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Close Up (Mar-Dec 1932)

Page scan 000146 from Close Up

Record Details:

Title:
Close Up
Date:
Mar-Dec 1932
Publisher:
[London, etc., Pool]
Volume:
Close up ... devoted to the art of films
Leaf #:
000146
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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136 CLOSE UP geographical or scientific reasons. This is at present impossible owing to the high rate of duty. We suggest that all those who are interested in the development of the cinema in schools should write, expressing their views upon the urgent necessity of getting duty on educational films abolished, either to the British Cultural and Educational Films Committee, or to the International Educational Cinematographic Institute, Villa Medioevale Torlonia, Via Lazzaro, Spallanzani, Rome, Italy. W.B. Several readers of Close Up wrote to congratulate Mr. Plicka on the first English showing of a portion of his film dealing with childrens' games by the Film Society, a short time ago. Mr. Plicka has now written to us in astonishment for details, being unaware that there was any project for showing his film in England. He supposes that the portion shown was a section omitted from his complete eight reel film. On the Mountains and In the Valleys, dealing with boys' games in Carpathian Russia. This part was very old, it was entirely re-photographed on pan-chromatic stock and the former inferior version was withdrawn from the picture. Mr. Plicka was very gratified at the interest shown in his work, but being himself a musician, he had wished to withhold the film until the soundversion upon which he is now working, was completed. He had wished himself to call the film Earth is Singing, but the provisional title of On the Mountains and In the Valleys is so firmly established it was impossible to change it. He has always desired to give to the pictorial and plastic values of a film the musical line, and is very anxious to know how his film was accompanied, musically, in London. At present he has sent three reels, to be shown silent, to the International Film exhibition in Florence.' The portion shown in England had been given by Mr. Plicka to the Ministry for Foreign afi^airs in his native country. There would seem to have been a misunderstanding somewhere, but one fortunately without grave consequences. As however, it is one of the disadvantages of film work that the director of a film seldom knows what happens to his picture, once it has left the studio, we are printing Mr. Plicka's explanation. We are sure that the fragm.ent already shown will have no influence adversely upon the presentation of Mr. Plicka's full length film later in England. ACADEMY OF MOTION PICTURE ARTS AND SCIENCES The new Uniform Aperture for Camera and Projector sponsored by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences was adopted to insure that the entire picture placed upon the film by the cinematographer reaches the theatre screen. The advent of sound to motion picture brought serious problems in