In August 1914 France was going to war. When general mobilization orders for WWI were announced, the French film industry was already retreating from the American cinematic establishment. Large companies were no longer able to produce films in the number or scale that had previously been achieved. A vacuum of sorts opened up which was filled by smaller, independent companies that were often more willing to experiment artistically and risk innovative methods and tactics. Unlike traditional big budget productions, which often incorporated several reels and focused on heroic, historic, or comedic subjects, these films were shorter and had a strong psychological focus. Out of this focus on inner life came many of the most advanced strategies of representation and narration yet seen in French film, including extraordinary lighting, framing, and editing techniques. These films continued to evolve through the 1910s and into the ‘20s, when the experiments of such avant-garde filmmakers as Marcel L’Herbier, Jean Epstein, and Germaine Dulac created Impressionist film. (http://www.paloaltoonline.com. 01/03/03)

Between 1918 and 1928, in a series of extraordinary films, the younger directors

Music plays a major, yet often overlooked role in this film. It helps to create a certain tempo with various scenes, an element common to impressionism. The music used in American Beauty follows, and helps to set, the pace of various scenes. For example, at the dinner table, where an elegant, sophisticated mood is presented, music is used which incorporates this mood. Another example is the work party. The music actually starts in the previous scene, indicating a change of mood is about to come.

Directed by Sam Mendes and starring the Oscar award winning Kevin Spacey, American Beauty is a wry observation of suburban American dysfunction. Spacey is Lester Burnham, a self-absorbed 40-something middle class American man. Despite an affluent lifestyle, he is unhappy, unloved and lacking in purpose. He adopts an openly self-centred approach to life, quitting his job and doing as he pleases. And while his newfound honesty creates mayhem for his family, it leads him to consider what it is he values in life. The movie is strengthened by its brutal, if beautifully realised, study of suburban disappointment. Beneath the wealthy façade of middle America lurks lives empty of beauty and reason. The distorting effect of ambition and selfishness is most profoundly embodied in the relationships between people, one of the many features of French Impressionism this film incorporates.

It is said that French Impressionism as a distinct movement had ceased by 1929, however its influences – the psychological narrative, subjective camera work, and editing – have remained to this day. They have continued to operate, for example, in the work of Alfred Hitchcock and Maya Deren, in Hollywood ‘montage sequences’, and in certain American genres and styles such as the horror film

Some topics in this essay:
American Beauty, French Impressionism, IMPRESSIONISM August, La Roue, French Impressionist, American Despite, Impressionism Hollywood, Germaine Dulac, Deren Hollywood, Impressionism Recent, french impressionism, american beauty, impressionist films, foreign film, french impressionist films, french impressionist, david “film art”, “film art”, david “film, bordwell david, films directors, impressionist film, bordwell david “film, external physical behaviour,