When did movies become art?
Motion pictures began in the 1880s, but they were novelties. It was not until the 20th century that they began to have a wide following.
When did the novelty end and serious endeavors begin, and when did it become art?
Is there a film or director that can be seen as giving birth to the art?
Here is an early film from 1902.
Here is D.W. Griffith’s The Country Doctor, an early attempt at adding plot.
Finally, in 1916, D.W. Griffith came out with Intolerance, a 3 hour silent film that broke all bounds.
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9 Answers
Good entertainment has always been an art. When movies became fiscally viable, they became art.
I think movies were always art in one form or another. Art isn’t defined by how beautiful or stirring it is but by creativity. It was somebodies creative endeavor much like a marker and paper are a child’s beginning experience with art.
Perhaps they ’‘became’’ art when they started doing something different and getting out of the norm. I have no examples of this, but I’ll have to assume that at one point movies did something different. Like if you watch Gummo, it’s often described as artistic, because the movie is shown through vignettes that look like family vacation home movies. Although movies probably don’t have to have some huge visual cue for them to be labeled as art. Gummo is also fucked up in its presentation and concept, which can also be viewed as art even if you don’t ’‘see’’ it with your eyes. (basically, the movie has no point, no real story, but this serves to underline the concept of nihilism which it has as its theme)
I have a collection of old black and white movies, all horror, starting from 1920 going to 1968. When watching these, I noticed how it took very long for movies to get out of their technological rut. Then you check out stuff from the eighties to today, and technology skyrockets. We got 3D shit now. But is it all art? As art itself seems to be defined very differently to many, it still has to have one clear definition…don’t know at all where this stands in movies. But I answered to suggest that, often, when something is different, whether it catches on or not, it can often be seen as art, through lack of better defining. Not saying at all that movies can’t have true art, mind. This includes my old black and white stuff, too. Maybe it’s because I didn’t grow up with this stuff, but I find it artistic in its own way, don’t know if it’s because of how different it is from modern works that makes me think this. (there was definitely a difference between then and now when it comes to telling a story, which surely has its own artistic merits, yea?)
To answer this question, you have to first identify what makes something Art.
To my mind, it is to produce something that can effect you emotionally.
Using that definition, you have to go back to Melies or some of the early Edison films.
@filmfann, evern granting that people have struggled for centuries to define art, I’d have to differ with your definition because it leaves out any human agency. Doesn’t art have to include a creative act and intentionality? A sunset or a seashore or a flowering plant can excite an emotional response, but do you consider that art? Is a spiderweb or a butterfly’s wing art? If there’s no distinction between works of art and works of nature, how can anything at all be art?
People can also perform gruesome acts that excite horror and revulsion. Those are assuredly emotional responses. Are they works of art?
They were born as an artform, much like photography was born as an art.
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