Celluloid Architecture

The Celluloid Architecture
Ehsan Khoshbakht
published: April 2010

The Celluloid Architecture book, written in Farsi, is the result of my long and obsessive studying of film architecture and the meaning of space in motion pictures, during the years that I spent in architecture school. It is a prompt reaction to the needs and necessities of many schools of architecture in Iran, and their most recent interest is cinema as a immense source of inspiration. Now films are studied for the purpose of discovering a more subtle and responsive architecture. My main aim in writing the book - and choosing the other texts, as well - was to switch swiftly from the position of a film scholar to the view of an architect. I tried to keep both point of views in focus, simultaneously.

This anthology, which some parts of it has been written back in 2002, though completely revised, come from a wide range of disciplines. From structural comparison between two medium to an architectural reading of motion picture history. Examining the influence of virtual architecture of film on contemporary scene of architecture and the playfulness that real architecture borrowed from the movies. A section is dedicated to studying the role of architecture , city and landscape in the films of key and architecture-oriented directors (though Jacques Tati is missing in this book, simply because he's the subject of my next book). This text will also help students in understanding the role of major cities in the development of the city film, or let's say mystic city - the one which is invented for the screen - in the different periods of film history. For instance, Berlin and expressionist city, or Paris of the avant-garde, or New York of Hollywood extravaganzas. Hence, I partitioned the book to three sections and 17 chapters within them:

Basic Concepts:
In this part I trace the theories and methods the rest of the book uses, and propose some new ways of looking at the film to interpret the role architecture and the city . In a sense it is a key to threads which run through the chapters.

• Introduction: The Metaphysical architecture of film [by Ehsan Khoshbakht]
• An Introduction to Time-Space in Films [by Ehsan Khoshbakht]
• Spacial experience in architecture and movies [by Juhani Pallasmaa*]

Directors, studio system and architecture:

• Learning from Hollywood [by Hans Dieter Schaal**]
• Studio Architecture: Escape by design [by Maggie Valentine]
• Architecture in the films of Michelangelo Antonioni [by Mitchell Schwarzer]
• Robert Bresson and the rejection of architecture in transcendental style [by Ehsan Khoshbakht]
• Hitchcock, architecture, city and Vertigo [by Ehsan Khoshbakht***]

Art Directors, Production Designers and Film Design:
All articles in this section are written by me, except Cedric Gibbons which is written by Christina Wilson.

• From architecture in motion pictures to architects of motion pictures: A history of design in films
• Cedric Gibbons
• Alexandre Trauner
• Ken Adam
• Henry Bumstead
• Richard Sylbert
• Dante Ferretti
• Patrizia Von Brandenstein
• Dean Tavoularis

This book can be read in any order, or as separate sections and as single chapters, though reading in order is recommended.
*All five English language articles, translated into Persian for the first time.
**Thanks to Hans Dieter Schaal for giving me the go ahead to translate his book, Learning from Hollywood.
***Published previously in Honar [art] Monthly.

Product Details:
Paperback: 288 pages (40 pages in color)
Publisher: Kasra Publishing + Herfe Honarmand
Language: Farsi
Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 8.8 x 0.8 inches
Design: Ehsan Irannejad
Translators of English articles: Sara Golmakani, Katayon Yousefi

A sample of the pages, index and bibliography is available from the website of my designer/architect friend, Ehsan Irannejad: Look inside!

The Book is dedicated to Michelangelo Antonioni, Jacques Tati and Edward G. Robinson. Please don't ask why Robinson!

Leopard: Death, Dung, Decay

"Where Visconti poured most of his talent and feeling was into his stunning decors, particularly those embellishing his climactically anticlimactic ballroom sequence, where history executes an ironic quadrille with death, dung, decay, and disgust to the mocking strains of a hitherto undiscovered Verdi waltz." -- Andrew Sarris

Stairs and Mirrors

The Heiress (1949/dir:William Wyler/design:Harry Horner, John Meehan)

The Spiral Staircase (1945/dir:Robert Siodmak/design:Albert S. D'Agostino, Jack Okey)

An Aesthetic Participation in History: Bazin on La Terra Trema

In La Terra Trema, Visconti aimed at and unquestionably achieved a paradoxical synthesis of realism and aestheticism. Visconti has not had recourse to the effects one can produce from the juxtaposition of images. Each image here contains a meaning of its own which it expresses fully. This is the reason why it is difficult to see more than a tenuous relation between La Terra Trema and the Soviet cinema of the second half of the twenties, to which montage was essential. We may add now that it is not by means of symbolism in the imagery either that meaning manifests itself here, I mean, the symbolism to which Eisenstein resort.

