Film critic Pauline Kael called it perhaps the greatest movie–and greatest movie folly–ever made. Its director is regarded by many as the screen`s greatest innovator.
”Citizen Kane” and Orson Welles? Good guesses, but incorrect. The key hint is ”folly.” There have been many flawed masterpieces in film history, but few can rival the vision, craft and influence of D. W. Griffith`s
”Intolerance.”
This seldom-exhibited 1916 film will be shown at the Film Center of the Art Institute Tuesday as a prelude to a lecture a week later by Dr. Michael Rogin of the University of California, Berkeley. Rogin will speak–also at the Film Center–on the images of women in the film and their relationship to Griffith`s cinematic techniques.
Said to have been made partly in response to his controversial but hugely successful ”The Birth of a Nation,” ”Intolerance” really is four movies in one, each with its own time period and plot, but all revolving around the theme of ”how hatred and intolerance have battled against love.”
Through the use of crosscutting from scene to scene, which Griffith mastered in ”The Birth of a Nation,” the four stories are weaved together in a film fugue of sorts. The complex style and length (nearly three hours in the Film Center version) were disconcerting to audiences of the day, and
”Intolerance” failed at the box office, never reaping a return on the near $2.5 million production cost.
Despite its sometimes confusing storytelling and dated plot devices, Griffith`s bravura moviemaking stands out more today than when originally presented.
The Babylonian story, filmed on a mile-deep set complete with 100-foot pillars, begins with a tremendous moving camera shot swooping down on the proceedings. Also well-known and imitated was Griffith`s dramatic use of the close-up, as in that of a young woman`s trembling hands as she hears her husband being sentenced to death.
”Intolerance” had a literal cast of thousands, some 400 for one day`s shooting, and included Mae Marsh, Erich von Stroheim and Lillian Gish.
The Film Center will be showing a tinted print, a feature common to the early films, and a technique originally done by hand. For those with access to a projector, the Chicago Public Library Cultural Center has a copy of
”Intolerance” available for loan.
What: D. W. Griffith`s ”Intolerance”
Where: Film Center of the School of the Art Institute, Columbus Drive at Jackson Boulevard (443-3737).
When: Film at 6 p.m. Tuesday; lecture at 7 p.m. April 9.
How much: $3.50 for each; lecture free for members.
