Manhatta
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This film has been preserved in the National Film Registry in 1995. | ||
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Manhatta is a 1921 short documentary film directed by painter Charles Sheeler and photographer Paul Strand.
Why It Rocks
- As one of the first avant-garde films to reach a wide audience, it provides a lyrical vision of Manhattan, from commuters arriving at the Staten Island ferry terminal at South Ferry to the towering skyscrapers of the financial district and midtown. It's based on and titled after a poem from Walt Whitman. The short's influence on other filmmakers was enormous, and some consider it the progenitor of the “city symphonies” that appeared in the following decade. The short had a strong influence and was followed in short succession by city films from Robert Flaherty, Herman G. Weinberg, Jay Leyda, and others.
- As a silent-era film, Manhatta includes intertitles, but unlike other silent films, whose intertitles communicated plot explanations or dialogue, here they hold lines of Whitman’s verse “Mannahatta". The poet’s lines relate to the scenes beside which they appear, but they are impressionistic, lilting, fragmentary, much like the film itself.
- The short's structured as a series of vignettes, and for its art, it's also a documentary because, as previously mentioned, it leads viewers through a day in the life of Manhattan.
- Sheeler was trying to achieve impressions and effects echoed in some of his previous works, including paintings like Church Street El and photographs like "New York, Buildings in Shadow" (both 1920).
- At some point between 1919 and early 1920, Sheeler bought a 35mm motion picture camera, and he and Strand shot in and around Manhattan until the fall of 1920. Their resulting film consisted of sixty-five separate shots, arranged from morning views of commuters to a sunset view of Manhattan. While the cinematography is predictably excellent, the film’s editing scheme is equally impressive, building narrative scenes by juxtaposing shapes, movements, and shadows.
The Film