Close Up (Mar-Dec 1931)

Page scan 000255 from Close Up

Record Details:

Title:
Close Up
Date:
Mar-Dec 1931
Publisher:
[London, etc., Pool]
Volume:
Close up ... devoted to the art of films
Leaf #:
000255
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 UP 241 Recently a group zvith M. de Mire as director, and Messrs. Lucas and Lachowski as cameramen, spent three months in the regions of Mont Blanc to turn a film of skiing and ivinter climbing. Nozv being mounted, it bears the provisional title, " Snow." Une equipe composee de M. de Mire, metteur en scene, MM. Lucas et Lachowski, operateurs, est demeuree recemment trois mois dans la region du Mont-Blanc pour tourner une bande relative a I'alpinisme hivernal et au ski. Actuellement termini et monte, ce film porte le nom provisoire de " Neige." Kurzlich verbrachte einen Gruppe mit M. de Mire als dem Regisseur und den Herren Lucas und Lachow ski als den Kameraleuten 3 Monate in Mont-Blanc-Gebiet, urn einen Ski und Eistout en-Film zu drehen. Nun, nach der Montage, tragt er den vorlaufigen Titel " Schnee." Decor. Two ways are open to the cineaste. Either he must go to reality for it, or he can ignore it altogether. The first alternative was adopted by the Russians, the second by Dreyer in Joan of Arc. The value, however, of a film like the Niebelungen saga is not to be denied. The fault of Lang and Company lies in their assumption that pictorial beauty could by itself bring artistic liberation to the film. But there is no reason why pictorial composition should not be of value to the film, though it mav not be indispensable to it. Beware of theory ! It so often fails to square with the facts ! The author deals soberly and necessarily somewhat briefly with the film in its social aspect, and has some interesting comments to make on the present tendency of the film artist to concentrate on the documentary film. The spielfilm belongs to a later more developed stage of cinematography, one which it has not yet reached. The book deserves consideration not only for what it gives and for what it promises, but also because it may verv well be that the chief contribution of Holland to the cinema, in spite of Ivens, Franken, Ankersmit, lies precisely in the field of criticism.