User:Cstickel(byu)/sandbox/Mormon cinema notes-1

"Jane Austen in Mollywood: Mainstreaming Mormonism in Andrew Black's Pride & Prejudice," Juliette Wells ✔

 * The 2003 crossover film Pride & Prejudice: A Latter-day Comedy avoided direct references to Mormonism (p. 164) ✔
 * "it avoids explicitly mentioning the words 'Mormon' and 'Latter-Day Saints,' even in scenes where characters attend church, and remains coy about the name of the university (presumably BYU) that its main characters attend." (p. 164)
 * Andrew Black, the film's director, wanted to "make a film that appeal[ed] to both insiders and outsiders," and have Mormon culture serve as "just a backdrop." (p. 163) ✔
 * LDS film directors since 2000 have been attempting to appeal to a wider, national audience (p. 165) ✔
 * Some scholars have argued that the quality of LDS cinema has plateaued thanks to both directors and audiences "ascertain[ing] what is morally wrong in films they see, and remain[ing] uninterested in seeking out, discriminating, or creating what is right (morally or aesthetically) in film." (p. 166) ✔

"What is Mormon Cinema?: Defining the Genre," Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, Randy Astle ✔

 * There are 4,591 entries of film or television shows in the Mormon Literature and Creative Arts Database (p. 18) ✔
 * "But by 1928 the Cleveland Ohio News christened the film All Faces West, produced primarily by non-Mormons under official guidance from Church leaders, "the first Mormon picture," (p. 18-19)
 * "along with music and temple architecture, [film] is the most prominent Mormon art form," (p. 19) ✔
 * In 2000, Preston Hunter and Thomas Baggaley created ldsfilm.com, "an online repository for everything related to Mormon film" (p. 22) ✔
 * This site provided a place for "a Mormon film community" to form (p. 22) ✔
 * It helped visitors stay apprised of upcoming LDS movies (p. 22) ✔
 * There is plenty of debate surrounding what should and should not be classified as "Mormon cinema." For example, Don Bluth's animated films, such as The Land Before Time (1988) and Anastasia (1997), carry some themes and undertones that coincide with the director's religion, but lack overtly LDS characteristics (p. 29-32) ✔
 * Preston Hunter, one of the creators of ldsfilm.com, limits the definition of Mormon cinema to films released commercially, both made by members of the Church and featuring "overtly Latter-day Saint characters or themes." (p. 22-23) ✔
 * This would exclude Brigham Young (1940) because its director, Henry Hathaway, was not a member of the Church. This film, however, harbors obvious Mormon aspects; church leaders at the time even had a hand in its production (p.25) ✔
 * Some Mormon films are marketed differently to the larger market than they are to their niche audience. The national release DVD cover of the 2001 murder mystery Brigham City, for example, featured "blood and much more implied violence" than the cover released to the Mormon Corridor (p. 25) ✔
 * Films such as Out of Step and Saints and Soldiers explore LDS characters expanding out into the world beyond "the Mormon heartland." (p. 39)
 * The cult classic Napoleon Dynamite, made by Mormons, "created a nationwide fad with its vocabulary, heightened and stylized language based in actual Mormon profanity like "gosh," "heck," "freakin'," "retarded," "sweet," "dang," "fat lard," and the less-common "butt-load." (p. 41)
 * Films that center themselves on Mormon-centric humor and vocabulary do not often find success among general audiences, who, according to Astle, "can react with incomprehension or apathy." (p. 42) ✔
 * One such film, The Singles Ward, focuses on a subgroup of Mormon culture: young adults living in Utah Valley searching for future spouses (p. 42) ✔
 * Astle writes that "many of the jokes and references [are] incomprehensible for Church members as close as Idaho, let alone India." (p. 42) ✔
 * The definition of Mormon cinema often shifts to reflect whatever is included in the annual LDS Film Festival (p. 56) ✔

"The Convert Bride and the Domestic Goddess: Refashioning Female Spirituality in Mormon Historical Films," Journal of Mormon History, Heather Bigley ✔