The aesthetic peculiar to the image here is always plastic; it avoids any inclination to the epic. As staggeringly beautiful as the fishing fleet may be when it leaves the harbor, it is still just the village fleet, not, as in Potemkin, the enthusiasm and the support of the people of Odessa who send out the fishing boats loaded with food for the rebels. But, one may ask, where is art to take refuge if the realism one is proposing is so ascetic? Everywhere else. In the quality of the photography, especially. Our compatriot Aldo, who before his work on this film did nothing of real note and was known only as a studio cameraman, has here created a profoundly original style of image, unequaled anywhere (as far as I know) but in the short films which are being made in Sweden by Arne Sucksdorff.

The images of La Terra Trema achieve what is at once a paradox and tour de force in integrating the aesthetic realism of films like Citizen Kane with the documentary realism. If this is not, strictly speaking, the first time depth of focus has been used outside the studio, it is at least the first time it has been used as consciously and as systematically as it is here out of doors, in the rain and even in the dead of night, as well as indoors in the real-life settings of the fishermen's homes. I canot linger over the technical tour de force which this represents, but I would like to emphasize that depth of focus has naturally led Visconti (as it led Welles ) not only to reject montage but, in some literal sense, to invent a new kind of shooting script. His shots (if one is justified in retaining the term) are unusually long, some lasting three or four minutes. In each, as one might expect, several actions are going on simultaneously. Visconti also seems to have wanted, in some systematic sense, to base the construction of his image on the event itself. If a fisherman rolls a cigarette, he spares us nothing: we see the whole operation; it will not be reduced to its dramatic or symbolic meaning, as is usual with montage. The shots are often fixed frame, so people and things may enter the frame and take up position; but Visconti is also in the habit of using a special kind of panning shot which moves very slowly over a very wide arc: this is the only camera movement which he allows himself, for he excludes all tracking shots and, of course, every unusual camera angle.

The unlikely sobriety of this structure is possible only because of the remarkable plastic balance maintained a balance which only a photograph could absolutely render here. But above and beyond the merits of its purely formal properties, the image reveals an intimate knowledge of the subject matter on the part of the filmmakers. Visconti is worthy of the novelty of his triumph. Despite the poverty or even because of the simple "ordinariness" of this household of fishermen, an extraordinary kind of poetry, at once intimate and social,emanates from it.

In La Terra Trema, the actor, sometimes on camera for several minutes at a time, speaks, moves, and acts with complete naturalness, one might even say, with unimaginable grace. Visconti is from the theater. He has known how to communicate to the nonprofessionals of La Terra Trema something more than naturalness, namely that stylization of gesture that is the crowning achievement of an actor's profession. If festival juries were not what they are, the Venice festival prize for best acting should have gone to the fishermen of La Terra Trema.

In the world of cinema, it is not necessary that everyone approve every film, provided that what prompts the public's incomprehension can be compensated for by the other things. In other words, the aesthetic of La Terra Trema must be applicable to dramatic ends if it is to be of service in the evolution of cinema.

One has to take into account too, and this is even more disturbing, in view of what one has the right to expect from Visconti himself, a dangerous inclination to aestheticism. This great aristocrat, an artist to the tips of his fingers, is a Communist, too, do I dare say a synthetic one?

La Terra Trema lacks inner fire. One is reminded of the great Renaissance painters who, without having to do violence to themselves, were able to paint such fine religious frescoes in spite of their deep indifference to Christianity. I am not passing judgment on the sincerity of Visconti's communism. But what is sincerity? Obviously, at issue is not some paternalistic feeling for the proletariat. Paternalism is a bourgeois phenomenon, and Visconti is an aristocrat. What is at issue is, maybe, an aesthetic participation in history.

