Close Up (Jul-Nov 1927)

Record Details:

Title:
Close Up
Date:
Jul-Nov 1927
Publisher:
[London, etc., Pool]
Volume:
Close up ... devoted to the art of films
Leaf #:
00055
Language:
English
Subjects:
motion pictures, Motion pictures -- Periodicals
Collection:
Switzerland, Early Cinema, and Global Cinema
Format:
Periodicals
Contributor:
Library of Congress, MBRS, Moving Image Section
Sponsor:
Library of Congress, Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division
Coordinator:
Media History Digital Library
Description:
As an active film magazine, CLOSE UP lasted only a short time, from 1927 to 1933. Yet the legacy of this English-language periodical, which was published in Switzerland, continues to matter. Edited by Bryher and her husband Kenneth Macpherson, CLOSE UP became THE magazine for energetic debates about the nature of cinema and manifestos imagining new forms of filmmaking and spectatorship. The magazine published articles by filmmakers, such as Sergei Eisenstein, and female literary modernists, such as H.D. and Gertrude Stein. As film scholar Anne Friedberg explains in the anthology CLOSE-UP, 1927-1933: CINEMA & MODERNISM, 'CLOSE UP became the model for a certain type of writing about film -- writing that was theoretically astute, politically incisive, critical of films that were simply 'entertainment.' For six and a half years, CLOSE UP maintained a forum for a broad variety of ideas about the cinema; it never advocated a single direction of development, but rather posed alternatives to existing modes of production, consumption, and film style.' Like Friedberg's own writing, CLOSE UP continues to be essential reading for anyone interested in the history of film and media theory. -- Eric Hoyt, 2014
Date Added:
August 29, 2022
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CLOSE UP cry of pain. I believe they are trying to domesticate the lion in America, — especially for films and circuses. This is better, but a tame lion looks tame. The Metro-Goldwyn trade mark would feed out of your hand ! Lions were better treated, and made more convincing in that much slated film The Wizard of Oz, with Larry Semon. They were beautiful beasts, and there were several excellent close-ups. Bears and tigers are never given their due. But again, they are of uncertain temper, as is also the leopard. Camels again are overlooked. Their attitudes, many of their habits would commend them both for comic and serious films, but one only sees them occasionally carrying i\rabs. Some goo.d pictures of an elephant appeared in the Desert Healer w4th Mr. Walter Pidgeon, in which he was most effectively ^'killed'', but this is the only elephant part I remember having seen. Zebras and kangaroos would be excellent, provided they were studied, but the only thing so far has been a film with zebras in a chariot. Sealions, beloved of circuses, which can be very highly trained, and would be excellent for comedy, or childrens' (or for that matter adults') educational films, but strangely, nobody seems to have thought of them as yet. Monkeys, having been plentiful, have been done both badly and well. There was one very well treated in an earlier Harold Lloyd film, and also some good studies of a cat looking for its kittens. Some close-ups of this cat's face were taken, and the expressions were marvellous. I wonder why more animals are not treated 43