New York School of Indies

• Disproportionately large number if indie directors from NY

• Graduates from film schools like NYU, Columbia.

• 1980’s innovative cinema emerged from the East Village NY.

• “We all had a similar sensibility, a combination of alienation and humor and a kind of low-key passion.”

-----Richard Edson

Susan Seidelman and Spike Lee were also part of this world

Jim Jarmusch

• Stranger than Paradise was not marketed towards a niche like other later indies.

• Won the 1984 Camera d’ Or in Cannes and later shown at the New York Film Festival

• Established Jarmusch as one of the most hip indie directors of the 80’s

Financial Success

• Jarmusch was courted by Hollywood to make teen films

• “It made me wonder if anyone had even seen Stranger than Paradise”

• He went on to make Down by Law and then Mystery Train

Disdain for overdramatic style of Hollywood Film

• “--While watching one is always thinking about actors as actors and not really as characters”

• Rich black and white and deep tones and deep focus in Down by Law allowed the audience to see the action and reactions of the audience

• Change from standard reverse angle Hollywood

miscommunication

• Sealed off from one another• Only link through pop culture• Living in a world devoid of values, his

characters seek the shelter of comfort and familiarity (Screamin’ Jay Hawkins)

• Despite the difficulties in communication presented in the film a benign, socially conscious poetry makes its way into the film

Stranger than Paradise

• Single long lasting shots• Not much happens in terms of plot• Structure in terms of place• No structure in terms of character

development (though some interactions are charming and unexpected)

• “It’s funny, You come to something new and everything looks the same.”

Absurdist ending

• Proves that America is the Land of Opportunity

• Tradition of storytelling where the universe’s meaninglessness is pointed out through unlikely storytelling (parody, or dismissal of realism)

• They all end up going in opposite directions-- Alienation (Ironically the character who denied his background ends up back in Hungary)

Hal Hartley

• Has been compared to Jarmusch, Linklater, and Stillman

• His influence can be seen in current directors like Wes Anderson, David O’ Russel, Jason Reitman, Jenji Cohan, Sam Mendes, and the late Adrienne Shelley to name a few

Themes and Aesthetic

• “Hartley’s inquiries into the burdens of desire and duty are as lyrical as they are comic”

• Journey of odd characters toward a self-awareness and maturity

• Out of sync characters bounce off one another and the offbeat oppositions produce unexpected results

• At the end of each film, a new couple emerges rather hesitantly into an unstable relationship

• He has maintained absolute creative freedom• In ten years he made 7 features

Different approach and Aesthetic as Jarmusch and Seidelman

• “What David Lynch did to the time-worn mythology of of Small-Town America in Blue Velvet, Hartley has done to the supposedly barren, stifling suburbs

• They have found in them new life and humor

Humor

• Everything superfluous in the dialogue is edited out

• Extremely precise (rather than deadpan)

• “Humor derives from an inability to see the difference between the serious and the funny”

Offscreen Space and Editing

Trust, Hal Hartley

Establishing Shots

• Rarely are there establishing shots or Master shots for scenes that have two characters

• Unlike many contemporary films, there are not cuts on action or after every significant line of dialogue

Cinematography

• Many close-ups

• Shallow depth of field

• Use of offscreen space

• Shows distance between characters

Economic reasons?

• Hartley says that limiting coverage, master shots etc. allow for cheaper and faster productions

• This created a strong visual style and concept