-- Andre Bazin (Esprit, 1948)

These Waiting Women: La Terra Trema (1948)

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Two Charles Mingus Films

Charles Mingus is a standard for modern jazz, and those charismatic musicians who were prominent in myth-making, as well as making spontaneous music. There are two documentaries about him:

Mingus (1968)

A 1968 portrait of the great jazz musician going through some particularly hard times in a life that seems to constitute the definition of turbulence. The Village Voice called this “the first jazz film about jazz,” and surely the implication (that jazz films have never really been about jazz) is undeniable. Directed effectively by Thomas Reichman (1944-75), and filmed in November 1966 in various locations around New York City and the musical portions were filmed in Lennie's On The Turnpike which was a jazz club in West Peabody, MA, north of Boston.

Footage from various club dates punctuated by poetry and all of it woven filming Mingus and his daughter during the final moments before they are evicted from the Manhattan studio where Mingus hoped to build a new jazz school. With: Charles Mingus, Lonnie Hillyer, Charles McPherson, John Gilmore, Walter Bishop, Dannie Richmond.



Charles Mingus: Triumph of the Underdog (1998)

An excellent documentary produced by Mingus's wife Sue, including numerous TV clips of Charles Mingus in performance and in interview over the years plus clips from the documentary discussed above, "Mingus" (1968). Also interviews with Gunther Schuller, Wynton Marsalis, John Handy, Sue Mingus, Celia Mingus, Jerome Richardson, Randy Brecker, Brian Priestley, Britt Woodman, Snooky Young, Eddie Bert, Andrew Homzy, Lew Soloff, Jimmy Knepper, Don Butterfield, George Adams, Jack Walrath, Dorian Mingus. Also film clips of the Duke Ellington and the Lionel Hampton bands and Dannie Richmond.
Read Jonathan Rosenbaum's article about the film and Mingus himself in his website.

Three Sun Ra Films

Sun Ra (1914-93) was a mysterious figure in history of jazz. He was a fearsome avant-gardist and a traditional musician and leader/arranger at the same time. He and his Arkestra had a theatrical approach to jazz, in terms of social and political effects of this music - especially on Negros - combined with a futuristic view that was an ideal starting point for experimental filmmakers like Bland, Niblock and Coney.

Cry of Jazz (1959)

It's Sun Ra's first film. Directed by Edward O. Bland with an interesting semi-documentary/avant-garde oriented style that sometimes reminds us of early John Cassavetes films. As soon as film starts to talk , it turns to a silly political commentary on the world of American negro and an a lousy history of jazz. Featuring Sun Ra and his Arkestra (including Sun Ra, Julian Priester, John Gilmore, Marshall Allen, James Scales). The film editor is Howard Alk who later became Bob Dylan's editor in his ill-fated Eat the document project.

The Magic Sun (1966)

A short avant-garde film directed by Phill Niblock, with Sun Ra's jazz score and featuring rare Sun Ra footage, photos & audio.


Space Is the Place (1974)

An 82-minute underground film, made in 1972 and released in 1974. It was produced by Jim Newman, directed by John Coney, written by Sun Ra, Joshua Smith and features Sun Ra and his Arkestra.

The plot centers around Sun Ra arriving on earth with his Arkestra to spread his philosophy of the music of the universe and to take back as many black folks as he can to repopulate his home planet and fill it with "human vibrations". Ra's greatest adversary in his quest is The Overseer, incarnation of evil in the Black community who poses himself to be a community leader and a man of charity. But in fact, he is the tool of the power structure. Ra is also pursued by White government agents (presumably from FBI) who attempt to assassinate him. On the other hand, Jimmy Fey is representative of the Black people in entertainment industry and mass media.

In 2003, the movie was re-released in its entire 82-minute format on DVD, after a heavily-edited 63-minute version on VHS. The original cuts were requested by Sun Ra, which director John Coney attributed to Sun Ra's prudishness. The scenes indeed follow a racy "pimps and hos" narrative that is not entirely congruous with the rest of the film, and there was a notable backlash from fans of the original film. The fact that the director inserted these scenes without the consent of Sun Ra does in fact leave room for scrutiny, considering the absence of Sun Ra in the scenes themselves.

