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26 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
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Genre |
French word that refers to a kind, type, or category of a particular phenomenon or thing. In cinema, it's a term that is used to designate various categories of motion picture production. |
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melodrama |
a term coined by Jean-Jacques Rousseau in 1770 that means a drama accompanied by music |
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royal monopoly |
primary theater groups that were granted exclusive rights to stage verbal dramas by companies that were officially approved, like Comedie Francaise |
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what were theatre groups, not part of the royal monopoly, restricted to? |
nonverbal dramatic forms like juggling, acrobats, ballets, puppet shows, and pantomimes |
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when did the "verbal monopoly" end? |
After the French Revolution (1789) |
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Francois Delsarte |
French scholar who recorded and catalogued melodrama's sign language or system of gestures and hand movements |
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melodramatic speech |
the ability to communicate ideas and feelings without dialogue |
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3 types of Melodrama |
melodramatic mode moral phenomenon democratic virtue |
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the melodrama |
a film that features conventional character types and formulaic plot patterns presented in a melodramatic way |
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Moral Phenomenon |
Family and feelings are the common denominator to which all melodramas ultimately return. Melodrama appeals to the middle-class. One definition of melodrama is "domestic tragedy". |
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Democratic Virtue |
Classical tragedy, seen as elitist, died in the 1800's with Racine whereas 19th century melodrama has an individualistic view on the universe |
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In melodramas, _______ empowers the ______; ______, the ______. |
virtue, hero; evil, villain |
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Melodrama is used as a tool of _______. |
reform |
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Which novel helped to transform the theater into a popular forum for the discussion of social issues? |
Harriet Beecher Stowe's antislavery narrative Uncle Tom's Cabin. |
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Popular melodrama helped to shape American character, expressing the American temperament, preaching American ideologies, and embodying American aesthetic principles. |
True |
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Given its associations with the French Revolution and its popular appeal in the U.S., the melodrama was often identified as what? |
a tool of revolutionary change |
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Marxists spoke in the language of what? |
class conflict -- the capitalist exploitation of the working classes |
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Populists spoke in the language of what? |
universal, heartfelt truths that all Americans supposedly understood and respected (ie. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation 1925) |
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Griffith's populist silent melodramas spoke on behalf of _________. |
19th century agrarianism. His films looked back to an earlier, more utopian, preindustrial past that was threatened by the forces of modernism. |
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What film tells the story of a speculator buying up all the wheat and artificially driving up the price of flour, ignoring the plight of the urban poor? |
Griffith's A Corner in Wheat (1909) |
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What film was made to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the end of the Civil War? |
Griffith's The Birth of a Nation (1915) |
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What negative aspects of the populist mythology were revealed in The Birth of a Nation? |
racism, anti-intellectualism, paranoia, religious fundamentalism |
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What is the main difference between Griffith's heroes and Vidor's heroes in their respective melodramas? |
Griffith's heroes possess "agency", they have the power to decide the outcome while Vidor's heroes, like John in The Crowd, have unpredictable and uncontrollable fortunes or misfortunes. |
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everyman vs. no man |
a man in and of the crowd vs. a nobody whose identity, goals, and desires are given to him by others rather than stemming from his own inner needs |
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In general, the film melodrama conveyed either ____________ or ____________ toward modern times. |
open hostility or profound ambivalence |
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The introduction of sound to film had what effect on the the melodramatic style? |
melodramatism was demoted to an inferior dialect within a new, more realistic system of communication and signification. |
