Language Inspired by Filmmakers
'Hitchcockian,' 'Felliniesque,' and other styles inspired by film legends
From Alfred Hitchcock (1899-1990) British-American
Think: nail-biting suspense, droll humor, cool patrician blondes.
(One of the few directors who was able to "brand" himself with the American public.)
Image Courtesy mptvimages.com
From Charlie Chaplin (1889-1977) British-American
Think: silent-movie slapstick, tears-and-laughter pathos.
(Score points with film aficionados by noting that he was the first true genius of cinema.)
Image Courtesy mptvimages.com
From Frank Capra (1897-1991) American
Think: celebration and eventual triumph of the average guy, sentimentalism.
(Probably the first nonactor movie director to be known by the general public.)
Image Courtesy mptvimages.com
From Orson Welles (1915-1985) American
Think: cinematic pyrotechnics done to technical and dramatic perfection.
(Spoiler alert: it's a sled!)
Image Courtesy mptvimages.com
From Stanley Kubrick (1928-1999) American
Think: irony, emotional aloofness, deliberate pacing.
(Don't even try deciphering what the finale with the Star Child means.)
From Federico Fellini (1920-1993) Italian
Think: poetic neorealism, surrealism, and sometimes just plain weirdism.
(Carl Jung's ideas about the collective unconscious helped inspire the dreamlike images in many Fellini films.)
Image Courtesy mptvimages.com
From Ingmar Bergman (1918-2007) Swedish
Think: deep, dark, depressing.
(Never play chess with someone who introduces himself as Death, and do not rent "Winter Light" if you're looking for a pick-me-up.)
Image Courtesy mptvimages.com
From Andy Warhol (1928?-1987) American
Audacious, minimalist, unwatchable.
(According to legend, when "Sleep" - an eight-hour static shot of a man snoozing in bed - played in a Los Angeles theater in 1963, 500 people started watching it and 50 remained at the end.)
Image Courtesy mptvimages.com
From Steven Spielberg (1947-) American
Think: exhilarating, over-the-top action sequences, childlike wonder, feel-good endings.
(And audience members who still fear deep water, even in pools.)
Image Courtesy mptvimages.com
From Sergey Eisenstein (1898-1948) Russian
Think: montage, montage, montage.
(Claim that you have studied the Odessa Steps scene frame by frame; some scholars actually have.)
MORE TO EXPLORE: 7 Words About the Movies
