Griffith and the Rise of Hollywood – By Paul O’Dell (1970) – PDF Download – excerpts

 

Griffith and the Rise of Hollywood – By Paul O’Dell (1970) – PDF Download – excerpts

  • Griffith and the Rise of Hollywood
  • By Paul O’Dell (with the assistance of Anthony Slide)
  • First published in 1970
  • A.S. Barnes & Co. Inc. Castle Books – New York

David Wark Griffith has tended to become in recent years, a figure in cinema history attributed with innovation in film technique; the close-up, the flashback, cross-cutting have all appeared in connection with his name. And so it is that he is now in danger of achieving a widespread reputation merely as technician: an inventor of cinematography. This does justice neither to Griffith himself nor to his work. It may very well be that he did “invent” all these ideas of pictorial presentation – but there is much evidence to suggest that he did not – and if he did not, then he certainly developed their use to startling effect. But these ideas, these techniques were for him only a means towards an end; never the ultimate distinguishing factor of his pictures. Nor was he dependent on these techniques in order to produce a film which stood above all contemporary works. Many of his early pictures contain no close-ups, no flashbacks, no camera movement, no complicated editing techniques, and no innovations. But nevertheless they are indisputably films of high artistic quality. Many post-Intolerance films also contain few, if any, of the “innovations” attributed to Griffith, and yet they are outstanding works nonetheless.

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