Films Research Articles

A Study on the Correlation between Sound-Pitch of Motion Contents and Picture Ratio

A Study on the Correlation between Sound-Pitch of Motion Contents and Picture Ratio

Determinants of Illegal File-Sharing of Motion Pictures

Determinants of Illegal File-Sharing of Motion Pictures

"Um apólogo - Machado de Assis": do escritor singular ao brasileiro exemplar

O artigo trata do processo de construção da figura de Machado de Assis na década de 1930, focalizando a primeira adaptação de uma obra sua para o cinema - "Um apólogo - Machado de Assis", baseado no conto "Um apólogo", produzido em 1939 pelo Instituto Nacional de Cinema Educativo (INCE), com direção de Humberto Mauro e participações de Lúcia Miguel Pereira e Edgard Roquete Pinto. O curta-metragem sintetiza o processo de transformação do escritor singular e estrangeirado, visão até então predominante entre os críticos, no homem brasileiro exemplar, intérprete da alma brasileira, em consonância com os novos papéis prescritos pelo Estado Novo para a literatura e o literário.

“Pictures with a Purpose”: The Birth Control Debate on the Big Screen

In the first half of the twentieth century, birth control advocates used the mass media to reframe contraception from a private, secret matter to an acceptable part of life fit for public discussion. Although their campaign began in print, they quickly embraced the more far-reaching medium of film to deliver their message. This article argues that birth control advocates circumvented the Comstock Act in the early decades of the twentieth century by taking up this new medium as part of a long-running strategy to publicize the birth control movement. Their efforts shaped both the public debate on the topic and the development of motion picture censorship.

Picturegoer: The Fan Magazine and Popular Film Culture in Britain During The Second World War

‘What agent of Chancellor Hitler is it who has suggested that we should all cower in darkness and terror “for the duration”?’, demanded George Bernard Shaw in a letter to the Times. Published on 5 ...

Britain Finds Andy Hardy: British Cinema Audiences and The American Way of Life in The Second World War

The years 1942 and 1943 saw great concern, on both sides of the Atlantic, about Anglo-American understanding. Almost one million American servicemen were to arrive on British shores by the end of 1...

Modeling Multichannel Home Video Demand in the U.S. Motion Picture Industry

The U.S. motion picture industry has become increasingly reliant on posttheatrical channel profits. Two often-cited drivers of these profits are cross-channel substitution among posttheatrical channels and seasonality in consumer preferences for any movie. The authors use a differentiated products version of the multiplicative competitive interaction model to investigate these two phenomena. They estimate the model using data from 2000 and 2001 on two posttheatrical channels in the U.S. market: purchase and rental home viewing channels. Contrary to expectations based on business press commentary, after controlling for seasonality and movie attributes, the authors find low cross-channel price and availability elasticity for both channels. To measure the extent of cross-channel cannibalization, they simulate a 28-day window of sequential release with either purchase or rental channel going first. They find that windowing reduces the sum of revenues across both channels, because more consumers choose to not purchase or rent when faced with older movies in their favored channel rather than to switch to the alternative channel with newer movies.

Acoustic Hazard Detection for Pedestrians With Obscured Hearing

Pedestrians' use of Motion Pictures Expert Group audio layer 3 players or mobile phones can pose the risk of being hit by motor vehicles. We present an approach for detecting a crash risk level using the computing power and the microphone of mobile devices that can be used to alert the user in advance of an approaching vehicle so as to avoid a crash. A single feature extractor classifier is not usually able to deal with the diversity of risky acoustic scenarios. In this paper, we address the problem of detection of vehicles approaching a pedestrian by a novel simple nonresource intensive acoustic method. The method uses a set of existing statistical tools to mine signal features. Audio features are adaptively thresholded for relevance and classified with a three-component heuristic. The resulting acoustic hazard detection system has a very low false-positive detection rate. The results of this study could help mobile device manufacturers to embed the presented features into future potable devices and contribute to road safety.

