Amateur Cinema: The Rise Of North American Moviemaking, 1923-1960

From the very beginning of cinema, there have been amateur filmmakers at work. It wasnÕt until Kodak introduced 16mm film in 1923, however, that amateur moviemaking became a widespread reality, and by the 1950s, over a million Americans had amateur movie cameras. In Amateur Cinema, Charles Tepperman explores the meaning of the ÒamateurÓ in film history and modern visual culture. In the middle decades of the twentieth centuryÑthe period that saw HollywoodÕs rise to dominance in the global film industryÑa movement of amateur filmmakers created an alternative world of small-scale movie production and circulation. Organized amateur moviemaking was a significant phenomenon that gave rise to dozens of clubs and thousands of participants producing experimental, nonfiction, or short-subject narratives. Rooted in an examination of surviving films, this book traces the contexts of ÒadvancedÓ amateur cinema and articulates the broad aesthetic and stylistic tendencies of amateur films.

• | Author: Charles Tepperman
• | Publisher: University Of California Press
• | Publication Date: Dec 24, 2014
• | Number of Pages: 376 pages
• | Language: English
• | Binding: Hardcover
• | ISBN-10: 0520279859
• | ISBN-13: 9780520279858