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 #:
000210
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:
November 07, 2023
Something wrong or inaccurate about this page? Let us Know!

Thanks for helping us continually improve the quality of the Lantern search engine for all of our users! We have millions of scanned pages, so user reports are incredibly helpful for us to identify places where we can improve and update the metadata.

Please describe the issue below, and click "Submit" to send your comments to our team! If you'd prefer, you can also send us an email to mhdl@commarts.wisc.edu with your comments.




We use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) during our scanning and processing workflow to make the content of each page searchable. You can view the automatically generated text below as well as copy and paste individual pieces of text to quote in your own work.

Text recognition is never 100% accurate. Many parts of the scanned page may not be reflected in the OCR text output, including: images, page layout, certain fonts or handwriting.

198 CLOSE UP peoples mistakes. There is an amazing scene when he realises that his class, the old ruling class, is doomed. He is a survival of that class, but pathetically strives to avoid the inevitable social extermination. " What is to become of us? his mother asks him. " Don't ask me, ask Lenin ; he knows everything," is the reply. " I suppose I shall have to beg for alms in the name of Christ — no, in the name of Karl Marx, otherwise I shan't get any." Skvortzov's job, apart from his work in the factory, is to give technical training to young workers. Ironicallv enough it is one of his own pupils who discovers the mistake in the plans, and so Skvortzov is exposed and arrested. The last reel of Counter Plan, when the turbine is ready for testing, provides one of the finest instances of the dramatic use of sound we have seen. The machine is started ; the volume of sound swells and swells ; the workers tense with excitement, stand round ; the noise becomes ever greater as danger point is reached ; the whole screen seems readv to explode in our faces, and then, at the critical moment the boom of the machine is changed to a steady, musical hum, signifying success. The workers surge round the machine, cheering. Sitting apart, ignored by everyone, is Skvortzov, applauding hysterically. He who tried so miserably to turn back the wheels of history shivers pathetically, alone and forgotten, while the workers sing a song of victory. Yutkevich and Ermler are described as belonging to the "Stalin" school. Stalin insisted upon the creation of real people in Soviet art, and the directors have successfully followed this advice. The characters in Counter Plan are real people. To borrow the phrase of the publicity sheets, we see Russians as they are and not as they ought to be. We must add that the photography is superb. A sequence shewing two lovers walking through one of Leningrad's " White Nights " is a veritable masterpiece of camera work. The one big fault of Counter Plan is its inordinate length and occasional slowness of development, indicating a certain carelessness in the construction of the scenario. We understand that this fault is recognised and that the English copy will be cut to a more workable length prior to any public presentation. Ralph Bond. MEDICAL FILMS When the March issue was already in the press, we received Kodak's new catalogue of Medical Motion Pictures. We should like to record our appreciation of this achievement — a catalogue of 234 pages with index. Anatomy; Case records; Dentistry; Ear, Nose and Throat; First Aid; Neurology ; Obstetrics and Gynaecology ; Ophthalmic ; Orthopaedic : Physiology; Public Health Lectures ; Radium and Rav Therapv ; Research ;