Lost Horizon, based on the 1931 novel by James Hilton, cost Columbia 2.5 million dollars, making it the most expensive American film up until 1937. And it was indeed heavily marketed as the mightiest picture of all time, promising adventure, escapism and grandiose visions of utopia. The reputation that Frank Capra obtained thanks to the success of Mr Deeds goes to Town (36) and It happened one night (34) allowed him to get the green light for this extravagant production about a group of men, and one woman, who are kidnapped in Shanghai and taken to the lost city of Shangri-La. There they discover a utopic society deprived of the ills and evils of modern society, a peaceful and fulfilled community that will put to the test each of the character’s resolve, personality and willingness to rediscover traditional values.
In spite of the escapist and moral nature of its theme, Lost Horizon was a commercial failure, and the critics were not too impressed either. In a similar fashion to Things to Come (36), Lost Horizon’s ambitious theme scared many who probably saw communist propaganda in it, and was most likely regarded as too naïve by others. Yet, its message, while clearly self-indulgent at times, is a powerful one that has even more significance today. The increasing power of global markets and the dominance of capitalism at the expense of basic human rights and values was already an important and scary theme to some at the beginning of the 20th century, and even more so after the crash of 1929, and yet, today, in a world where there is plenty of evidence of rising inequalities, the message of Lost Horizon continues to be perceived as naïve…

Just Imagine, strongly influenced by Hugh Ferriss’s book, Metropolis of Tomorrow (1929), takes the archetype vision of the future city as defined by a Manhattan-like skyline, and portrays it in all its beauty and majesty. Ferris was America’s most celebrated architectural conjurer of ideal cities of the future and saw in the skyscraper city the ideal form of utopic betterment.

As with High Treason, the city of Just Imagine is buzzing with activity, lights and motion. Cars are everywhere and walkways and bridges saturate the entire skyline. Celluloid Skyline: New York and the Movies states that ‘where Metropolis seems inspired by lower Manhattan, with its angular streets and closely packed towers, Just Imagine’s city suggests midtown, its layout of buildings and avenues more regular and widely spaced’ . Indeed, while its skyscrapers, some of which seem to grow on top of existing structures and buildings, reach high in the sky, the space and airy feel that exists inside the city reminds us that this film (also inspired by the work of the Italian Futurist Antonio Sant’Elia) is overall quite positive and optimistic in its outlook.

Excerpt from Architectural Representations of the City in Science Fiction Cinema.

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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‘Either our actions are determined, in which case we are not responsible for them, or they are the results of random events, in which case we are not responsible for them’
Hume
At the core of most paradoxes lie unresolved contradictions. Douglas Sirk was a man in search of ambiguity, most likely due to his own ‘split’ character, even though he never said so in so many words. But it is difficult to imagine a straight and undivided personality seeking, time after time, to populate his work with tormented and ambiguous characters. Even less likely is the idea of a happy and content artist constantly creating situations in which his characters find themselves trapped, constrained, and with nowhere to go except back to the beginning. This inability to confront and to deal with one’s own predicament, or worse, to slowly become aware of it only to attempt a mediocre and inappropriate escape, results in the failure of a human being to transcend his or her space and to ascend to betterment. Whether this interest in failure and the ambiguity that lies in many people originated in Sirk’s experiences in Nazi Germany or from some more innate predisposition (probably a combination of both), it nevertheless instilled in him a cynicism and love of irony, which, combined with a masterly craftsmanship for mise-en-scene and for working with actors, resulted in some very powerful works that could operate on different levels.
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Things to Come is a masterpiece of British Cinema. Based on H.G Wells’ story The Shape of Things to Come, it offers a utopian vision of the future filled with ideas and concepts that, in spite of the fact that we now know that some of these propositions were naive, are staggering in their seriousness and realization.

Often to the dismay and irritation of the cast and crew, Wells was involved in all aspects of the production of Things to Come. This is a project that was very close to his heart and he was keen on making sure that the result would be an appropriate visualization of his ideas and values. Previous screen adaptations of his work had left him unimpressed (First Men in the Moon 1919, The Island of Lost Souls 1932 and The Invisible Man 1933, among others), branding them as amateurish works. Yet, he maintained an admiration and respect for the cinematic medium and saw Things to Come as the opportunity of a lifetime (especially that he was nearing 70 at that time).

He was given almost unlimited powers (plus a substantial sum of money) by Alexander Korda, the Hungarian-born head of London Films who in the 30’s and 40’s would be responsible for many British classics. Fascinated by Wells’ mind, Korda agreed to finance the most expensive British film to date, with a budget close to £300,000.00 and a shooting schedule of one year. The film was marketed as Britain’s answer to Hollywood, a proof that the British film industry could compete with its American counterpart. It was also portrayed as a boost to the economy, bringing hundreds of new jobs for the building of the sets and for some of the scenes in the film.A remarkable aspect of this production, and a substantial contributor to its success (in the context of film history only since it achieved relatively poor commercial success), is the number of personalities and ‘experts’ who contributed to the film. William Cameron Menzies was brought on board to direct. A master visualizer, the recipient of the first Academy Award for ‘Interior Decoration’ and practically the father of the storyboard, Menzies had become famous in Hollywood for his abilities to translate scripts into powerful visual realizations. Menzies would go on to become Hollywood’s first ‘Production Designer’. Vincent Korda, Alexander’s brother, was hired as set designer, and is responsible for the majority of the visual language of the film. A major aspect of his strength as set designer was his ability to collect and compile design and architectural styles and influences and merge them together to create an outstanding final product. As such, one can detect in the many facets of the design of Things to Come various influences, and in some cases, direct contributions, from several masters of that time: Bel Geddes’ streamline concepts influenced the designs of the bombers and tanks as well as various shapes in the interior decoration, Fernand Leger provided ideas for some of the costumes and concepts, Le Corbusier’s work inspired the design of the city of the future with its suspended gardens, much of the furniture design came from Oliver Hill and Laszlo Moholy-Nagy brought his skills to the design of some of the machinery and various objects.

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Many have declared that had Vigo’s life not been unfortunately cut short at the age of 29, he would have surely gone on to become one of cinema’s undisputed masters. L’Atalante certainly offers several touches of genius and has its fair share of beautiful and poetic shots. Vigo seemed interested in trying out various ideas, mixing genres and using an array of different camera angles. There is enough in this film to warrant the claim that he was indeed destined for greatness. But he hadn’t reached that point yet and L’Atalante can sometimes be a reminder of this fact.

Based on the play by George Bernard Shaw (who also wrote the screenplay), Pygmalion is a well-crafted film with outstanding dialogues and solid acting. Funny, emotional and highly entertaining.

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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Did the world ever design anything more beautiful than what was created in the US between 1930 and 1955? I tend to think not, at least not as part of a well-defined style as was the case with the Streamline Style of that period. The Streamline Style stood for mobility, speed, efficiency, luxury and hygiene, concepts that were all identified with modernity. It was also the symbol of mass consumption, which Americans were ready to embrace at the beginning of the 30s and after World War II. Once again, what fascinates me here is this embrace of a dream, this thirst to create the perfect city of the future, this belief that all will be well and that the times ahead will only bring prosperity and happiness. In addition, of course, to a design philosophy which appeals completely to my sense of aesthetics. People like Bell Geddes, Teague, Mendelsohn, Dreyfuss and Loewy tried to create a society where form and function would merge to create the most inspiring experiences.