The Importance Of Colour In 'Redskin'

'Redskin' is a 1929 film which was an early example of the use of two-strip technicolour in film. Not only was this use of colour important with regards to the great advances of filming techniques but would prove crucial to enhancing the experience and message behind this film in particular.
To begin with, the title itself can be disected to highlight its importance with regards to the motivation behind the film and the film's plot. It was part of a revolution in film theory that was tired of the stereotypical and prejudiced depiction of the Native American in cinema as the nomadic savage. 'Redskin' aimed to present a more true to life representation of the Native American man with full intelligence and humanity through the character of Wing Foot (as played by Richard Dix). Whilst some may view the title of 'Redskin' perhaps as stereotyping in itself, it is through a watching of the film, that we the audience see Wing Foot boldy procclaiming that he is "Proud to be a Redskin" after a vicious entounter with his fellow prejudiced white students has caused him to want to return to his true roots. Therefore the importance of colour in the title can arguably be said to encourage pride in the Native American culture as opposed to an attempt at stereotyping.
The most noticeable use of colour in the film is without question, the use of colour during the scenes with the Native tribes and the outdoors which is used to directly contrast the black and white of the scenes in the city, school and university. Whilst some accounts of the film detail that this was purely for reasons of budget constraints, I argue that this was a deliberately iconic use of colour decision made by the director. The black and white of the city can be seen to extenuate the dull oppressiveness of the white man's culture through the eyes of the Natives in comparison to their previous, nature-filled surroundings. This is the most obvious metaphor to highlight with regards to the absence of colour, a more subtle angle could be to highlight the notion that as he has tried to assimilate so hard into this society, he is no longer recogniseable as a Native American. This notion is also carried through the fact that Dix himself was a white actor, when he first returns home to his father, he is clearly pale-faced, however, in a key use of makeup colour, the longer he spends in the wilderness, the darker and redder his skin turns, showing that he is returning to his Native roots.
The tribal grounds themselves are full of colour, red is particularly dominant on clothing and rugs perhaps to highlight the notion of pride in being a 'redskin' but also to display that they are a vibrant culture and firmly stand out in the dull and arid dirt desert. It is also key to note that whenever the white charatcers are on the tribal lands, their costumes are usually of dull pastal colours again as a deliberate attempt to display that the important characters that the audience should focus on are the Natives.
It is clear that the importance of colour as symbolism is still important and a great cinematic technique thanks to this example in 'Redskin'. Without it, such films as 'Sin City' or 'Sophie Schroll: The Final Days' would never have existed.

D.W.Griffith: A Man of Vision and Contradiction

Upon the study of Griffith’s contribution to cinematic history, it is evident that he was a very contradictory man, as described by David A. Cook;
‘a provincial southern romantic with pretensions to high literacy culture and a penchant for...melodrama’. Here we already see a form of contradiction in terms as melodrama was viewed by some of being of a lower class of literature and the 'pretentions' in Cook's description make it sound as though Griffith was far from being as clever as he believed himself to be.
Each film he released seemed to drastically oppose the other, an early film of his called ‘The Rose of Kentucky’ centres around a southern man who refuses to join the Klu Klux Klan and in fact fights against them. To have 'The Rose of Kentucky' to be followed by‘The Birth of a Nation’, a very openly racist film which glorifies the KKK is truely a bizzare progression. It is also equally difficult to determine exactly what precise vision Griffith truly had for his films. Whilst he seemed one minute to revel in the storm of controversy that ‘Birth of a Nation’ had created, he then complained that people were not admiring its technical expertise and historical accuracy.
Two of Griffith's films after "Birth of a Nation" also seem to be some sort of attempt at repentance for the offence he caused with it. "Intollerance" is a profoundly anti-war film that observes the battles in history of various nations, whilst the lower-key "Broken Blossoms" highly romanticises the grace and gentleness of the Chinese culture as embodied by the store owner who looks after the young girl who is abused by her father. Griffith even goes so far as to make the white male father the villain of the piece as opposed to the Chinese man, one could argue, however, that despite an attempt to show his humanity, Griffith has still fallen back onto the use of a stereotype as the actor playing the Chinese was infact white and made to look like a stereotypical image of a Chinese person.
Many film critics and students are too quick to dismiss Griffith's work due to the high level of racism. I believe, however, that whilst the open display of vile prejudice and vulgar spin on history, ‘The Birth of a Nation’, should be recognised first asGriffith’s vision to prove to the world that film could be used as an art form to deftly convey a comprehensive narrative to an audience that would evoke great reaction and discussion, whilst thoroughly displaying his brilliance of mastering new filming techniques that had never been seen before. It is evident that Griffith has achieved this as to this date it is cited as one of the most important films ever made and can still provoke discussion and debate. Griffith’s overtly grand and extravagant vision with regards to the study of ‘The Birth of a Nation’ has done nothing to effect his great achievements that the history of cinema should recognise for pushing the boundaries of what could be done with film that would pave the way for everything to come afterwards.

Film Fanatic Intorduction!

Hi everyone! Oli here! I'm from Swansea University in the UK here at WSU for an exchange year and seriously already LOVE English 339 as anyone will tell you I'm OBSESSED with films! I also do the film reviews for The Daily Evergreen and back home in Swansea I ran the Film Section of the newspaper there called The Waterfront. I've even been very lucky enough to have a mini-scetion of my writing published in a UK magazine called Total Film. My fave film genres are horror and comedy and anything that's abit weird and left of centre! Fave directors are Tim Burton, Quentin Tarantino, Sam Raimi, Christopher Nolan, Edgar Wright, Peter Jackson, John Carpenter, Martin Scorsese, David Fincher, Kevin Smith and The Coen Brothers.

Plus here's a list of my fave films!:
Sweeney Todd:The Demon Barber Of Fleet Street, The Dark Knight, Donnie Darko, Repo! The Genetic Opera, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Shaun of the Dead, Ghostbusters, The Evil Dead Trilogy, Drag Me To Hell, [REC], Inglorious Basterds, Ginger Snaps, This Is Spinal Tap, Beetlejuice, Sleepy Hollow, Ed Wood, Mars Attacks!, The Hangover, In Bruges, Watchmen, Batman, Batman Returns, Edward Scissorhands, The Corpse Bride, The Life of Brian, Control, Coraline, Hot Fuzz, Tropic Thunder, Kiss Kiss (Bang Bang), Dodgeball, Anchorman, Snakes on a Plane, Being John Malkovich, Suspiria, Serenity, The Thing, Escape from New York, Star Wars Trilogy, Pirates of the Carribean Trilogy, 30 Days Of Night, Sunshine, Little Miss Sunshine, Garden State, The Big Lebowski, The Crow, Moulin Rouge!, Sin City, Back to the Future Trilogy, Batman Begins, The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, Braindead, No Country For Old Men, The Adams Family 1 and 2, Fargo, American Psyco, Bram Stoker's Dracula, Whithnail and I, Pulp Fiction, Resevoir Dogs, Kill Bill, Blade Runner, A Clockwork Orange, Night Watch and Day Watch, Clerks1&2, Alien and Aliens, A Nightmare On Elm Street, Sherlock Holmes, Fight Club, Zodiac, Grindhouse, Halloween, Night, Dawn, Land and Diary Of The Dead, Team America:World Police, Pan's Laberynth, Se7en, Saw Series, South Park Movie, The Running Man( Best Worst Film Ever!!!)