British Silent Cinema and the Transition to Sound

近年来，数字、CGI和3D技术的出现被誉为给我们的电影体验带来了革命性的变化，但与20世纪20年代末新声音技术的影响相比，这些都算不了什么。当时，无声电影作为一种艺术形式，被有声和歌声所征服。在英国，除了希区柯克的《勒索》(1929)之外，在这个过渡时期制作的电影，有无声版和有声版，在很大程度上被忽视了。早期的英国有声电影受到了批评性的诋毁，因为他们被认为在处理口语方面的尝试很笨拙。然而，他们早就应该重新评估了，特别是在这项研究提出的更广泛的背景下，这项研究将首次全面考察英国电影如何应对声音的到来，涉及制作、放映、发行和接受的各个方面--从为制片厂和电影院申请专利和安装新音响设备的疯狂国际竞争，到对电影明星和成千上万为无声电影演奏的电影音乐家的影响，到制作的电影类型和对这些电影的批评和大众反应。为制片厂和电影院配备音响设备的经济负担需要大量的国内外投资，而且恰逢全球经济衰退、华尔街崩盘，以及需要从根本上改变对电影的金融投资。这个项目将考察英国电影对这些状况的反应，以及支持和反对声音电影的各种积极和消极的驱动因素；从大众广播的影响力越来越大，观众渴望听到唱和说的话，以及各种设备制造商争夺全球市场，到依靠电影谋生的音乐家和作曲家等受害者，声音不回应麦克风的无声明星，以及为无声电影写字幕的编剧。为了仔细地划分这一过渡的周期，这项研究将被分为与该项目工作计划相对应的三个关键时期：1927-1928年--紧靠英国爵士乐歌手到来之前的时期--1929-1930年--无声和有声之间的过渡，当时两种格式的电影都采用了这两种格式，该行业试验了不同的技术和方法。1931-1933年--无声电影技术和人员适应新媒体的早期有声时期。利用这个历史框架，研究将调查和总结以下三个领域：1.英国电影业和基础设施在制片人、工作室和制作公司方面的情况以及新的有声技术造成的变化，包括工作室录音和电影放映技术的发展，争先恐后地为新系统申请专利，以及那些成功或失败的人。与电影有关的对企业和工业组织的整体影响；赢家和输家，包括对以下方面的影响：1.迅速需要新技能的人员和与无声电影有关的人员的流失以及劳动力组织的相关变化。观众、观影以及媒体和批评者的反应。新有声电影院的素材。联合制作和发行领域的国际关系2.根据上述情况对电影本身进行批判性的重新评价，包括电影技术和美学在这三个时期的变化和发展。3.历史证据解释了有声电影如何永远改变了英国电影，以及它们所留下的遗产的重要性。

In recent years the advent of digital, CGI and 3D technologies have been heralded as revolutionising our experience of cinema, but these are nothing compared to the impact of new sound technologies in the late 1920s when silent cinema as an art form was subjugated to the spoken and sung word. In Britain the films produced in this transitional period, with the exception of Hitchcock's Blackmail (1929), produced in both silent and sound versions, have been largely overlooked. Early British sound films have suffered from critical denigration due to their supposedly clumsy attempts to deal with the spoken word. However, their reappraisal is now long overdue, particularly in the wider contexts proposed by this study which will look comprehensively, for the first time, at the ways in which British cinema responded to the coming of sound across all aspects of production, exhibition, distribution and reception - from the frenzied international competition to patent and install new sound equipment in studios and cinemas, to the impact on film stars and the thousands of cinema musicians who played to silent films, to the kinds of films that were produced and the critical and popular responses to them. The economic burden of equipping studios and cinemas for sound required massive domestic and foreign investment and coincided with global recession, the Wall Street Crash and the need for fundamental changes to financial investment in cinema. This project will examine British cinema's response to these conditions alongside the various positive and negative drivers for and against sound cinema; from the increasing influence of popular radio and audiences' desire to hear the sung and spoken word and the various equipment manufacturers competing to dominate global markets, to victims such as the musicians and composers who relied on the cinema for their livelihood, the silent stars whose voices did not respond to the microphone, and the scenarists who wrote intertitles for silent films.In order to carefully periodise this transition, the study will be divided into three key periods corresponding to the project's workplan:1927-1928 - the period immediately before the arrival of The Jazz Singer in the UK1929-1930 - the transition between silent and sound when films were made in both formats and the industry experimented with different technologies and methods1931-1933 - the early sound period when silent cinema technologies and personnel were adapting to the new mediumUsing this historical framework, the research will investigate and draw together, the following three areas:1. The British cinema industry and infrastructure in terms of producers, studios and production companies and the changes caused by new sound technologies including the development of studio recording and cinema exhibition technologies, the rush to patent new systems and those who succeeded or failed. The overall effects on businesses and industrial organisations associated with cinema; the winners and losers including impacts on:i. personnel with the rapid need for new skills and the loss of those associated with silent cinema and related changes in the organisation of labour.ii. audiences, cinema-going and the response of press and critics.iii. the source material for new sound cinema.iv. international relations in the spheres of co-production and distribution 2. a critical reappraisal of the films themselves in the light of the above including how film techniques and aesthetics changed and developed over these three periods. 3. historical evidence explaining how 'the talkies' changed British cinema forever and the significance of their legacy.