Silent Film

The silent film was invented at the end of the 1800's beginning of the 1900's. They lasted until 1929 when sound was introduced. One of the most famous silent film actors was Charlie Chaplin. This is who I looked at to get inspiration for my silent film. I found his work to be very slapstick comedy.

When you think of the typical conventions of a black and white silent film. you think about the camera angles. You would only have one camera on set so you would have to plan your shots as you would not be able to change camera angles. Also when it came to the acting it was normally a bit more over the top, so they would have to exaggerate their hand gestures and movements. This is because you had know sound so you had to explain what was happening though your movement and actions. The use of text was important because it was another way to help the audience understand what was happening, or if there were any time changes. Sometimes the text would illustrate what the actor was thinking.

For my film we wanted to try and keep to as many of the typical conventions. The main thing we looked at was the camera angles. We wanted to keep the camera fixed and have the actors walk in and out the frame. therefore we had to think about each shot and the composition so it would be in the style of an old silent film. With the acting we wanted to make sure it looked like a typical silent film. So we made the gestures exaggerated and there movements over the top.
When it came to the editing I knew that it was going to be black and white and that I would put a crop on it. I also added a bit of grain, I did this because that was how the films looked in the 1910's. I added text so I could explain to the audience what was happening, in terms of time changes. I decided that I would speed the whole film up. I wanted to do this because I felt like it would give of a more slapstick comedy look and it follows the convention of the comic silent films.