Douglas Sirk as Auteur (Lecture)
From Screenpedia
Douglas Sirk is a director who managed to work in the studio system but still put his own personal stamp on his films.
Contents |
Chronology of Sirk's Career
- A. 1900-1987
- B. Began career in Germany
- 1. In the theater
- a. 1922-
- b. Production of Twelfth Night (1934)
- i. Led to hiring by Ufa
- ii. Year after Hitler came to power
- 2. Film career
- a. Began with shorts
- b. Feature-length films: 1935
- i. Worked in melodrama
- I. "chamber play films" = from the German Kammerspielfilm
- A. Small casts
- B. Intimate stories
- II. Established Zarah Leander's career
- A. Was known as a "woman's director" for all the work he did with female stars
- I. "chamber play films" = from the German Kammerspielfilm
- i. Worked in melodrama
- 1. In the theater
- C. Fled Germany in December 1937
- D. First US period
- 1. 1942: Hired by Columbia
- a. Hitler's Madman (released in 1943)
- i. Not well-received, bought by MGM and then rereleased
- a. Hitler's Madman (released in 1943)
- 2. Not very distinctive films
- a. E.g., Slightly French (1948)
- b. Left US after Shockproof (1949), which was the end of his Columbia contract
- 1. 1942: Hired by Columbia
- E. 1945: WWII ended
- F. 1949-50: Returned to Germany
- G. Second US period
- 1. 1950: The First Legion (released in 1951)
- 2. Hired by Universal
- a. Mostly produced by Ross Hunter
- b. Mostly shot by Russell Metty
- 3. Final film: Imitation of Life (1959)
- a. Returned to Europe
- i. To Switzerland
- a. Returned to Europe
Sirk's critical reputation
- A. Dismissed during the 1950s by US critics
- 1. Simple director of weepies
- 2. Cluttered visual style
- B. Rediscovered by auteurist critics
- 1. Late 1950s and '60s
- 2. Concentrated on his visual style
- a. Central to the meaning of the films
- i. Ex: There's Always Tomorrow (1956) featuring Fred MacMurray (who was also in Double Indemnity, The Absent-Minded Professor, and Son of Flubber) - who appears trapped by the toy factory
- I. Character trapped in middle-class life
- i. Ex: There's Always Tomorrow (1956) featuring Fred MacMurray (who was also in Double Indemnity, The Absent-Minded Professor, and Son of Flubber) - who appears trapped by the toy factory
- a. Central to the meaning of the films
- C. Similar to other '50s melodrama directors
- 1. E.g., Nicholas Ray, Otto Preminger, Vincente Minnelli
- D. Freud used to analyze '50s melodrama
- 1. Manifest dream content = The part you remember when you wake up, the real/actual part
- a. Conscious level expressed through actual film narrative
- 2. Latent dream content = Hidden/repressed desires that one often cannot know until it filters to the manifest dream content... (i.e., the conflict with middle class style in There's Always Tomorrow)
- a. ...Through
- i. Displacement = moves/transfers desire onto something safer (ex: desire to murder father but in dream murder police officer)
- ii. Condensation = bringing everything together into one thing (manifest)
- b. Hidden drives and desires of '50s society (show through visual style = displaced/condensed way to show/display)
- a. ...Through
- 1. Manifest dream content = The part you remember when you wake up, the real/actual part
Characteristics of Sirk's 1950s work
- A. Manifest, overt validation of middle-class values
- 1. E.g., remakes like Imitation of Life
- 2. Subverted through visual style
- a. Mise-en-scene
- i. Iconography of middle-class home
- I. Ex. All That Heaven Allows (1956) - older, upper class woman dating younger, lower class man: home seen as oppressive and claustrophobic
- ii. Mirrors and reflective surfaces
- iii. Windows
- I. Often trapping characters within
- iv. Lighting
- I. Somestimes expressionist
- i. Iconography of middle-class home
- a. Mise-en-scene
- B. Ex.: Written on the Wind - dysfunctional family with a troublesome daughter, love triangle, and ominous staircase
