July 2014
Intermediate to advanced
486 pages
16h 43m
English
Content preview from The Technique of Film and Video Editing, 5th EditionBecome an O’Reilly member and get unlimited access to this title plus top books and audiobooks from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers, thousands of courses curated by job role, 150+ live events each month,
Start your free trial
CHAPTER 3
The Influence of the Documentary
D. W. Griffith and his contemporaries were part of a growing commercial industry of which the prime goal was to entertain. This meant that the ideas presented in their films were subordinate to their entertainment value. Griffith attempted to present conceptual material about society in Intolerance and failed. Although other filmmakers—such as King Vidor (The Crowd, 1928), Charlie Chaplin (The Gold Rush, 1925), and F. W. Murnau (Sunrise, 1927)— blended ideas and entertainment values more successfully, the commercial film has more often been associated primarily with entertainment.
The documentary film, on the other hand, has always been associated with the communication of ideas first and with ...