An Information Technology Executive's View of Innovation

PG. 1 WHAT IS YOUR GENERAL PERSPECTIVE OF INNOVATION IN AN ORGANIZATION? WB. 1 Recently my wife came home from the library with a basket full of books that my 3⁄2 year old had chosen . One book happened to be a children’s biographical account of Thomas Alva Edison’s life and his many accomplishments. Over Thomas Edison’s life he attained 1093 patents which until recently was the highest for any individual. Many would agree that Thomas Edison might be the most innovative figure in history with inventions such as the electronic stock ticker, the motion picture camera, and of course the light bulb. What was interesting is that early in Thomas’s Edison’s childhood his mother removed him from school after just 3 months as she felt the teacher, Mr. Engle did not know how to teach a curious child. I think organizations can sometimes be similar to Mr. Engle in their approach towards innovation. Mr. Engle strove for strict completion of lesson and assignments and didn’t recognize that a budding innovative genius was sitting in his classroom. Likewise organizations can be overly focused on process improvement and driving cost containment initiatives while possibly overlooking the innovative potential within the midst of their organization that could revolutionize a team, department, organization or an industry. Every individual may not be an innovator at the level of Thomas Edison but I am suggesting that organizations may overlook a lot of undiscovered ingenuity within their own four walls.

Structure and Electrical Property of CuInS<SUB>2</SUB> Thin Films Deposited by DC Reactive Magnetron Sputtering

采用直流反应磁控溅射技术在玻璃基底上制备了太阳电池用CuInS 2 薄膜. 以X射线能量色散谱仪、扫描电镜、X射线衍射仪、冷热探针和霍尔效应测试系统对薄膜进行了表征. 结果表明, 薄膜成分可通过调整Cu靶和In靶的功率比PCu/PIn来进行调控; 而薄膜形貌则取决于靶功率比和薄膜的成分. 随着PCu/PIn的增大, 薄膜物相由富铟相向CuInS 2 转变. 对于CuInS 2 薄膜, 提高铜铟原子比[Cu]/[In]可改善薄膜的结晶质量. 但当薄膜富铜时, 过高的[Cu]/[In]又会导致薄膜结晶质量的下降. 当CuInS 2 薄膜为富铜与略微贫铜时, 其导电类型为P型; 且载流子浓度随[Cu]/[In]增加而增大, 并远高于其它贫铜薄膜. CuInS 2 薄膜的载流子迁移率明显高于富铟相薄膜; 且随着[Cu]/[In]的提高, CuInS 2 薄膜的载流子迁移率呈上升趋势, 而电阻率则迅速下降.

The heterogeneous effect of WOM on product sales: why the effect of WOM valence is mixed?

PurposePrevious literature on WOM has consistent findings on the positive and significant effect of WOM volume on product sales, but the literature on WOM valence has been mixed. In this study, the authors aim to explain the reason for the mixed effect of WOM valence on product sales by considering heterogeneous characteristics of products, especially in the movie market, by segmenting products into mainstream and non‐mainstream movies.Design/methodology/approachThis study uses empirical data from the motion picture industry, such as box office revenue, WOM volume and valence, and other variables of movie characteristics. The hypothesis is tested using OLS and panel data analysis in econometric methods.FindingsThe authors find a significant effect of WOM valence on box office revenue only in the case of non‐mainstream movies, which have relatively smaller marketing budgets than mainstream movies. The findings suggest that as marketing communication channels become more diverse, with larger marketing budgets, the effect of online WOM valence on product sales can be diluted. In addition, it is found that the effect of WOM volume on box office revenue is greater for mainstream movies, suggesting that consumers build higher credibility on products with larger sales or WOM volume, especially for experience goods with uncertain quality.Practical implicationsThe findings explain the weak relationship between WOM valence and product sales, which has been controversial in the WOM literature, and broaden the understanding of the effect of WOM on product sales.Originality/valueThe relationship between WOM valence and sales and, consequently, the revenue of a good has not been clearly understood, considering the heterogeneous characteristics of consumers in previous literature. In this study, it is found that WOM volume and valence have different effects on product sales, corresponding to differences in product category. The findings suggest a reason for the weak relationship between WOM valence and product sales, which has been controversial in the WOM literature.

The Importance of Coupling between Thermal and Molar Fluxes in a Nitrogen-Oxygen Distillation Column

A model for the transfer of mass and thermal energy in a vapour-liquid region is used to investigate the influence of neglecting coupling on the transfer rates. As an example, we studied a nitrogen-oxygen distillation column. Using a combination of stage and point boundary conditions, a nitrogen transfer profile is obtained that shows the same trend as a profile based on an equilibrium stage distillation model. The distribution of the total transfer over the two column halves is not in agreement, however. This disagreement can be expected to decrease when the dependency of the vapour film thickness on the vapour flow rate and the vapour viscosity is included in the model. The effect of neglecting coupling on the calculated transfer rates changes along the length of the column. The total effect is considerable and should be taken into account in models for the transfer of mass and thermal energy through an interface.

