Country Gees

It was the 1930s, largely due to the escape of artists and intellectuals from Nazi Germany, that provided Hollywood with a bevy of top-notch directors who would make a decisive contribution to making US cinema the most popular form of entertainment in the entire world. world. The Thirties, however, are notable for an event of even greater importance: the large-scale consolidation of sound cinema. The invention of the soundtrack did nothing but enhance the components that had made US cinema the leading show on a planetary scale: the reality effect of amazing adventures, overwhelming passions, breathtaking pursuits intensified so as to make cinema (or at least of narrative cinema) a sort of ante litteram virtual reality, an articulated and credible alternative universe, enough to provide the most sensitive and dreamers with an unprecedented dream refuge. It was not for nothing that a prose narrative was born in that decade that took Hollywood at its center, and desperate people obsessed with beauty and success as their protagonists (a title for all: The day of the locust by N. West, published in 1939). In short, the sound came to attribute to Hollywood products a verisimilitude and credibility such as to unleash a sort of psychopathology, obviously fueled by the terrible conditions in which the whole country had fallen due to the Great Crisis and the Depression. and desperate people obsessed with beauty and success as their protagonists (a title for all: The day of the locust by N. West, published in 1939). In short, the sound came to attribute to Hollywood products a verisimilitude and credibility such as to unleash a sort of psychopathology, obviously fueled by the terrible conditions in which the whole country had fallen due to the Great Crisis and the Depression. and desperate people obsessed with beauty and success as their protagonists (a title for all: The day of the locust by N. West, published in 1939). In short, the sound came to attribute to Hollywood products a verisimilitude and credibility such as to unleash a sort of psychopathology, obviously fueled by the terrible conditions in which the whole country had fallen due to the Great Crisis and the Depression.

It was inevitable that US cinema would then develop in two opposite directions: the direction of stronger and more marked social realism, with films that described the precarious conditions of large sections of the population and the pervasiveness of the underworld in the social fabric (and of which the gangster film marked the apex) and the direction of the absolute rejection of that reality in favor of an enchanted world made of elegance, beauty, wealth, which to some extent referred to the carefree previous decade (the roaring Twenties, ‘the roaring twenties’) and that on the screen materialized above all in the musical, a genre that at the time saw the triumph of the couple Fred Astaire / Ginger Rogers.

In more than one musical signed (or choreographed) by Busby Berkeley, a convergence of the two opposite directions can be observed (e.g. the economic difficulties that the Depression caused to the staging of a theatrical musical show in 42nd street, 1933, Forty-second street, by Lloyd Bacon), but it was still the spell of music, dance, song that featured as the protagonist of the various films. Furthermore, the Berkeleyan choreographies opened a path – theoretical as well as practical – of extreme importance in the history of American cinema, since for the first time the camera, regardless of any verisimilitude, gloriously ‘broke through’ the original theatrical space for to attribute to cinema its role as a means not only and not so much of the reproduction of reality, but also and above all of the creation of new universes and dimensions. The sound revolution caused not a few dramas to those, actors and workers, who were unable to adapt to it. But it also brought about the concentration of power in the hands of some producers. Laemmle bought Universal, Harry Cohn ran Columbia Pictures Corporation like a tyrant, movie theater owner Marc Loew joined Samuel Goldwyn to renovate the studios of the young Metro Goldwyn Mayer, the four Warner brothers, former butchers, dominated the cinema socially inspired. In those years a rigid division of labor brought a very high ratio of professionalism in the individual sectors of specialization. In a certain sense this consideration can also be applied to actors, that the production houses classified and used in relation to physical type and character. The Thirties were essentially the period in which US cinema stabilized and perfected its assets, immeasurably expanding a star system in which world stars shone in every single production and were exchanged for a game of sales, purchases and loans at dizzying figures.. The refinement and stabilization operation, however, also included the ever more precise focusing of the purchases and loans at dizzying figures. The refinement and stabilization operation, however, also included the ever more precise focusing of the purchases and loans at dizzying figures. The refinement and stabilization operation, however, also included the ever more precise focusing of the film genres, and also the expansion of their casuistry. Traditionally attributed to this decade, for example, is the birth of the screwball comedy – a kind of crazy comedy with a dizzying pace in which the saturnine qualities and the capricious determination of the characters prevailed over the logic of the circumstances – which coincided with the release of the award-winning It happened one night (1934; Accadde una notte) by Frank Capra, although Howard Hawks stood out in this genre (as in many others), with titles such as Twentieth century (1934; Twentieth century) and Bringing up baby (1938; Susanna!).

