese filmmakers
3. Classical Hollywood film style as international film style and language
4. Rise of art cinema in 1950s, Hollywood plays role as counter-object, by
which national film movements define themselves
5. French New Wave elevates Hollywood filmmakers to new degree
6. Bordwell: 1960s, the return of modernism
a. But in the 1920s all the arts experienced the phase
b. Not all the areas align historically in this pattern
c. Mixture of modernist elements of filmmaking with Hollywood
generic conventions
I. Difference between studio system and true machine-like production is that
some level of distinction/difference is desired in products, even in attempts to
replicate previous success
1. Genre and stars ways of indicating commercial success
2. On the other hand, studio system provides tremendous resources for
individual artists, craftsmen who can only contribute to your production
and are contractually guaranteed to do so
II. The Big Sleep & Classical Hollywood style
A. Hawks does play around with style with expressionist lighting, fast dialogue,
long takes
B. But still adheres to classical Hollywood narrative style -- repeating information
for audience
1. Yet film is notoriously convoluted
2. Rumor that Raymond Chandler himself didnʼt remember key event
III. Film noir
A. Origins of term
1. France: Occupation 1940-1944
2. Liberation of France, August 1944
a. Flood American film imports
b. Raymond Borde & Etienne Chaumeton, Panorama du film noir
americain, 1941-1953
c. A French invention to define a trend in American films
i. Darkening in subject matter and visual style
ii. Expressionistic dimension
B. Double Indemnity clip
 1. Barbara Stanwyck as femme fatale -- draws protagonist into scheming,
murderous web or tragic narrative
a. But most of the characters in this film are already breaching a
moral line
b. Here with a pre-existing insurance scheme
c. An untrustworthy world, can only rely on the individual
d. Alienated individualism
2. Domestic drama in which ordinary individuals become involved in crime
C. Noir influences
1. Literary
a. Dashiell Hammett, The Maltese Falcon
b. Raymond Chandler, James Cain, Double Indemnity and The
Postman Always Rings Twice
c. American literature: William Faulkner, Ernest Hemingway, Horace
McCoy
2. Cinematic
a. German Expressionist films: distorted effects created by lighting,
setting, and the use of shadows to reflect inner turmoil and
alienation
b. German directors: Fritz Lang, Billy Wilder, Robert Siodmak, Otto
Preminger, Douglas Sirk, Max Ophuls -- all produce noir films in
America
D. 1951: debut issue of influential french film journal Cahiers du Cinema