The Quality Control of Diagnostic Radiology Devices in Hospitals of Sistan and Baluchestan, Iran

One of the most significant factors in decreasing the radiation exposure dose is quality control and making sure of the quality of radiological devices. The aim of this study is to consider the quality control of nine radiological device in nine hospitals in Sistan and Baluchestan, Iran, so that the question can be answered whether radiological devices are in the best efficiency conditions or not and to assure about their appropriate function. This study was performed cross-sectional in the year 2009, and the DIAVOLT and the dosimeter device named DIADOSE made by PTW's company were used for conduction quality control experiment. For making this experiment practical, various parameters of quality control programs as output repeatability of X-ray tube, time accuracy, time repeatability, output linearity with mA, voltage accuracy, adapting the optical field with radiation field, being vertical of radiation field on the film and the filtration of the concerned devices based on the analyzable standards are implemented. Our finding reveals that six out of the nine devices have not the required standards for voltage accuracy and need mending. In addition, all the nine devices have defects concerning adaptation with optical field and radiation field and one of the devices has not also sufficient filtration. The quality control of the utilized radiological devices should be performed periodically and regularly and the defects of the devices should be removed in order to be assured of the appropriate function of the devices. Unfortunately, all the devices need mending because of lack of implementing the quality control program regularly, which indicates that the quality control programs should be extended regularly.

Vicksburg, 1863 (review)

Reviewed by: Vicksburg, 1863 John F. Marszalek (bio) Vicksburg, 1863. By Winston Groom. (New York: Vintage, 2010. Pp. 482. Paper, $17.00.) Like so many other Americans, I first heard of Winston Groom when his book Forrest Gump was made into a blockbuster motion picture. Forrest Gump is now a part of American mythology, but Groom is no longer a novelist. He has become an author of war histories. Being a veteran of the Vietnam War encouraged Groom to make this move; so too did his discovery of a Civil War ancestor. [End Page 559] Reviewers have readily praised the narrative strengths of Groom's war histories, with some comparing him to Bruce Catton, Shelby Foote, and even James McPherson. Telling the history of a person or an event clearly and effectively is something all historians aspire to, whether or not they write narratives. However, historians also work diligently, not only to make sure the reader understands the thrust of their argument, but also to make sure that their facts are accurate and their interpretation fits within the accepted historical milieu. Historians who write well are to be praised, but when their presentation includes inaccurate facts and their interpretation is archaic, their volumes cannot be greeted with much historical enthusiasm. James McPherson's greatness lies not simply in his ability to tell his story well, but also in his mastery of the facts and his ability to interpret those facts accurately and place them within the appropriate historiography. Groom has neither mastered the facts nor availed himself of the historiography on Vicksburg. Groom enters a crowded field with no clear indication as to what his intentions are. Edwin Bearss has written a detailed factual account of the Vicksburg campaign, and Terrence Winschel has written numerous well-received books and articles. Michael B. Ballard has published a monograph that most historians consider to be definitive. Whereas Groom's book is well written, he provides no citations, and his "Acknowledgments and Source Notes" fails to cite a number of major books. The vast majority of this book does not even deal with Vicksburg; it is an overview of the Civil War in the West leading up to Vicksburg, a topic that has been treated many times before. The book is clearly aimed at the general reading public, but they—as well as professional historians—would be better served turning to earlier treatments of the campaign. As well written, poetic even, as it is, Vicksburg, 1863 includes numerous erroneous and questionable comments. Groom mistakenly says that a Civil War regiment, presumably infantry, consisted of six hundred men, instead of ten companies of approximately one hundred men each, or around one thousand in all (9). What would Native Americans think about the assertion that Americans were "nominally peace-loving people" (25)? Groom says that the U.S. government tried John Brown for treason, when the state of Virginia actually conducted the trial—a significant point (31). Groom misunderstands the symbolic meaning of the caning of Charles Sumner, and his description of the 1850s rise of the Republican Party is inaccurate (32). And Groom relies on out-of-date assessments of Sherman and Halleck. Grierson's raid played a major role in the Vicksburg campaign, but Groom's emphasis, instead, is on the alleged drunkenness of the raiders. A footnote on Teddy [End Page 560] Roosevelt and his encounter with a bear in the Mississippi Delta is also inaccurate (299n). These are only a few examples of the misstatements in this monograph. The book is a good read, but both professional historians and the general reading public will find it wanting. Readability cannot take the place of strict accuracy. John F. Marszalek John F. Marszalek, Giles Distinguished Professor Emeritus of History and executive director of the Ulysses S. Grant Association at Mississippi State University, has published widely on Civil War topics. Copyright © 2011 The University of North Carolina Press

