The transition from silent film to talkie has been mentioned by many Singin' in the Rain shows the transition in a humor way.
First, the editing of films has changed a lot. The editing of silent film has more freedom without the constraints of sound. Many editing modes had been developed during the silent period, such as classic editing and theme montage. In the early stage of talkie , sounds and pictures were recorded simultaneously, which brought a big challenge to the editing job, because it was hard to maintain the continuity of sound. Many great masters gave up the fancier ways and took the most original method called ”paragraph lens”. The so-called “paragraph lens” could be understood as a full length shot without a single cut. The experimental talkie which Mr. Simpson showed at the party was “paragraph lens” without a cut or even a mirror position change.
Secondly, Mise-en-scène has changed. Mise-en-scène refers to everything that appears before the camera and its arrangement—composition, sets, props, actors, costumes, and lighting. We can see the changes of actors' stations and lighting performances in Singin' in the Rain. On the surface, acting looks like pretty easy, in fact, every step has been discussed by the directors, cinematographers and gaffers throughout. At the early stage, the microphone hairy ball has not yet been invented, so the microphone can only been hidden inside the scenery. And the microphone can't record the sounds if the actors are too far away. So the director has to consider the sound effect during Mise-en-scène. In the same time, the actors have to adjust their performing styles to keep close to the microphone when saying dialogue. In the movie,Lemon can't adjust her performing style and keep her head swaying, which results the microphone can't record her voice correctly.
Thirdly, many new stars have appeared during the transition. In this era of technological innovation, the superstars of silent films fell overnight, and some nameless actors became new stars. Silent film and talkie have different requirements for the actors. Without dialogue, the information is largely conveyed by the exaggerated body language and facial expressions. However, when the movie had sound, the complex plot could be explained clearly in two or three dialogue, the former set of methods seemed pompous and pretentious. Many famous actors of the silent era ruined their careers as they could not change their own methods of acting.
The actor's voice also plays an important role. In Singin' in the Rain, the male and female leading roles both were trained by language masters to learn how to speak clear. Although the accent and speaking skills can be acquired through hard practice, but the voice can't be changed. Some actors' voice were not very appealing or not consistent to their person temperament, on the other side, some young actors with melodious voice gained more opportunities. What's more, the heyday of musicals after the appearing of talkie had higher standard for the voice of actors.
The last but not the least, the scripts have improved a lot. We still can remember that when Gene Kelly said in the play: “I love you. I love you. I love you.”, one of the audiences said, “How can someone get paid by writing such a rubbish?” In a silent film, the role of the dialogue was reduced to a minimum which may occasionally appear in the caption card in two or three short sentences. So nobody has ever considered of pondering dialogue, so the dialogue was monotonous and crude mostly. With the appearing of talkie, the screenwriters devoted themselves to writing a good script. When the play “Dance of the Knights” was released, boring dialogue has become lyrics with rich meanings.
During the development of films, the integration of every new technology will require lots of time and practice of filmmakers. In the early stage of talkie, the directors were not very skilled of using sound, but the curiosity of the audience made the sound film a big success. The birth of new technologies leads people to think new ways of making films, evoluted the new film theory, and with the practice of filmmakers and the critics of reviewers, we find the best way to integrate the art and technology, then the movies history moves forward a big step.
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