Research Project Essay

The film ‘Man with a Movie Camera’ is considered to be one of the best films ever made. Given the time in which is was made, the effects used were ahead of its time. This led to the film paving the way for many of our modern-day films and their effects.

After watching the film, my first impressions of it was that is came across as very abstract and ‘trippy’ but as the film continued, I felt as though social issues were being touched on throughout. We see a variety of social classes, such as the poor, the working class, the middle class and the upper class. All of which are taking part in their activities, such as the working class being at work, and the upper class being at the beach enjoying their leisure. It also touches on the different ages of people, from young babies to old people. The music is very important within this movie as each piece of music is extremely powerful, none being subtle. In some respects, the way pieces have been matched to the visuals can seem quite comic like. For example, when the visuals are sped up, the music seems to match its speed. One of the main characteristics of this film is that it is all done in black and white, which adds so much more depth and mystery to it.

In an article posted by Ben Nicholson, he states “…it is difficult to watch his most famous film, Man with a Movie Camera, without being bowled over – by its energy, its dynamism, and its visually playful nature.” Overall this film has as Ben Nicholson says, “playful nature”; which we see so much throughout the film. From the speed of the music to the repetitive nature of some scenes, the viewer is forced to acknowledge how experiential Dziga Vertov was.

Now in terms of how I have made my film I have responded to ‘Man with a Movie Camera’ in a similar but still quite different way. My first scene is an airplane flying through the sky, I intentionally kept the sound on as it is the only sound heard throughout the whole film.

In comparison to ‘Man with a Movie Camera’ I haven chosen to stick to a more modern theme, for example including an airplane, changing gears within a car, driving a car and buses and cars driving past. We see many different cars in ‘Man with a Movie Camera’ therefore I felt it was appropriate to respond with something similar, however in one scene in my film I reverse the clips of a bus and car driving past the camera, this effect has been used to throw the viewer off. I had also included the changing gears scene for not only the airplane travelling but for the walking scene too. This was done to implement an abstract theme, as it is incorrect. When flying an airplane, you do not change gears and when walking you do not change gears. Both are considered to be an automatic process however I wanted to show it from a manual type metaphor. In ‘Man with a Movie Camera’ we see a lot of scenes of machinery and gear changing; this was my inspiration behind the idea. Another aspect I had done different in comparison was the fact that any scene of me changing gear I kept in colour, as I felt it was the spine of the movie. Therefore, I wanted it to stand out but not overpower any other scene. Where as in ‘Man with a Movie Camera’ we only see scenes in black and white, therefore it shows consistency. In term of some of the editing effects used, I included a few black out cut scenes, this was done to add dramatic effect and to add suspense, where as in ‘Man with a Movie Camera’ I feel as though suspense it added through the pieces of music. The blackout cut scenes vary from short to slightly longer, both done for suspense. ‘Man with a Movie Camera’ does keep the viewer guessing, which makes the movie quite edgy, therefore using effects such as black & white tone and blacked out cut scenes can really enhance those elements.

Overall it was an enjoyable film to watch, and it has given my inspiration and techniques on how to make a film more playful and abstract using very little to no sound.

Bibliography:

Nicholson B. 2017 “Five wonderful effects in Man with a Movie Camera…and how they’re still inspiring filmmakers today”  BFI. https://www2.bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/news-bfi/features/five-wonderful-effects-man-movie-camera