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Mar 19, 2022 · The RKO and Paramount bankruptcies were both announced during the period now widely viewed as the lowest point of the entire Great Depression — the four months between the November 8, 1932 ...
Jun 12, 2015 · In fact, “Happened” was the first film ever to sweep the Oscars in all major categories. The film begins with heiress Claudette Colbert escaping the prospect of a loveless marriage, and traveling incognito around the country with little money. She meets reporter Gable on the road, who soon discovers her identity.
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Feb 24, 1991 · Feb. 24, 1991 12 AM PT. Hollywood responded to the Great Depression almost immediately after the crash of 1929. The films produced were either “social conscious” dramas that reflected the ...
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Apr 27, 2017 · Summary. Notwithstanding remembrance of the 1930s as a golden era of iconic movies and glamorous stars, the decade was a time of crisis and transformation for Hollywood in the face of the Great Depression. An industry that had still not come to terms with the costly advent of sound technology found itself plunged into financial meltdown in 1931 ...
- Iwan Morgan
- 2018
- Introduction
- Issue Summary
- Contributing Forces
- Perspectives
- Impact
- Notable People
- Primary Sources
- Suggested Research Topics
- Bibliography
"Who's afraid of the big bad wolf? Big bad wolf, big bad wolf?" This musical line originates from the Three Little Pigs movie, produced by Walt Disney in 1933. The big bad wolf in Walt Disney's animated short film is a metaphor for the Depression of the 1930s. People needed to sing that song through the vehicle of the movie to defend against their ...
The Depression Hits Hollywood
Established beneath the San Gabriel Mountains in Southern California was a golden community known as Hollywood. Through the 1920s Hollywood had churned out thousands of silent films captivating the whole nation. Talkies, or movies with sound, premiered in 1927, as more and more Americans flocked to the theaters. Although the stock market crash of 1929 marked the beginning of the Great Depression, 110 million people still went to the movies in 1930. The introduction of sound proved enticing an...
Animated (Cartoon) Films
When Walt Disney pioneered the field of animation in the 1930s a totally different form of movie escapism was created. There are two main elements in animation: characters and background. The sketches of the animation are traced, inked and painted on transparent celluloid, also known as cells. In the meantime, the backgrounds are made to fit the various needs of the action. The completed drawings are then placed in frames below a large camera and photographed one cell at a time. Many techniqu...
At a Glance Paramount Studios
Founded in 1913 in a horse barn near Sunset and Vine streets in Los Angeles, Paramount moved to Gower Street in 1926. Today it is the longest continually operated studio in Hollywood. As Paramount Studios grew, it took over the former properties of RKO Studios. In the 1930s major stars acting in films for Paramount included Marlene Dietrich, William Powell, Gary Cooper, Clara Bow, and Claudette Colbert. One of Walt Disney's first creations, Mickey Mouse (1929) was probably more famous and fam...
Development of Motion Pictures
The geniuses of the turn of the century, including Thomas A. Edison, contributed to the invention of the gilded screen. The first motion picture was taken in 1872 by a horse. California photographer Eadweard Muybridge set up a row of 24 cameras and from the lens shutter of each he stretched a thread across the track to a fence. The horse, as it ran, broke through each thread in succession and thereby worked the shutter of each camera. By using a white horse and painting the background fence i...
Attractions of Southern California
Originally, films were produced in or around New York and Chicago. Early in the twentieth century, however, moviemakers discovered California and the bright sunshine that aided in the filming. Located in Southern California, Hollywood in a few years became the movie capital of the world. Lying northwest of downtown Los Angeles, Hollywood is a district at the foot of the Santa Monica Mountains;
More About… Movies and Movie Stars of the Great Depression
The American Film Institute(AFI) is an internationally prestigious arts organization with the purpose of advancing and preserving film, television, video, and digital moving images. AFI creates and implements programs that train visual storytellers, preserves moving images, and recognizes moving images as an art form. In 1998 AFI released a list of the one hundred greatest films made between 1915 and 1998. Fifteen hundred distinguished leaders from the American film community compiled this li...
A Necessity
For most people in the United States movies became a necessity of life during the 1930s. They would save and penny-pinch just as diligently for the price of a weekly admission ticket as for the purchase of food. Hollywood paid careful attention to what genre of movies sold the most tickets and then produced what the public wanted. Early in the 1930s gangster movies were a prime example. After the initial success of Little Caesarin 1930, approximately 50 gangster movies appeared in 1931. Why d...
Morals
Correspondingly in the early 1930s many Americans were becoming more and more alarmed at the glorification of gangsters and the ridiculing of law enforcement agencies. Other threats to the public'smoral safely such as scant clothing, vulgarity, suggestive language, reduction, and four letter curse words were decried.