Pierre Étaix 5-DVD SET

PIERRE ÉTAIX 5-DVD SET The heyday of the slapstick is long past but this comedy form, perhaps the most filmic of all motion picture genres has not really disappeared. Some of its finest post-WWII accomplishments exist in the work of two famous French film comedians: Jacques Tati (1907-82), the creator of the unforgettable Monsieur Hulot and a generation younger, Pierre Étaix (b. 1928) - the master of subtle visual humour recalling Buster Keaton and Max Linder, the French genius of pre-WWI slapstick, and an inspiration of Chaplin. Étaix was undeniably influenced by Tati whom he met in 1954 and worked with for several years; he was assistant-director in Tati's MyUncle where he also played a minor role....

The Impact of Runaway Productions on Hollywood Labor Organizations

This study tries to show the impact of runaway productions on Hollywood labor unions. In the context of globalization, and also of US federalism used to lower labor standards, the unions’ response towards the producers has generally been weak despite some successes in recent years, notably of the screen writers in 2007. Among all the unionized in the motion picture industry, members of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE) and members of the Screen Actors’ Guild are some of the most vulnerable.

Jean-Luc Godard—musicien: die Musik in den Filmen von Jean-Luc Godard , and: Jean-Luc Godard (review)

Jean-Luc Godard-musicien: die Musik in den Filmen von Jean-Luc Godard. By Jurg Stenzl. Munich: Edition Text + Kritik, 2010. [464 p. ISBN 9783869160979. i48.] Music examples, facsimiles, interview, bibliography, filmography, discography, index. Jean-Luc Godard. Edited by Bernd Kiefer. (Film-Konzepte, edited by Thomas Koebner and Fabienne Liptay, Heft 20.) Munich: Edition Text + Kritik, 2010. [116 p. ISBN 9783869160719. i22.] Music examples, screen stills, filmography, list of contributors. Given his fame and widely acknowledged influence, Jean-Luc Godard reached his eightieth birthday in December 2010 after a year predictably filled with festivals, retrospectives, and similar public events. Just as predictably, the director himself was actively involved in the celebration and stirred up controversy along the way. He had already set the terms with a retrospective exhibition in 2006, and when the time came, he offered the premiere of a dense and politically pointed film (Film socialisme, Cannes Film Festival, May 2010). Later in the year, media attention spiked as he dithered about whether he would attend the ceremony to receive an honorary award from the Academy for Motion Picture Arts and Science (he decided not to go). Rumors started in 2009 also continued throughout 2010 that Godard's next proj - ect would be a film version of Daniel Mendelsohn's book about the Holocaust, The Lost: Six of Six Million. The year offered surprisingly little from publishing quarters, however. The specialty film seller, Criterion Collection, did take advantage of the event to release a number of early films on DVD and to upgrade several of the most familiar to Blu-ray format. Of three substantial trade-level publications, one is a topical dictionary ( Jean-Luc Douin, Jean-Luc Godard, dictionnaire des passions [Paris: Stock, 2010]) and the second an exhaustive documentation of more than 900 pages by a film historian (Antoine de Baecque, Godard: biographie [Paris: Grasset & Fasquelle, 2010]). The third actually appeared in 2009 and was a paperback reprint of a critical biography skewed by overly aggressive claims that Godard is anti-Semitic (Richard Brody, Everything Is Cinema: The Working Life of Jean-Luc Godard [New York: Picador (Macmillan), 2009]). Academic journals, on the other hand, barely seemed to notice. Cinema Journal, the official organ of the Society for Cinema and Media Studies, did run a print symposium, but it covered the New Wave generally, not only Godard (in vol. 49, no. 3 [June 2010]). Critical Quarterly also ran a five-article symposium on Godard's late films (in vol. 51, no. 3 [October 2009]), but film periodicals with a leftist political tradition, such as Screen, Cineaste, and Cineaction, published only the scattered article through 2009 and 2010. Ironic, then, that two of the most sustained efforts came not from France or North America but from Germany: a special issue in the periodical Film-Konzepte and a monograph survey of Godard's career in terms of his treatment of the sound track. Jurg Stenzl is emeritus professor of musicology at the University of Salzburg. He is known as a medievalist and a specialist on Italian modernists, in particular Luigi Nono. Jean-Luc Godard is his first book about film. The author's segmentation of Godard's career comes through very clearly in the book's organization. Six chapters begin with Godard and his composers, covering early films (from 1959-67) that follow the traditional path in which an experienced musician provides original material for the underscore and sometimes also for source music. For Ever Beethoven gathers seven films from the 1970s and 1980s (with one outlier from 2002) in which that composer's music provides the source material from which Godard fashions the musical component of his film's sound design. Political and Musical Passions, as the title suggests, divides into two sections: the first on the films that respond to world events in the 1970s and in which music's role is either reduced or eliminated, and films from the 1980s in which Godard returns to aesthetic concerns but refashions his approach to the sound track. …

