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 #:
000450
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 ica do cut their own films. The others don't. The principle is unparalleled, but only about twice as preposterous as leaving the compositor to decide what parts of your book he will and will not print. This being the rule in America (and I have too an article for you next month on how American pictures are made) there is nothing to be said. The director has nothing to do but direct. Naturally he won't want to fight for more work. With us in Europe it is difl^erent. The only real creative work in film making, namely cutting (and incidentally the most exhausting) is done in America by a paid staff. If the director has aimed at subtle effects (he hasn't, but let us suppose) nobody in the cutting room is hkely to know it. I want you to read the articles on Pabst this month which will show you how cutting should be done, and indeed how films must be made if they are to be anything but "ordinary programme features". When Pabst emerged finally from the cutting room he brought with him a perfect work of art with Joyless^ Street and now with Die Liehe Der Jeanne Ney. Each was individual, complete ; each was Pabst. There remained and now remains for the censors and their confederates war dances, tomahawks, and all the unpunishable offences. Kenneth Macpherson. i6