The Thirties, however, boast the greatest masters in the history of that cinema, from the inimitable hand of E. Lubitsch in comedy to that of King Vidor and Frank Borzage in melodrama.. However, while the comedy mocked the Depression in its own way by staging the exploits of gentlemen thieves and spoiled young billionaires, the drama found itself in a difficult position to deal with the subject by pretending to neglect it: in other words, to confront it metaphorically. And the American screens were filled with noble doctors who underwent very hard sacrifices, sad sentimental stories, frustrations in the face of the difficulties of life, and overall a vision of the world that overshadowed the difficult moment experienced by the country. In some rare cases the theme was approached in a more directly recognizable way, as in the courageous defense and celebration of an experiment in rural collectivism, Our daily bread (1934; Our daily bread) by Vidor, which did not report any success with the public. Conceived as a documentary, it was nevertheless a work of fiction and consequently could only disappoint an audience that in cinema was looking for a temporary parenthesis from the distress of reality, which had been largely confined to the context of the documentary., a genre much encouraged by the New Deal launched in 1929 by President FD Roosevelt’s administration.

Overall, therefore, it is not surprising that much of the dramatic production of the period focused on themes and places that were often exotic and in any case foreign to contemporary national reality: Wuthering heights (1939; The voice in the storm) and Jezebel (1938; Daughter of the wind), both by William Wyler, Camille (1937; Margherita Gautier) by George Cukor, Queen Christina (1933; Queen Christina) and Becky Sharp (1935), both by Rouben Mamoulian, almost all production by Cecil B. DeMille and J. von Sternberg testify well, albeit in different ways and connected to the personalities of their authors, that the public asked the cinema to suspend its potential interest in the America of the time, to open a door to more or less fantastic worlds., always alternative to the real one. And when even the real world had forcefully pressed to enter the screens, it was still transformed into a moment of the past, as in the famous case of Gone with the wind (1939; Gone with the wind) by Victor Fleming. For this reason, the adventure film, the seafaring story, the swashbuckling epic and the thrilling spectacle of daring and nobility, prowess and courage that was identified in Captain’s Errol Flynn soon returned to vogue. Blood (1935; Captain Blood) by another exile, Michael Curtiz.

And in its own way, an escape was also another entire film genre, sporadically present throughout the history of American cinema, but consolidated only in that decade: the horror film. Universal became its main production house with historical titles such as James Whale’s Frankenstein (1931) and Tod Browning’s Dracula (1931). But what might have seemed a harmless fantastic show had recognizable ideological roots: almost always set in mysterious and / or inaccessible regions of old Europe, these films suggested a substantially xenophobic image of the old continent, seen as a bilge of horrors and corruption, a threat looming (sometimes directly: in some films the monster even lands in America) of the integrity and innocence of the United States. Behind what may appear to be entertaining entertainment was the elaboration of an ideology, a vision of the world and even a hint of politics, whether domestic or foreign,

The rise to power of Nazism in 1933 led not a few German directors and intellectuals to flee their homeland to the new continent: Fritz Lang, Billy Wilder, Edgar Ulmer, Douglas Sirk (of Danish origin), Robert Siodmak, Bertolt Brecht, the famous theater director Max Reinhardt, to name but a few. They were later joined, for other reasons, by authors from other European nations, such as Alfred Hitchcock from Great Britain, Jean Renoir, René Clair, the German Max Ophuls from France and so on. In a short time, Hollywood found itself able to employ the flower of European cinema (including first-rate photographers and set designers), part of which had been trained, directly or otherwise, in the school of Expressionism. This soon paid off: American cinema of the 1940s was to a certain extent the result of the encounter between the efficiency of the Hollywood industrial system and the genius, humor, elegance, culture of a Europe that had found a ground in America where transplant some seeds of their own tradition. This of course does not apply to African-American cinema, which, moreover, was beginning to have its famous stars among the minority to which it was addressed: Bee Freeman, whom Micheaux called ‘the sepia-toned Mae West’, or Lorenzo Tucker, whom he had baptized ‘ il Valentino nero ‘, and which appeared in melodramatic and even gangster-themed films. the culture of a Europe that had found a ground in America in which to transplant some seeds of its own tradition. This of course does not apply to African-American cinema, which, moreover, was beginning to have its famous stars among the minority to which it was addressed: Bee Freeman, whom Micheaux called ‘the sepia-toned Mae West’, or Lorenzo Tucker, whom he had baptized ‘ il Valentino nero ‘, and which appeared in melodramatic and even gangster-themed films. the culture of a Europe that had found a ground in America in which to transplant some seeds of its own tradition. This of course does not apply to African-American cinema, which, moreover, was beginning to have its famous stars among the minority to which it was addressed: Bee Freeman, whom Micheaux called ‘the sepia-toned Mae West’, or Lorenzo Tucker, whom he had baptized ‘ il Valentino nero ‘, and which appeared in melodramatic and even gangster-themed films.