Serial

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As Serial production form of numerous series will feature films in the United States and other countries called. In the first half of the 20th century, they ran weekly as shorter supporting films with a duration of approx. 30 minutes (three film roles) before the actual main film and consisted of at least 12 individual films. The films usually ended with the words To be Continued ( "continues") and a cliffhanger - Scenario. In the sequel, the past story was briefly introduced and then the cliffhanger dissolved. However, it often happened that a scene not shown in the last film was inserted from which it became clear why the hero or heroine was able to escape their fatal fate at all.

characterization

A typical Saturday cinema screening in the USA in the 1920s and 1930s consisted of at least one film from a series , an animated film , a newsreel and two feature-length films. Due to the serial film with its open plot, the viewer was forced to go to the cinema regularly once a week in order to get the whole story at all, no matter which main film or which main films followed.

In production, a complete film script was first created and then divided into suitable chapters. The films were usually made cheaply and quickly, but there were exceptions, such as the series with the adventures of the science fiction hero Flash Gordon with Buster Crabbe . In France, René Navarre caused a stir in 1913 as Fantômas in a five-part film series by Louis Feuillade , and a US version in twenty parts followed in 1920 with Edward Roseman as the super bandit.

The serials were particularly popular in the 1920s and 1930s. In 1936 alone, eleven different series competed at the same time for the favor of cinema-goers and in 1937 the number rose to 12 different series. There were initially many films that dealt with the so-called Damsel in Distress (persecuted innocence), such as one of the best-known early series The Perils of Pauline (1914) with Pearl White , whose basic story was filmed again in 1933, 1947 and 1967 In the sound film era there was hardly a topic that was not included in a serial, about the science fiction heroes Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers (also with Buster Crabbe in the leading role), the snoopers Dick Tracy , who were already successful in comics , the masked "avenger of the oppressed" Zorro , the devious Chinese Fu Man Chu to the intrepid western hero Lone Ranger and the glorified adventures of the scout Kit Carson .

Western adventures were by far the largest number of early series, in which the future movie star John Wayne began his career as a singing cowboy. From the 1940s onwards, there was an increasing number of espionage topics and adventures by comic heroes.

The descent of the Serials ran parallel to the rise of television . The only serial based on a television series as a model was 1951 Captain Video: Master of the Stratosphere ; The model was the series Captain Video and His Video Rangers , which has been in production since 1949 .

Film series (excerpt)

Silent movie era

"The Golden age"

Turning points

  • 1929: The King of the Congo - The first sound film series ( Mascot Pictures )
  • 1946: The Mysterious Mr. M - The last serial from Universal
  • 1955: King of the Carnival - Republic's last serial
  • 1956: Blazing the Overland Trail - The last serial ever ( Columbia Pictures )

See also

literature

  • Guy Barefoot: The lost jungle. Cliffhanger action and Hollywood serials of the 1930s and 1940s , Exeter (University of Exeter Press) 2017 (Exeter Studies in Film History). ISBN 0-85989-887-3 . ISBN 978-0-85989-887-4
  • Hank Davis: Classic Cliffhangers Volume 1 1914-1940 , Baltimore, MD (Luminary Press) 2007. ISBN 9781887664769 .
  • Hank Davis: Classic Cliffhangers Volume 2 1940-1955 , Baltimore, MD (Midnight Marquee Press) 2008. ISBN 978-1-887664-82-0
  • Jim Harmon / Donald F. Glut: The great movie serials: their sound and fury , Garden City, NY (Doubleday & Company) 1972. ISBN 0-385-09079-X
  • Robert K. Klepper: Silent Films, 1877-1996, A Critical Guide to 646 Movies , McFarland & Company, ISBN 0786421649
  • Kalton C. Lahue: Bound and Gagged: The Story of the Silent Serials. New York: Castle Books 1968.
  • Kalton C. Lahue: Continued Next Week: A History of the Moving Picture Serial. Norman. University of Oklahoma Press. 1969
  • Roy Kinnard: Science fiction serials. A critical filmography of the 31 hard SF cliffhangers. With an appendix of the 37 serials with slight SF content , Jefferson, NC et al. a. (McFarland) 1998. ISBN 0-7864-0545-7

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