Lecture 2: I ’ m Ready for My Close-Up

1. Lecture 2:I’m Ready for My Close-Up Professor Michael Green Sunset Boulevard (1950) Directed by Billy Wilder

2. Billy Wilder Major figure in Hollywood History Won six Oscars and was nominated for 15 others. Worked in a number of genres

3. Double Indemnity (1944)

4. The Lost Weekend (1945)

5. Stalag 17 (1953)

6. Sabrina (1954)

7. Witness for the Prosecution (1957)

8. Some Like it Hot (1959)

9. The Apartment (1960)

10. Sunset Boulevard • William Holden (Joe) • Gloria Swanson (Norma Desmond) • Erich von Stroheim (Max) • Nancy Olsen (Betty) • Cecil B. DeMille (Himself)

11. Analyzing the Film: Genres • Genres • Film Noir • Gothic Horror • Melodrama • Satire Watch clip #1.

12. Formal Film Techniques • High contrast black and white photography • Gothic mise-en-scene • Vast interior sets filmed in high/low angles • Flashback / Narration

13. Themes/Motifs • Themes • Hollywood culture is shallow, disposable and hypocritical. • Money, success and vanity corrupt. • L.A. and Hollywood are dystopias disguised as utopias. • L.A. Motifs (rendered ironically) • Cars • Movie lots • Swimming pools

14. Analyzing the Film: Gender • What does the film have to say about gender roles and relationships? Consider the historical context. • Joe • Norma • Betty • Max • Watch clip #2.

15. Lesson 2 Reading • “Hollywood and the Dawning of the Aquarian Age,” By Robert Sklar • The early moviemakers. Douglas Fairbanks, Mary Pickford, D.W. Griffith and Charlie Chaplin, founders of United Artists

16. Reading Points • The attractions of California. • Working in the young L.A. film business. • The emergence of film acting and stars. • The “movie-struck girl” and women in the early movie business. • Norma and Joe in Sunset Boulevard • A “new race” of men and women. • Early scandals and the relationship of America to Hollywood.

17. End of Lecture