In the soundtrack of film Sun Ra and his Intergalactic Solar Arkestra are: Sun Ra, Kwame Hadi,Wayne Harris, Marshall Allen, Danny Davis, Larry Northington, John Gilmore, Eloe Omoe, Danny Thompson, Lex Humphries, Ken Moshesh, June Tyson. Music recorded in California in 1972.

Last Breakfast at Tiffany: Finding Mambo

آخرین صبحانه در تیفانی

امروز همه سینمادوستان استودیوهایی مثل مترو، وارنر، کلمبیا یا پارامونت را می‌شناسند و فیلم‌های مورد علاقه‌شان از سینمای کلاسیک آمریکا معمولاً به یکی از چند استودیوی بزرگ و معتبر آن دوران مربوط برمي‌گردد، اما آیا جز احتمالاً چند مورخ و چند خورۀ فیلم کسی اسم استودیوی کوچک و بی‌بضاعت «تیفانی» را شنیده است؟ از این اسم‌ها و استودیوهای فراموش شده در تاریخ سینمای آمریکا فراوانند و تازه استودیوهایی مانند «بلک لایون» (که اولین فیلم های بزرگ آنتونی مان آن جا ساخته شد) و «مونوگرام» (که گدار از نفس افتاده را ادای دینی به فیلم‌های ساخته شده در آن‌جا خوانده است) به واسطه کارگردان‌هایی که از آن بیرون آمدند یا اشاره‌هایی که توسط آدم‌های مشهور دیگر – مانند گدار – به آنها شد، اندک نامی به هم زده‌اند. اما تیفانی چطور؟

موضوع وقتی جذاب‌تر می‌شود که بدانیم در تابستان 1929 تیفانی اولین استودیویی بوده که دست به تهیه نخستین فیلم درام تمام رنگی تاریخ سینما زده است. تا آن زمان سه یا چهار فیلم موزیکال رنگی ساخته شده بود اما هنوز کسی جرأت پیدا نکرده بود تا رنگ را در یک درام کاملاً جدی هم امتحان کند. تیفانی هر چه در جیب داشتند داد تا شاید بتوانند مانند ریسک بزرگی که وارنرها دو سال قبل انجام دادند و تمام زندگی‌شان را روی فیلم ناطق گذاشته و جواب هم گرفتند، از این وضعیت دربیایند و تبدیل شوند به استودیویی طراز اول و در حد مترو یا وارنر.

اسم این پروژۀ عظیم که تبلیغ فراوانی برای آن کردند مامبا بود، داستانی که در مستعمره‌های آلمانی در آفریقا می‌گذشت و توسط آلبرت روگال کارگردانی شده بود. روگال 120 فیلم از 1921 تا 1954 ساخته که تقریباً همۀ آن‌ها فراموش شده‌اند. بازیگران فیلم یان هرشولت (بازیگر حرص اشتروهایم) و النور بوردمن (زن کینگ ویدور که در جمعیت شوهرش هم بازی کرده) بودند. فیلم‌برداری تکنی کالر توسط چارلز بویر انجام شده که بعدها چند وسترن مهجور باد بوتیکر در دهۀ 1950 را فیلم‌برداری کرد.

فیلم در 10 مارس 1930 روی پرده آمد و موفقیتی استثنایی نصیبش شد، اما با ورشکستگی تیفانی در 1932 که نتیجۀ بحران بزرگ اقتصادی بود، مامبا نیز برای همیشه به فراموشی سپرده شد. در 1939 برای ساخت فیلم خانه خراب کن بربادرفته صدها نسخۀ اصل نیترات فیلم‌های هالیوودی برای مشتعل کردن آتش سکانس آتش‌سوزی آتلانتا به کار گرفته شد (در حالی که خود دکورهایی که طعمۀ حریق شد متعلق به شاه شاهان سیسیل دمیل بود) و یکی از آن ها مامبا بود.

