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The following “Blast from the Past!” series will be touching upon the history of film. How it started and how it has made it to where it is. The purpose of these posts is to show that movies and film are in reality a construction, and to understand why we feel a certain way when we see a film.

A question to ask is, “Why do people go to the movies?”

• Emotional response
• Plot / Story
• Source material
• Comparison to other films
• Director
• Genre

If I were asked who are some of the best directors of today (when I say best directors, I’m talking from all fronts, the picture, resourcefulness, end result, etc.), I’d probably give you a list that looked something like this:

• M. Night Shyamalan
• Quentin Tarantino
• Robert Rodriguez
• Steven Spielberg
• Wachowski Brothers
• George Lucas
• Clint Eastwood
• Scott Ridly
• Mel Gibson
• Christopher Nolan
• Peter Jackson
• Martin Scorsese
• Spike Lee
• Bryan Singer

They say that we all build off of the shoulders of giants. If so…who were the giants whom these directors built off of?

That is what will be discussed here

Orson Wells was a director of the Hollywood Era. One of his known styles of filming was that he would like to withhold information from the audience, keeping them guessing and at the edge of the seat. How did he do it? The following is the opening sequence one of his movies, “Touch of Evil“.

He does one take, no cut until the explosion. Camera movement in real time and real space. A tracking shot (camera is on an actual track) that is constantly moving. See for yourself…

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