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Mark Twain Forum <[log in to unmask]>
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Joe Alvarez <[log in to unmask]>
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Thu, 25 Aug 2016 17:59:40 -0400
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My apologies to Professor Hochbruck and the Forum for my error in naming him "Wohlbruck." I was just a bit careless and regret my error.

Thank you.

Joe Alvarez
900 Havel Court
Charlotte, NC 28211-4253
Telephone: 704.364.2844
FAX: 704.364.9348

Sent from my iPad

> On Aug 25, 2016, at 12:09 PM, Bliss, Donald <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Glen M Johnson [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
> Sent: Thursday, August 25, 2016 11:22 AM=0A=
> To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: Re: Life on the Mississippi passage
> 
> I don't know if anyone has made this correction:
> 
> A jump cut in film is not a series of directional shots gradually moving
> into a particular location. It is a "bad edit": the picture "jumps" in a
> way that looks like a bad splice. As Wikipedia correctly puts it:
> "sequential shots of the same subject are taken from camera positions that
> vary only slightly. . . . gives the effect of jumping forwards in time."
> 
> Jump cut is a meta- technique rooted in the old days when film broke and
> was spliced by removing a few frames.
> 
> The technique of moving in on a location through a series of ever-closer
> shots is something different, traditional and conventional.
> 
> To see the gradual-closing-in technique, look at the opening of Hitchcock's
> "Shadow of a Doubt." To see jump cuts, see the newsreel at the start of
> Welles's "Citizen Kane."
> 
> 
> Glen M. Johnson
> Professor and Chair of English
> The Catholic University of America
> Washington, DC  20064
> 202 319-5488, 202 238-2028
> 
> On Thu, Aug 25, 2016 at 11:09 AM, Wolfgang Hochbruck <
> [log in to unmask]> wrote:
> 
>> ...true -- and the LoM passage might be read as sequential
>> jump-cuts alright. But a _really_ cameratic zoom-in is
>> difficult to do in literary fiction (and i am still trying
>> to figure out HOW Belasco did it at the beginning of _The
>> Girl of the Golden West_). It is possible and has been done
>> in stream-of-consciousness passages of modern novels, but
>> in the 19th c. conventional syntax structures would still
>> have blocked that route.
>> 
>> best,
>> w
>> 
>> On Thu, 25 Aug 2016 09:58:25 -0500
>> Kevin Mac Donnell <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>> Are we talking about a zoom-in (a single camera moving
>>> in) or a sequence of
>>> jump cuts, each one closer to the scene of action? They
>>> are not the same.
>>> 
>>> Kevin
>>> @
>>> Mac Donnell Rare Books
>>> 9307 Glenlake Drive
>>> Austin TX 78730
>>> 512-345-4139
>>> Member: ABAA, ILAB
>>> *************************
>>> You may browse our books at:
>>> www.macdonnellrarebooks.com
>>> 
>>> 
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: Hal Bush
>>> Sent: Thursday, August 25, 2016 7:56 AM
>>> To: [log in to unmask]
>>> Subject: Re: Life on the Mississippi passage
>>> 
>>> Yes!  Joe & Wolfgang; even more specifically; a zoom-in,
>>> establishing shot.
>>> 
>>> Psycho!  good one!  also thought of:  The Birdcage
>>> (terrific opening zoom
>>> right into the club); Saturday Night Fever (not exactly
>>> zoom in); The Dark
>>> Knight; (are there others?)
>>> 
>>> Alternatively: there is the amazing scene in Gandhi
>>> zooming out from the
>>> funeral.
>>> 
>>> -hb
>>> 
>>> On Thu, Aug 25, 2016 at 4:08 AM, Wolfgang Hochbruck <
>>> [log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>> 
>>>> ...actually, I feel like i should chime in here because
>>> Joe said "Zoom
>>>> in" first, and then "establishing shot", and he is
>>> right on both counts,
>>>> only that narratologically "establishing  shot" is the
>>> general category,
>>>> including also bird's eye, pan(orama) shot etc.  The
>>> really wild thing
>>>> is that what Twain uses here - and what Belasco adapted
>>> for the theatre
>>>> -- is really a cameratic technique before any camera
>>> could do something
>>>> like it. Like with a number of other developments, the
>>> technology here
>>>> followed the writer's imagination.
>>>> 
>>>> best  wishes,
>>>> w
>>>> 
>>>> Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Hochbruck
>>>> Department of English /
>>>> Centre for Security and Society
>>>> Albert Ludwigs University
>>>> 15 Rempart St.
>>>> D- 79098 Freiburg
>>>> 
>>>> Am 25.08.2016 08:18, schrieb Joe Alvarez:
>>>>> Establishing shot, that's probably the closest one
>>> yet. The description
>>>> from=3D
>>>>>  Life on the Mississippi reminds me of the
>>> opening--establishing
>>>> shot--of Al=3D
>>>>> fred Hitchcock's Psycho.
>>>>> 
>>>>> Joe Alvarez
>>>>> 900 Havel Court
>>>>> Charlotte, NC 28211-4253
>>>>> Telephone: 704.364.2844
>>>>> FAX: 704.364.9348
>>>>> 
>>>>> Sent from my iPad
>>>>> 
>>>>>> On Aug 25, 2016, at 1:47 AM, Peter Salwen
>>> <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>>>>> =3D20
>>>>>> What you called the"birds-eye view" might also be
>>> called an
>>>>>> establishing
>>>>>> shot
>>>>>> Not by Twain, though.
>>>>>> =3D20
>>>>>> On Aug 25, 2016 1:27 AM, "Joe Alvarez"
>>> <[log in to unmask]>
>>>> wrote:
>>>>>> =3D20
>>>>>> How about "zoom in"? That is what is happening in
>>> your description.
>>>>>> =3D20
>>>>>> Joe Alvarez
>>>>>> 900 Havel Court
>>>>>> Charlotte, NC 28211-4253
>>>>>> Telephone: 704.364.2844
>>>>>> FAX: 704.364.9348
>>>>>> =3D20
>>>>>> Sent from my iPad
>>>>>> =3D20
>>>>>>> On Aug 24, 2016, at 8:33 PM, Wesley Britton
>>> <[log in to unmask]>
>>>> wrote:
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> I have a question about one passage in Life on the
>>> Mississippi. I
>>>> suspect=3D
>>>>>> i=3D3D
>>>>>> t
>>>>>>> will be very familiar to many of you.
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> It's the passage where we first get a birds-eye
>>> view of a place along
>>>> the=3D
>>>>>>> river before Twain narrows his focus to one town,
>>> then one street,
>>>>>>> then
>>>>>> on=3D3D
>>>>>> e
>>>>>>> house, then a sleeping man on a porch.
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> Back in grad school, a professor used a term to
>>> define this technique
>>>> of
>>>>>>> moving from the general to the specific, but I
>>> can't figure out now
>>>> what
>>>>>>> term he meant.
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> Any ideas?
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> Dr. Wesley Britton
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> Author, Beta-Earth Chronicles
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> www.drwesleybritton.com
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>>>>>> =3D3D20
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> --
>>> Prof. Harold K. Bush
>>> Professor of English
>>> 3800 Lindell
>>> Saint Louis University
>>> St. Louis, MO  63108
>>> 314-977-3616 (w); 314-771-6795 (h)
>>> <www.slu.edu/x23809.xml>
>> 
>> Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Hochbruck
>> Dept. of English / Centre for Security and Society
>> Albert Ludwigs University Freiburg
>> Rempart St. 15
>> D-79098 Freiburg
>> Germany
>> 

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