8mm Forum: One Frame of Film

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Topic: One Frame of Film

Richard Bock
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 239
From: El Cerrito,CA,USA
Registered: Jan 2010

posted June 27, 2013 09:31 AM

I like to take still shots of films I project. In particular DW Griffith's pictures. There is something satisfying in the pursuit because I get to study how Griffith achieved what he did. Last night I was looking at my stills and saw this one from Griffiths' House of Darkness which I have in a Standard 8mm Blackhawk print.

The short film is about a demented sick mentally ill man who is threateningly violent through no fault of his own. He is placed in an institution. The shot is compelling. I noticed the tangled web on the right side filling the majority of the frame and the man peering off on the far left. Truly a masterful setup that is both frightening and tells a story all at the same time.

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Joe Caruso
Film God

Posts: 4105
From: USA
Registered: Jun 2003

posted June 27, 2013 11:14 AM

I have this too, there really should be an accurate study on Griffith, via TCM or even by us - Shorty

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Osi Osgood
Film God

Posts: 10204
From: Mountian Home, ID.
Registered: Jul 2005

posted June 27, 2013 01:12 PM

It's a shame that Griffith was "marginalized" in the public view due to "Birth Of A Nation" (another great film) and these days, sadly, he's not looked at by most critics as the brilliant director he was, but instead, as some kind of racist.

Brilliant director and in my view, the first true artist of the "celluloid age"!

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"All these moments will be lost in time, just like ... tears, in the rain. "

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Akshay Nanjangud
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 637
From: Dallas, TX
Registered: Nov 2011

posted June 27, 2013 01:38 PM

Orson Welles said, "I have never really hated Hollywood except for its treatment of D. W. Griffith. No town, no industry, no profession, no art form owes so much to a single man."

I also remember reading somewhere that Hitchcock had similar things to say about Griffith. Just can't find it now.

[ June 27, 2013, 05:08 PM: Message edited by: Akshay Nanjangud ]

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Adrian Winchester
Film God

Posts: 2941
From: Croydon, London, UK
Registered: Aug 2004

posted June 27, 2013 03:37 PM

Richard - interesting post and a nice photo. If you photographed that while projecting Std 8 on a screen, it's a remarkably good result.

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Adrian Winchester

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Tom Photiou
Film God

Posts: 4837
From: Plymouth U.K
Registered: Dec 2003

posted June 27, 2013 05:04 PM

Osi i completley agree, your country and ours has got so ridiculous you only have to say the wrong phrase and your branded racist sexist or homophobic, D W is one of the pionerring directors of all time, one movie,(and a great one) and certain groups shout and moan and he becomes a racist, what crap. Where will this PC crap ever end? So much for free speech and expression. Good job we still have these films to view the way they were intended.

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Richard Bock
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 239
From: El Cerrito,CA,USA
Registered: Jan 2010

posted June 27, 2013 11:36 PM

Osi and Tom-people like to put artists in categories because the artist has moved them or upset them on some level so they need to label it to make themselves feel comfortable. Griffith defies categorizing. He was the first great film director. And he certainly was not an overt racist. He grew up in the south. Take a look at how blacks are portrayed in some of his earlier films. They are trapped by the circumstances they found themselves in. The central character in His Trust shows a former slave as the central character and as the hero of the film.

Akshay-yes I read that quote recently from Hitchcock. He said that we all owe homage to Dw Griffith, that is our source. Something along those lines.

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