Close Up (Jan-Jun 1930)

Page scan 000206 from Close Up

Record Details:

Title:
Close Up
Date:
Jan-Jun 1930
Publisher:
[London, etc., Pool]
Volume:
Close up ... devoted to the art of films
Leaf #:
000206
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:
June 20, 2024
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CLOSE LP eye not yet sufficiently educated to revolt from the inanities for the most part filling the screen. Through the medium of words such' films become so aggressively stupid that protest is inevitable. False complications will disappear, realistic opulence, serving onlv tc disguise povertv of imagination, will stand self-condemned. Only the other day I chanced upon a performance admirably illustrating my contention. A showing of Man Rav's last film, Le Mystere du Chateau du De and of L n Chien Andalou by the young Spanish producer Louis Bunuel, was preceded by a Harold Lloyd comedy dating from the time when he was a beginner. But the ingenuity of his ideas and discoveries by far outdoes anything to be found in these new films whose only excuse is an occasional felicitv in their setting. This little old picture was a condensed witticism. Its star had something to express. The stars of to-day are content with trying to stagger us. Man Ray has unloaded his single noveltv. He is an amiable fantasist who doubtless greatly enjoys exhibiting his virtuosity, who tries to dazzle us with his photographic ingenuities and is satisfied when he has demonstrated, bv means of literary sub-titles, that he has heard all about what is called idea or scenario. It is not a great matter and one mav pass an agreeable hour watching these cleverly arranged photos. Louis Bunuel's first film, Le Chien Andalou, is of a different brand. It is the representation of a waking dream, forcefully and intelligently constructed. From the beginning of the first short reel a warmth, at once brutal and admirable, emanates from the chosen images and remains throughout the whole performance, which reveals moreover in the 138