Film architecture and design has existed almost as long as cinema itself. In 1976, Leon Barsacq argued in Caligari’s Cabinet And Other Grand Illusions that the fantasist sets developed by Georges Melies at the beginning of the 20th century were a considerable improvement over anything that had been done previously in that they created a deeper reality and gave the image a more substantial meaning. He further added that cinema escaped its primitive phase once it moved away from simple backdrops to three-dimensional sets, thereby creating an architectural space within cinema[1]. Post World War I, the German Expressionists fully explored this new architectural space through the creation of sets that attempted to reflect the inner emotions of the characters in the films. And David O. Selznik’s use of the term ‘production design’ in reference to the work of the American director and set designer William Cameron Menzies on Gone with the Wind (1939), finally helped film design and architecture gain the official recognition and visibility that has since become an integral part of the cinematic experience and of the output of most film industries.

Following fairly closely the emergence of production values in the history of cinema has been the rise and acceptance of science fiction cinema. It is indisputable that the two are interconnected and that a process exists where both feed off from one another. Cinema learns from architecture and architecture learns from cinema. As far back as 1926, many architects were said to have been impressed and influenced by Metropolis (1926). Stanley Kubrick’s 2001 (1968) also apparently became a source of inspiration for the world of architecture, with the director himself having sourced a lot of his inspiration from several existing architectural and design trends and concepts. Today, terms like ‘science fiction architecture’, ‘high-tech architecture’ or ‘cyber architecture’ are commonly used to refer to a new and ‘modern’ style of architecture that draws heavily on science fiction and new technologies. For many architects, ‘science fiction is an imaginative form of design’[2], making its visualizations worth studying.

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High Treason, Gaumont-British’s first sound film (a silent version was also made to accommodate theatres still not equipped to handle sound) and directed by Maurice Elvey, was to be Britain’s answer to Metropolis, Fritz Lang’s science fiction masterpiece from 1926. Based on a play by Noel Pemberton-Billing, it depicts a not so distant future (1950) where the two main powers are the Federated States of Europe, which include Britain, and the Atlantic States.

This rift between what is in fact Europe and the USA is one of several ideas that seem quite pertinent today in a film that has often been accused of containing too much naïve pacifist propaganda. For High Treason is indeed very much a film about pacifism, drawing on the fears and anxieties that continued to haunt the British public since the end of World War I. As Dr Seymour, the lead character and head of the Peace League, replies when told that people are now too sensible for war, “that’s what they said in 1914!”. Yet, the bombing of the channel tunnel as part of an overall plan by the agitators to use terror to influence the two governments and the comment by the President of the Atlantic States that “We must strike the first blow”, demonstrate that perhaps High Treason may not have been as naïve as was often thought.

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British Science Fiction cinema has always lived in the shadow of its American counterpart, either as a result of a direct effort to emulate an American style to enable the films to reach broader markets or as an indirect consequence of the fact that, since the 50’s, Science Fiction cinema has been associated with America, drawing on its rich heritage of comics and magazines.

But British Science Fiction cinema has in fact a much greater legacy than is often given credit to. Since the beginning of the 20th century, various British directors and producers have explored the genre, often taking it into new directions, pushing its boundaries, and drawing on the wealth of ideas and masterful works which British Science Fiction writers like H.G Wells, George Orwell, Aldous Huxley, Arthur C. Clarke, John Wyndham and Michael Moorcock have produced over the years.

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The transition from silent to sound proved quite a challenging one for French cinema. Considering that Leon Gaumont started to experiment with sound at the turn of the century, it is rather unfortunate that by the 1920s, practically all attempts to bring sound to film had ended in France. And by 1926, when Warner’s Don Juan came out in America, most French production companies still did not have the foresight to understand the full implications of Fox’ Movietone or Western Electric’s Vitaphone.

But foresight was not the only thing lacking within the French film industry throughout the 1920s. Indeed, several factors contributed to a slow transition to sound and to a passiveness that would result in ‘silent movies persisting well into the 1930s, and even towards the end of 1931 it has been estimated that less than a quarter of France’s 4500 cinemas had been converted to sound’.[1]

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To understand the Japanese film industry’s reaction to the coming of sound, it is necessary to look at it in the context of the country’s relationship to performance arts and particularly, to the art of Katsuben. While Japan’s official transition to sound did not come until the year 1935 (and even at that time, silent films continued to play a prominent role), some have argued that sound had in fact existed in Japanese films and foreign films distributed in Japan since the turn of the century.

This argument is not a new one and has also been made for silent films in general, since actors and actresses had always “spoken” in films before the coming of sound. However, in the case of Japan, the argument takes on a new dimension as illustrated by the art of the Katsuben. As we will see, many factors delayed the arrival of sound in Japan, but there is little doubt that the Katsuben, and the influence they exercised throughout the first thirty years of the industry, was the strongest of these factors.

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I am extremely fond of the Russian Avant-Garde movement that took place in Russia at the beginning of the 20th century, especially between 1905 and 1920. This was a period of great upheaval and changes. And change usually leads to the creation of rich and interesting experiences. Painters of that time such as Kandinsky, Rodchenko, Malevich, Goncharova, Shevchenko, Chagall, Exter, Rozanova created a mix of French Cubism and Italian Futurism which reflected their desire to blend folk culture with modernism and the pursuit of abstraction. It is beautiful to see how the architects and designers of that time came up with the most amazing visions and representations of the future, most of which would unfortunately remain at the concept stage. But ultimately, what interests me the most in this movement is the artists’ thirst for the future, their desire to reach and give their Utopia a meaning.