Three short films/ and some reading

The two films I could follow the most closely with was Child of the Big City and the The Dying Swan. The 1002nd Ruse I wasn't sure exactly the point of it was besides the fact that it was of a husband whose trying to follow this book of rules of what to look out for when it came to his wife who was cheating on him. A silent film carries certain potential advantages over sound by not being blunt on what exactly is happening on the screen by having speech that is heard. The actors have to express more body language and facial expressions in a silent film then they would in a film with sound. A challenge a director faces in creating a silent film is portraying the message clearly enough for the audience to understand. A challenge a viewer faces is being able to understand the storyline clearly and read the actions of the characters enough to understand the purpose of the film. My viewing strategies that have changed are reading further into the characters emotions and using clues to follow the storyline.

Mostly in reading Early Soviet Cinema I was a bit surprised how first Russian cinema never really had a chance to reach a highpoint in success because of political change and government. Then again without the challenge of the Civil War there would not have been shown the "forceful, distinctive, and revolutionary visual style of Soviet cinema."