Film Capsule

Nostalgia can be a powerful emotion in film, and a dangerous force. Simply hearing the sound of an old projector or seeing an old-fashioned boxy aspect ratio and a frame with rounded edges is enough to evoke it. With The Artist poised to dominate award season this year, filmmakers and audiences seem more interested than ever in exploring—or perhaps exploiting—the effects of nostalgia. Its detractors have accused The Artist of wielding nostalgia like a weapon, a technique guaranteed to produce an intended affect, but its success proves there is still room for a thoughtful and even humorous examination of how film creates such a strong, romantic connection to its own past.

While The Artist is a rare—though not unprecedented—contemporary silent film, a full 41 directors previously explored the issue of nostalgia in 1995’s Lumière and Company, a collection of shorts produced to celebrate the centennial of the Lumière Brothers’ first ever films. The filmmakers were challenged to use the unmistakable aesthetics of the Lumières’ camera and the constraints of an approximately 50-second running time to do something new, or perhaps old. Some directors in the anthology actively combat the feeling of nostalgia for an older cinema. Patrice Laconte, for example, recreates the famous Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat, using the same camera placement and framing to photograph a highly modern train rushing past the station. Merchant and Ivory use the look of the Lumières’ primitive camera to lure the viewer into a feeling of nostalgia, photographing the Eiffel Tower before dollying to reveal a McDonald’s invading the scene. Another batch of filmmakers, however, embraces the effect of nostalgia, exemplified by a charming and creative short from Claude Lelouch. Read more…