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 #:
000164
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 then they are taught to approve of war stuff in most schools. Has Wings some hidden meaning to which even a psychological student cannot penetrate? Or are they afraid that small boys may purloin aeroplanes to escape another term at school ? In Germany you may take your child to Buster Keaton or to The Dangers of Ignorance, and nothing much between. In Switzerland you can take a child to anything provided it is accompanied by a parent : otherwise it cannot go alone until over fifteen unless it is labelled a programme de famille. This, incidentally, I feel is the ideal arrangement. In England everything is censored in order to conform with what a certain group considers wholesome for children. Now I am very doubtful if the cinema in any of its forms is responsible for much harm. It cannot be more harmful than the average daily Press nor the average education. Of course, there are a lot of films that one would prefer a child not to see ; just as there are bad forms of any art that one prefers they should escape if possible. But I would run the risk of their seeing any film I know of to date, rather than that some absurd system of censorship should bar them from the films that matter — from Mother, from Jeanne Ney, and others in that category. But these would be the first to be barred under a policy of restriction. Once a child is fourteen in mental age there is no reason why it should not see any film : particularly, if I could, I would see they went to films such as Joyless Street and Bett und Sofa, For children under fourteen care, if necessary, not from any point of view that their morals might be damaged, but because many great films treat of subjects outside their 18