More About… Movie Palaces
Part of the romance and excitement of going to the movies was to escape grinding realities of everyday life in the 1930s. Theater owners embraced showy architecture and special themes for their "movie palaces." Following the discovery of ancient Egyptian King Tutankhamun's tomb in 1922, a wave of interest swept the United States for Egyptian Revival Architecture. Movie theaters mirrored this interest with sphinxes, pharaohs, hieroglyphics, Phoenix birds, temple facades, and other elements dra...
Contributions of the Depression Period in Movies
The "Golden Age of Hollywood" emerged out of the trials of the Great Depression. The Depression audience posed a major influence on Hollywood and the kind of movies it produced. Escapism and movies with meaning replaced movies made for only entertainment value. The impacts of this area were multiple. The growth of the industry almost eliminated vaudeville and minstrel shows. Vaudeville acts were light entertainment on stage involving comedy, dancing, song, and pantomime. The acts traveled aro...
The Post-Depression Era
Success of the motion picture industry in the 1930s carried right into the 1940s. During that decade almost five hundred films were made each year. During the early 1940s 80 million people attended the movies each week. The Office of War Information labeled the movie business an essential industry for the war effort. In fact the Bureau of Motion Pictures was created to ensure only positive portrayals of the war effort were shown. Almost four hundred of the over 1,300 movies made between 1942...
Later Movies of the Depression
Few movies after the 1941 The Grapes of Wrath were centered around the theme of the Great Depression. World War II had captured the attention of Hollywood in the early 1940s ending abruptly much introspection of the period. Of note were Aunt Mame (1958) which won six Academy Award nominations including for best picture and was later remade into Mame (1974) starring Lucille Ball. The story focused on an eccentric and wealthy woman whose life changes when she becomes guardian of her late brothe...
Fred Astaire (1899–1987). Astaire was known as one of the top professional dancers of the 20th century. Astaire made some 30 movie musicals, including ten highly acclaimed films with co-star Ginger Rogers. Some of Astaire's movies included, Dancing Lady (MGM 1933), Flying Down to Rio (RKO 1933), Roberta (RKO 1935), Top Hat (RKO 1935), and Follow th...
We're In the Money
"We're in the Money" was a song from "Golddiggers" of 1933. The phrase quickly entered everyday language (from Bergman, p. 62, "We're In the Money." Music and lyrics by Harry Warren and Al Dubin. Copyright 1933, Remick Music, Inc.).
Bank Nights
Bank Nights were used as gimmicks to increase attendance at movie houses. The following article by Forbes Parkhill appeared in the Saturday Evening Post(December 4, 1937, p. 20).
Respect of the Law
Respect of the law in movies and in real life had returned by 1935 as reflected in the following item published in Timemagazine (June 1, 1936, p. 26).
Identify the impact of movies on the public as a means of escape from the economic depression existing in the country during the 1930s. How did the "movie palaces" create exotic atmospheres for the...Discuss the technological developments in photography, animation, sound, and color that enabled the movie industry to develop and grow despite the economic hard times of the Depression.Describe the economic impact that the movie industry had in the 1930s when the majority of businesses were struggling to stay afloat.Assess the role of movie stars and development of American popular culture shaped by films in the 1930s. Even when most "Westerns" were B-Movies, why were they so popular and sources of stardom for...Sources
Bergman, Andrew. We're in the Money: Depression America and Its Films.New York: New York University Press, 1971. Bondi, Victor, ed. American Decades: 1930–1939.Detroit, MI: Gale Research, Inc., 1995. Briley, Ron. "The Hollywood Feature Film as Historical Artifact," Film & History26(1–4):82–85. ——. "Reel History: U.S. History, 1932–1972, as Viewed Through the Lens of Hollywood," History Teacher23(3):215–236. Dobbs, Charles M. "Hollywood Movies from the Golden Age: An Important Resource for the...
Further Reading
Black, Shirley Temple. Child Star.New York: Warner Books, 1989. Britten, Loretta, and Sarah Brash, eds. Hard Times: The 30s.Alexandria, VA: Time-Life Books, 1998. Britten, Loretta, and Paul Mathless, eds. The Jazz Age: The 20s.Alexandria, VA: Time-Life Books, 1998. Cameron, Kenneth M. America on Film: Hollywood and American History.New York: Continuum, 1997. Dardis, Tom. Some Time in the Sun.New York: Scribner, 1976. Harmetz, Aljean. The Making of the Wizard of Oz.New York: Alfred Knopf, 1977...
This system was the essential feature of Hollywood's "classical" era, the basis for what Tino Balio has called the "grand design" of 1930s American cinema. But as we have seen, the American cinema faced myriad challenges both inside and outside the industry in 1940-1941. These would have enormous impact on the studio production system during ...
Industry revenues dropped from $720 million in 1929 to $480 million in 1933, while total company profits of $54.5 million in 1929 gave way to total company losses of $55.7 million in 1932. At the time of the stock market crash the film industry was organized by a studio system, and most of the important films produced in Hollywood in the 1930s ...
