Close Up (Jul-Dec 1928)

Record Details:

Title:
Close Up
Date:
Jul-Dec 1928
Publisher:
[London, etc., Pool]
Volume:
Close up ... devoted to the art of films
Leaf #:
000147
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:
July 25, 2024
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CLOSE UP Denissa have very kindly shown me some of the best lilms I have yet seen. I am to see more this coming week, so cannot comment on them in this issue, though I will in the next, so will limit myself to two as yet unrealeased films, Der Sohn {The Son) and Das Dorf der Sunde (The Village of Sin), The latter, made by a woman director, Olga Preobrashenskaja, is non-political, but sociological, and (partly because I prefer sociology to poHtics) gives me almost greater delight than any of the others. I want you to remember the name, because it is without question a film that could and should be shown everywhere. I shall hope to give stills next month, and full information about it, and will content myself now by saying only that here is a fihii that every woman and everv thoughtful man will acclaim. It states the case for women, for children, for decent laws and decent education as only a woman could have done it. Beyond this, Olga Preobrashenskaja has great power and poetry. Her exteriors, taken on panchromatic stock, have never been equalled. Here is peasant life, and here is corn. Corn blowing, waving, she has it from every angle, near and far. It is a great ethereal sea, with crisp, swift waves. Its beauty is indescribable. Her technique is strong, her types well chosen and never over-emphasised. I do hope that CAose Up readers will have the opportunity to see this film. Der Sohn, with Anna Sten, is less good, but still a remarkable and beautiful film. Anna vSten has never been so good. The story is intellectual, and intellectually conceived and intellectuallv directed. We will have more to say of this also, but space for the moment forbids. Der Gelbe Pass is also not so good. It has moments of great beauty, and J. 9