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Live Poll: Director Trademarks
These talented auteurs all exhibit a near instantly recognizable style in their films - so recognizable in fact, that it doesn't take their viewers long to know whose film they are watching upon beginning. This could mean recurring themes, special effects or a general tone with which we've come to associate these directors.
Rather than asking which director is your favorite, which of these director's trademarks do you find MOST RECOGNIZABLE?
List: http://www.imdb.com/list/ls068931289/#1
Poll: http://www.imdb.com/poll/-Y73S_q6kRU/
Rather than asking which director is your favorite, which of these director's trademarks do you find MOST RECOGNIZABLE?
List: http://www.imdb.com/list/ls068931289/#1
Poll: http://www.imdb.com/poll/-Y73S_q6kRU/
kyle_perez_8yd0eqcwxu1mz
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jen_264364
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urbanemovies
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Manipulated deep-focus photography: split diopter lens (2min00sec on)
Carrie, Blow-Out, The Untouchables, Casualties of War, Snake Eyes, etc
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ElMaruecan82
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Guilt-stricken, tormented characters in quest for a redemption that can't do without a sudden yet slightly predictable outburst of violence they don't necessarily cause, stories with deep Messianic undertones set in a world dominated by sleazy macho men whose Mediterranean roots divide their conception of women into two archetypes: wives/mothers and broads.
Ingmar Bergman:
A photogenic, generally in black-and-white, brainstorming over the meaning of life or its meaninglessness, taking suffering as either a proof of God's nonexistence or his cruel silence, or as his greatest miracle, since pain also highlights our own mortality, symbolized by the many closeups on clocks, Naturally, the iconic close up revealing only half a face while the other is shown in profile, as if the formed shadows represented our own fears, mysteries or unanswered questions..
John Cassavates:
Improvised dialogues, deep intimiate portrayals of people caught in an existential crisis caused by their age or their troubled relationships, pivotal scenes shots in stairs, harrowing hand-held directing giving the feeling of a documentary thus accentuating the voyeuristic feeling, generally movies that don't intend to deliver a message but to show domestic reality as its rawest.
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jen_264364
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akash_charudatta_deshpande
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If I have to choose the most recognizable, I would most certainly go with WES ANDERSON.
I guess I would add- Faces filled with sorrow- as most of his movies are about dysfunctional families or people.
Here's a video that look almost like a imitation of his style- which is why I think he's the most recognizable.-
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akash_charudatta_deshpande
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Even Antonioni's style is recognizable- which makes him boring for a lot of cinephiles- including great directors like Bergman or Truffaut.
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sparse
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rubyfruit76
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It'd be nice to have a woman on the list and I thought of Kathryn Bigelow, as a few of her films have some trademarks of sorts, but I'm not sure that she's blatantly recognizable.
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jen_264364
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Some ladies:
Catherine Breillat - Dramas that explore female sexuality in a clinical, bleak style and with unconventional explicitness. Has been accused of being a "porno auteuriste". Explores critically as well as in an innovative way the perceptions imposed on female sexuality, related family and coming of age issues. "I am the pariah of French cinema. That can make things complicated for me: it is never easy to drum up a budget or to find a distributor for my films in France. Some people refuse even to read my scripts. But it also makes me very happy because hatred is invigorating. All true artists are hated. Only conformists are ever adored."
Leni Riefenstahl - the most effective, epic and technically innovative, propaganda films ever made. Riefenstahl heard Adolf Hitler speak at a rally in 1932 and was mesmerized by his talent as a public speaker. Describing the experience in her memoir, Riefenstahl wrote, "I had an almost apocalyptic vision that I was never able to forget. It seemed as if the Earth's surface were spreading out in front of me, like a hemisphere that suddenly splits apart in the middle, spewing out an enormous jet of water, so powerful that it touched the sky and shook the earth". Was one of the first filmmakers to use tracking shots, placing a camera on rails to follow movement. Riefenstahl played with the idea of slow motion, underwater diving shots, extremely high and low shooting angles, panoramic aerial shots, and tracking system shots for allowing fast action. Many of these shots were relatively unheard of at the time, but Leni’s use and augmentation of them set a standard, and is the reason why they are still used to this day.