برای هشتاد سال داستان مامبا مانند داستان بسیاری از فیلم‌های دیگر تاریخ سینما تمام شده تلقی می‌شد تا این که امسال کسی در بخش یادداشت آزاد مدخل این فیلم در imdb نوشت که دو حلقه از فیلم را دیده است. این یادداشت مختصر و نه چندان قابل اعتماد پل برنان، کارشناس و متخصص سینمای صامت و ناطق‌های اولیه، را کنجکاو به تحقیقاتی بیشتر کرد تا این که از روی همین سرنخ ساده، کپی سالم و تمیز هر نُه حلقه فیلم در یکی از سینماهای دورافتادۀ استرالیا پیدا شد، ده کوره ای که آخرین ایستگاه نمایش فیلم‌های آمریکایی محسوب می‌شد و پس از این "آخرین ایستگاه در دنیا" دیگر لازم نبود فیلم به جای دیگری فرستاده شود و به همین خاطر می‌توانست در مجموعۀ شخصی صاحب سینما جاخوش کند یا این که طعمۀ آتشی دیگر شود.

فیلم در حال حاضر به سوئد منتقل شده تا یوناس نوردین، یک خبرۀ سینمای صامت، فکری برای گذاشتن صدای فیلم از روی دیسک (هنوز در آن زمان صدا به روی خود نگاتیو منتقل نشده بود و سینما در عصر ویتافون های RCA ویکتور به سر می‌برد) به روی تصاویر بکند و البته فقط چهار دیسک صدا (از نُه تا) پیدا شده است. کلیپ‌هایی از دو صحنه فیلم و داستان کامل این کشف در وبلاگ نوردین با نام talkeking وجود دارد.

مامبا آخرین صبحانۀ باشکوه استودیوی تیفانی بود و خدا می داند که چقدر از این فیلم‌های گم شده و فراموش شده در زیرزمین‌ها، انبارها و اتاقک‌های زیرشیروانی منتظر کشف شدند. مرمت فیلم‌های قدیمی و آماده کردن آن ها برای نمایش دوباره و ارائه به صورت دیجیتال که در همه جای دنیا پدیده‌ای جاافتاده، رایج و حتی یک تخصص مهم محسوب می شود، مطلقاً به ایران راه پیدا نکرده است. آن هم در حالی که به شهادت رأی گیری بهترین‌های عمر در شمارۀ 400، بیشتر توجه سینمادوستان معطوف به دورانی است که می توانیم آن را "گذشته" سینمای ایران بخوانیم، گذشته‌ای که از نظر کیفیت تصاویر به سرعت در حال محو شدن و از بین رفتن است.

احسان خوش‌بخت

Hi De Ho (1937)

Hi De Ho (1937) is a 11-minute long musical variety starring one of the best big bands of all times, Cab Calloway’s orchestra, which along Duke Ellington’s were the hottest attractions in 1930s New York jazz scene. The setting is similar to most black and white musicals of the period with a high angel camera and dancers in front of the band. Directed by Roy Mack (1889-1962) an expert of short musical film from early days of talikes with an all negro cast. It is written by Burnet Hershey. Cinematographer is Ray Foster, and edited by Bert Frank.

The cast (mostly Cab Calloway and His Cotton Club Orchestra) including Doc Cheatham, Irving Randolph, Lammar Wright, trumpet; Claude Jones, De Priest Wheeler, trombone; Keg Johnson, trombone, guitar; Garvin Bushell, clarinet, alto sax, bassoon; Andrew Brown, alto sax, clarinet; Walter Thomas, tenor sax, clarinet, flute; Bennie Payne, piano; Morris White, guitar; Milt Hinton, acoustic double bass; Leroy Maxey, drums; Cab Calloway, leader, vocal.

See also Notes on Jazz.

Ben Webster, Cineaste!

Ben Webster (1909–73), American jazz tenor saxophonist from Kansas City, with his tough, raspy, and brutal tone on stomps (with his own distinctive growls), and yet on ballads, warm and sentimental, spent his last days was in Netherlands, where along his sax, an 8-mm camera was his companion.

These shots are from a Dutch documentary, Big Ben: Ben Webster in Europe (1966), directed by Johann van der Keuken. There are appearences by Don Byas, Michiel de Ruyter, Dolf Verspoor, Jimmy Parsons and Cees Slinger. Ben shoots, and projects. Like his playing, his home-made films are a mere reflection of a soulful and vulnerable individual.

There is even a part when van der Keuken alludes to the beast inside Webster (who, because of his violent behavior after drinking, was nicknamed The Brute) by inter-cutting shots of wild animals in a zoo and the artificial advertising photographs to a haunting close up of Webster in darkness.