From Silents to Studios

Part 1: Explore how the inclusion of sound in the movie pictures impacted the Movie Industry. Detail how it happened, who was effected, what was lost. 

Although it may seem as if adding sound to movies would be a revolutionary breakthrough in the film industry, many studios opposed the idea due to their many reasons as to why it wasn't a wise choice. Many criticized that viewers would not accept it or some were already too accustomed to the traditional silent films. That way audience members were more focused on the characters themselves in terms of traits, purpose and physicalities. As sound made its way through into the business of film industry, some conflicts arose with actors' appearance and their voices, meaning they wouldn't match with their image. For example, on screen we would see this burly, rugged, masculine male figure, but as soon as he opened his mouth to speak viewers would hear this high pitched voice that would not match and throw off the whole character's appearance in the film. In addition, actors would have to take the extra step in memorizing their lines, rather than the directors telling them what to do and where to go, further consuming more filming time. Purchasing the technology for capturing audio and dialogue was another conflict, that of which would put crews at minor set backs in terms of time and budgets. However, on the other hand, the one company that dared to pursue the art of sound became a success in the film industry. They are known as Warner Bros. Studios. In 1927, they were the first to incoporate audio and dialogue into their films. Doing this, a chain reaction was eventually developed and other studios were quite intimidated by their instant success. They have decided to take on the challenge of sound and in no time it had spread throughout the film industry. 

Part 2: The 20 years between 1930 and 1950 are generally recognized as the studio years. Describe what the pros and cons were of this factory system.          

Due to a lack of experience with sound in films, there were a number if limitations that arose during production. Actors were to be with talking range of the microphone and during scenes between two characters, the the conversations had tendencies in dragging on and on and on. Actors were to even lean in towards a hidden microphone, making it far too obvious for viewers to notice. Since recording audio was such an elaborate process, it was to be done in an enclosed area, limiting the variety in shot selection, causing audience members to grow bored. Although many negatives were brought up during this new method, there were numerous positives to the incorporation of sound. Studios thrived in the creation of set design, bringing more interest to the viewer eye with its colors and props. Through their devotion the studio, productions like MGG, Warner Bros. and 20th Century Fox grew and progressed throughout the dynamic era of the "talkies", successfully putting the highly growing mediation of Silent vs. Sound to an end and a new beginning to work.