 * In the 1980s and 90s, the church released multiple direct-to-video films (p. 116)
 * Bigley lists a number of common locations where Mormon movies are filmed, including the Rocky Mountains, New England, New York City, and Los Angeles (p. 118) ✔
 * "As American members begin to think of themselves as part of a world-wide organization, efforts at self-definition abound." (p. 118) ✔

"The Medium is the Institution: Reflections on an Ethnography of Mormonism and Media," Mormon Studies Review, Rosemary Avance ✔

 * Particularly in the years before the internet, the church encouraged its members to look to its "correlated"—that is, church-produced—media, including "films and filmstrips," for information (p. 64) ✔

"'There is Room for Both': Mormon Cinema and the Paradoxes of Mormon Culture, BYU Studies Quarterly, Terryl L. Givens ✔

 * One Hundred Years of Mormonism was 90 minutes long and involved "a cast of over a thousand, an elaborate reconstruction of sections of Nauvoo, and four concurrently running cameras". It is considered a large-scale production for its time. (p. 194) ✔
 * In the early decades of the 20th century, Latter-day Saints were somewhat slow to adopt filmmaking as a method of storytelling; "harsh depictions" of Mormons such as A Victim of the Mormons (1911), A Mormon Maid (1917), and Trapped by the Mormons (1922) overshadowed church-produced films in the market. (p.194) ✔
 * This changed with the adoption of the Motion Picture Production Code in the 1930s, which "strictly prohibited the ridicule of religious denominations, their leaders, or adherents". The Hollywood-made 1940 film Brigham Young followed this change. (p.194) ✔
 * The Association for Mormon Letters created a film category for its AML Awards in the year 2000. (p.195) ✔
 * In 2001, the first LDS Film Festival was hosted in Provo, Utah (p.195) ✔
 * Comedy satire films like The Singles Ward (2002), The R.M. (2003), and The Home Teachers (2004) hosted a score of niche vocabulary and cultural humor (p. 195-196) ✔
 * These films proved to be popular among LDS audiences. Givens attributes this success to the films' capitalizing on the market's wish to see their "distinctive eccentricities" represented on the screen. He writes: "The popularity of these comedic films seems in part to derive from a people hungry for entertainment that validates their own cultural specificity. Like insiders to a private joke, Mormons can comfortably laugh at a genre that … promotes Mormon cohesion and reifies and confirms Mormon self-definition" (p. 196) ✔

"The Threat of Mormon Cinema," AML Annual, 2004, Gideon O. Burton ✔

 * "Mormon movies have been around almost since the inception of the medium—if one counts institutional films produced and distributed by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints." (p.200) ✔
 * Animation has found its place within the Mormon subgenre, with Richard Rich and Jared Brown's company Living Scriptures creating "at least thirty-five half-hour animated films, half of which are based on the Book of Mormon or LDS Church history or leaders." (p.200)
 * God's Army "was the first successful commercially released Mormon feature; it was not the first." (p.200) ✔
 * Lester Card's Corianton: A Story of Unholy Love was the first film within the Mormon niche to be commercially released, but it disappointed both the audience and its investors (p.200) ✔
 * The Other Side of Heaven was "largely blanched of its specifically Mormon content in order to accommodate a larger national distribution." (p.200)
 * "Mormonism is coming out of obscurity as a culture with its own stories and storytelling due to independent Mormon film." (p.202)

"A History of Mormon Cinema," BYU Studies Quarterly, Randy Astle and Gideon O. Burton ✔

 * On the day the film Brigham Young was released in 1940, a celebration was held in Salt Lake City (p.13) ✔
 * In 1913, the film One Hundred Years of Mormonism was made by the church (p.14)
 * By the time making films became a possibility, a major shift had occurred in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from "inward isolation to outward accommodation." In the 1890s, the practice of plural marriage had ended, and Utah became a U.S. state. (p.20) ✔
 * At first, Mormons were warned against the detrimental effect of film on society (p.21) ✔

