Close-Up (Mar-Dec 1933)

Record Details:

Title:
Close-Up
Date:
Mar-Dec 1933
Publisher:
[London, etc., Pool]
Volume:
Close up ... devoted to the art of films
Leaf #:
00088
Language:
English
Subjects:
motion pictures, Motion pictures -- Periodicals
Collection:
Switzerland, Global Cinema, and Early 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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80 CLOSE UP Machine, with a reel showing Lottie Collins dancing " Ta-ra-ra-boomde-ay " ; Lumiere's combined projector, printer and camera; and among many instruments and machines which seemed no more than toys, with their rolls of painted figures, their mirrors, and lantern slides, such a thing as " Life in the Lantern," described in the catalogue as " a later development of the Bio-Phantoscope," which is " historically of the utmost imp'ortance," for Friese-Greene, the inventor of practical commercial cinematography, used it at his Piccadilly shop, causing such crowds that the police ordered its removal. This is "a vertical copper lamp-house, having fixed about its outer surface a gallerv carrving seven photographic lantern slides, showing Rudge apparently taking his head off his bodv and placing it under his arm ." This was the first example of trick photography in the world. Round these relics, the latest cameras, projectors, and lenses. There was a strip of the first film in the world made of an endless celluloid band: many other strips of early film, too, including a two-colour positive of 1898. These would have gained had they been better exhibited. There was also a piece of paper film, soaked in castor oil to make it transparent-period 1885, but complete with perforated margins and toothed sprockets. One could peer through glass cases at the first film review of the first display of moving pictures ; at old playbills, and programmes of early demonstrations, photos of Friese-Greene's first studio, prints .... these were from the Gardener Collection. The others, naturallv, from Will Day's. Upstairs a displav of stills from the world's familiar best films. Most interest attached to the Japanese. It was worth while to see how many men had to work, in how many wavs, before the cinema that we know was evolved. It was interesting to speculate why this and not that method proved fruitful, and to wonder what would have happened had men of vision equal to the inventors' been at hand to use the three marvels that ultimately supplanted Chorentoscope and Heliocinographe — projector, camera, and screen. R. H. PUBLICITY AGAIN. " And still the pensive spring returns And still the punctual snow." Yes, these are genuine extracts from publicity sheets issued by the leading companies ! Men are paid to sit in offices and compose this dope for film critics ! NUMBER ONE. " Mr. X wants atmosphere. So, working on Y, African story of sleeping sickness, he appeared in the following : One cork helmet, one tunic, one pair of shorts, one pair high leather boots. If it had been anyone but a director — well?" We suggest if it had been a publicity agent ....