American Cinematographer - July 1989 - 85

The country

itself is one of
landscapes that present
almost geometric compositions to the
eye. The land is as flat as the sur¬

showmen to travel around the

coun¬

horizontal

try showing motion pictures. Around

face of its inland

films of area events to lend their
shows local interest. One sunny Sat¬

sea.

Windmills, trees

and historic

buildings rise in con¬
spicuous relief. It is not surprising
that the prevailing cinematographic
images of the Netherlands are
cleanly composed and carefully bal¬
anced.
When the

early motion pic¬
neighboring France
England invaded what was then

1901

they began producing short

urday in July 1905 Willy directed and
Albert photographed Mesaventure
van een Fransch heertje zonder panta¬
lon op het strand to Zandvoort (Mis¬
adventure of a French Gentleman
Without Trousers on the Beach of
Zandvoort). This little gem seems

ture devices from

ahead of its time in terms of

and

edy construction, photography and
editing. A dignified Frenchman,
snoozing in his basket chair, awakes

called Holland

-

M. Doublier of

Lumiere arrived
eral

cameras

early in 1896 - sev¬
were
purchased. Among

the first movie
Franz Anton

entrepreneurs was

Noggerath the elder,
the head of a showbiz family, who
contracted with Warwick Trading
Company of England to be the agent
for the American Bioscope.
Noggerath Sr., in 1899, di¬
rected and photographed a recon¬
struction of the visit of King William
III of Orange to Amsterdam's Vondelpark. This brief film, with a fair¬
sized cast wearing 17th Century uni¬
forms, required staging of a scope
rarely attempted anywhere before.
The Mullens brothers, Willy
and Albert, were among the earliest

to

find that the tide has

come

com¬

in and

surrounded him. He is forced to

rip

off his pants as he struggles to reach
the shore, and when he emerges he
is chased over the beach and through
the streets by the police and an in¬
furiated mob. The camera pans

freely, reaction close-ups

are

inter¬

cut, and the locations are utilized

effectively.
Several studios

were

estab¬

some

Below: Kaisa

achieved

Leppaneti and
Oliva Joini in

of them directed by Binger -
worldwide distribution.
The studio also undertook co-production with British and American
interests. Other companies of the

early period

were Rembrandt Film
and FAN Film (headed by F. A.

during the early part of the
century, the most successful being

Hollandia Filmfabriek in Haarlem,
founded by a printer, Maurits Bin-

The outbreak of World War

ger. The varied Hollandia comedies,
melodramas and serious dramas -

I in 1914 halted the

Dutch

exporting of
films, and the burgeoning film

industry was virtually strangled.
Only a handful of pictures were
made each year for the compara¬
tively unprofitable local market, but
by 1920 the industry was back on
its feet

Northerners

(1925). Above:

Village ambi¬

Noggerath Jr.).

lished

the Finnish

drama, The

ence

in The

Spanish
tragedy, The
Accursed

Village (1929).

again.
Hollandia, the best of the

Dutch

companies, weathered the
austerity of the war but closed in
1923 following Binger's death. Again
production slowed, with only a few
small companies making sporadic
films.

Although light comedies
and

melodramas

remained

as

staples, the most distinctive and
influential silent era contribution
from the Netherlands is its rich tra¬
dition of documentary films. This
tradition flowered in the late 1920s,
at

a

time when the

industry

was

in

the doldrums, through the efforts of
a few maverick writers and cinema¬

tographers. The most gifted of these
was a young Communist destined
for international acclaim, Joris Ivins.
"Your set is the world and

have to look all around before
focusing your camera on a comer of
it," Ivens advised aspiring documenyou

tarians in his book, "The Camera

and I"

(New York, Berlin 1969). "The

newsreel tells

us

where-when-what;

the

documentary film tells us why,
and the relationship between
events." Bom in

100

-

Year Start

1898, Ivens

on

was

Tomorrow

27a
American Cinematographer - July 1989

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of American Cinematographer - July 1989