"A History of Mormon Cinema: First Wave" ✔

 * From 1916 to 1929, brothers Shirl and Chet Clawson made the first documentary-style films for the LDS Church. (p.24) ✔
 * The 1920s saw a boom in theater construction in Utah and Mormon moviegoers (p.25-26) ✔
 * One Hundred Years of Mormonism "[followed] the Church from Joseph Smith's infancy to the development of modern Utah." (p.36) ✔
 * Only a few minutes of the film survive (p.37) ✔
 * Brothers Chester and Shirley Clawson became prominent 1920s Mormon filmmakers by recording the church's General Conference, LDS landmarks (such as Temple Square), and the everyday lives of general authorities of the church (p.38-39) ✔
 * They did this for 13 years, "creating a priceless visual record of the Church" (p.42), but most of their work was destroyed in a fire in 1929 (p.43) ✔

"A History of Mormon Cinema: Second Wave" ✔

 * In the 1930s and 1940s, film became a key component of Latter-day Saint life (p.45) ✔
 * The 1940 film Brigham Young, developed by Twentieth Century Fox, became the film with "the largest premiere in American history to that point." (p.49-50) ✔
 * The church embarked on the journey of larger-scale film production after Wetzel Whitaker, an animator at Walt Disney Studios and a member of the church, spearheaded the creation of the Welfare Films, a series of short features depicting the Church Welfare Program. (p.71)
 * One major step towards greater film autonomy for the church was the creation of the BYU Motion Picture Department in the 1950s (p.73-75) ✔

"A History of Mormon Cinema: Third Wave" ✔

 * In the 1960s, Judge Whitaker directed Johnny Lingo, which became "the most popular institutional film in the history of the Church." (p.78)
 * In 1958, the BYU Motion Picture Department became the BYU Motion Picture Studio (p. 80) ✔
 * Judge and Scott Whitaker made multiple films for the church at the BYU MPS (p.78-81)
 * Including Man's Search for Happiness, which was shown at the 1964 New York World's Fair (p.82)
 * The LDS film industry became much more established in the 1950s-70s, especially under the influence of David O. McKay and Judge Whitaker (p.95) ✔

"A History of Mormon Cinema: Fourth Wave" ✔

 * In the 1980s and 90s, LDS director Kieth Merrill released titles such as Mr. Krueger's Christmas and Legacy—larger-scale films than those made in previous decades (p.97-99)
 * The church made its own audiovisual department in 1991, and the BYU MPS became the Latter-day Saint Motion Picture Studio (p.107-108)
 * Following this transition, films such as The Mountain of the Lord and The Lamb of God were created (p.109)

"A History of Mormon Cinema: Fifth Wave" ✔

 * In more recent decades, Mormon-made and -themed films produced neither by the church nor by big Hollywood film studios have garnered recognition among LDS audiences (p.127) ✔
 * One notable example is God's Army, director Richard Dutcher's 2000 film depicting LDS missionaries in Los Angeles, California. Dutcher created God's Army after he realized the potential for a Mormon niche within the film industry (p.136-137)
 * The financial success of God's Army paved the way for a range of new Mormon-centric films to enter the market, from the Disney-distributed The Other Side of Heaven to the Utah cultural comedy The Singles Ward. (p.136-138)
 * The cult classic Napoleon Dynamite, released in 2004, began as a short student film (p.149)
 * The success of the niche market slowed around 2005; many directors and movie-goers lost enthusiasm for the subgenre (p.144-146)

Author description=Irreantum magazine's Film and Photography Editor; graduate of the London Film School; screenwriter, director, and producer

"Establishing Shot: The Scope of Mormon Cinema," BYU Studies Quarterly, Gideon O. Burton ✔

 * "some three thousand films have been made by and about Latter-day Saints …" (p.5)
 * Film has played an integral role in how the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints instructs both its members and visitors (p.6)
 * The LDS Film Festival was born in 2001 (p.7) ✔
 * In the 1910s, Latter-day Saints responded to what they felt were sensationalist films made about Mormons by making their own films about the church, such as One Hundred Years of Mormonism (1913). (p.8)
 *  Author description=Assistant Professor of English at BYU