Jane Campion - stories always focus on strong women, most of her films are period pieces. Campion's work is described as "perhaps the fullest and truest way of being faithful to the reality of experience"; by utilizing the "unsayable" and "unseeable," she manages to catalyze audience speculation. Campion's films tend to gravitate around themes of gender politics, such as seduction and female sexual power.
Kathryn Bigelow - often used first person perspectives and slow motion in action scenes. Her films tend to have a very raw feeling to them, without holding anything back. Violence, sex, nudity, it all has a home within her films and it never seems like it’s unnecessary.
Lisa Cholodenko - Her films are psychological character studies, revolving around a small cast of characters, and as the films progress the audience observes how the characters interact amongst each other. Her films address the fluidity of human sexuality and desire, and Cholodenko's work has helped give the LGBTQ community visibility in mainstream culture.
Nicole Holofcener - The style of much of Holofcener's work is realism. Her films do not always follow a typical plot structure and are sometimes obscure adding to the theme of realism in her work. Holofcener furthers the theme of realism in her work by dealing with a typical "everyday" middle class person and their actions. Holofcener's films almost always feature a female character in the lead as well.
Mira Nair - End credits often feature pictograms, with the credit reel ending on a pictogram. specializes in films for international audiences on Indian society, whether in the economic, social or cultural spheres. Heavily influenced by political street theater in Calcutta and documentary filmmaking, her approach, she explained, is to seek the truth of life, no matter how unpredictable.
Nora Ephron - smart romantic comedies where people are clever, beautiful, witty and politically informed. Leads are often strong but somewhat confused women in their 30s.
Sofia Coppola - Sun filmed through leaves. Character seen gazing out of a car window from the outside, looking in. Character walking down a long hallway. Introduction scene focusing on the main character during an unidentified point in time, shown to express their loneliness. Casts former child actors as her leads. Characters often move, dreamlike, through the world that mirrors whatever dilemmas and crises they are going through in her films. There are frequent repeated shots (for example, looking outward through a window at a world passing them by) and a reliance on natural lighting throughout all of Coppola’s films that bring together her signature approach to storytelling and filmmaking. What defines the Sofia Coppola aesthetic? Is it the sublime use of soft and natural lighting? Is it the subtle pastels of the color pallet? Maybe the handheld camera that dizzily floats around the characters? All of these visual characteristics work together harmoniously to create Coppola’s distinct dreamlike atmosphere. However, the aesthetic reaches far beyond the idea of a visual trademark—Coppola’s atmosphere seems to mirror the inner workings of her characters.
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ElMaruecan82
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- since you ask for the most recognizable, I think we should stick to relatively known directors, no offense for Ozu or Edgar Wright, but it's not like their work is instantly recognizable. There are certainly many foreign directors for instance, Iranian or Ethiopian, with terrific trademark but it should be wiser to stick to the canon of the average IMDb viewers.
- some directors have instantly recognizable style, one minute from any of their films gave them away. Peckinpah is one of them, he was the major influence of QT, you can't have QT without Bloody Sam. Fellini, too, with his casting of voluptuous women, orgiastic moments, baroque directing, luscious characters representing the director's hedonistic psyche etc.
- personally, Lumet never struck me as a director with particular trademarks, he's like John Huston or Billy Wilder, a versatile director who made different movies, the one trademark Lumet has is to make intelligent movies. The theme of failure and losers is also recurring in Huston's work but I'm not sure one theme is enough to make it a trademark.
You don't have room for all the suggestions but I would reconsider some of the options you listed, are they really identifiable trademarks or can't we replace them?
Good luck!
PS: Jean-Pierre Melville is also a good one: crime-related film noir with dark and lonely characters, long tracking shot, long moments of silence (there's no dialogue during the first 15 minutes of The Samurai), theme of fatality and failure, and movies inspired by the American gangster classics.
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jen_264364
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jen_264364
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