The clinical characters of tear film instability in diabetes patients

Background The current epidemiology study had shown the prevalence of age and sex adjusted dry eye was higher in patients with diabetes than population without diabetes.Further researches demonstrated that the tear film disturbance is common after the phacoemulsification or photocoagulation in the eyes of diabetic patients.Objective The aim of this study was to characterize the clinical features of tear film instability in diabetes patients.Methods One hundred and sixty-two patients with tear-film abnormality referred to Tongren Eye Center from January 1,2010 to September 1,2010 underwent questionnaire about diabetes and other diseases,BUT,Schirmer test.Tear film instability was diagnosed as abnormality of either Schirmer test or BUT and showed as M ( Q25,Q75 ).The right eyes of 162 dry eye patients meeting with the including criteria were enrolled.The patients were assigned to two groups according to with ( 80 patients) or without ( 82 patients) diabetes mellitum.DEQ questionnaire were scored.The percentage of cases with meibomain gland abnormal score ＞ 1 was calculated.Mann-Whitney U analysis and Chisquare analysis were used to compare the difference between the two groups.Results The Schirmer test in diabetic group was 8 ( qualities:5,9 )mm and was longer than 6 ( qualities:5,7 ) mm in non-diabetic patients ( U =2452,P =0.00).The result of BUT test was 3 ( qualities:2,4 ) seconds in diabetic patients and was shorter than 4 (qualities:3,5) seconds in non-diabetic patients( U=2104,P＜0.01 ).The DEQ score of diabetic patients was 15 ( qualities:1 0,19,which was less than21 ( qualities:19,23.25 ) in non-diabetic patients.51.2 ％ ( 41/80 ) diabetic participants and 32.9％ (27/82) nondiabetic participants appeared meibography ( grade larger than 1 ) (x2 =16.07,P=0.00).The percentages of dry eyes were 51.2％ (41/80) and 93.9％ (77/82) respectively in diabetes and nondiabetes groups(x2 =37.24,P＜0.01 ).No significant correlation was found between the diabetes course and DEQ score or meibography( r =0.16,P =0.16 ; r =0.10,P =0.36 ).Conclusions Diabetes patients with tear film instability have longer Schirmer test results,shorter BUT,more severe meibomain glands damage and lower DEQ scores.The dry eye symptom is lack in the diabetic patients though appearing the tear film and meibomain glands damage.Therefore,more attention should be given to ocular surface health in diabetes patients. Key words: Diabetes mellitus; Tear film; Meibomain gland; Dry eye

Introduction of the Method of Discriminating Oil Spills in SAR Images

The oil spills can be effectively discriminated through SAR images.This paper is taking use of the characteristic parameters extracted from the ASAR images of south sea and other sea areas of China using the software of marine oil spill radar image monitoring systems,which include the backscatter coefficient of oil film(AVR),the homogeneous level(PMR),gradient value(GRD),the area(A),the complicated level(C),and so on.Based on the statistical regularity of these parameters and other knowledge,this paper will tell readers a method of discriminating oil spills and look-alikes.And an example is also attached.

What is Advertising Content Worth? Evidence from the Motion Pictures Industry

The large literature on the impact of advertising on consumers and firm behavior in marketing and economics has tried to distinguish between the informative and the persuasive roles of advertising. The extant literature typically uses advertising expenditure and implicitly assumes that advertising content is homogeneous. We analyze the contents of print ads in the motion picture industry to see whether the persuasive content or the informative content is more impactful on revenues. We estimate a simultaneous equation system via the GMM method and find that the persuasive content (role) of advertising is more significant than the informative content (role). Overall, we find that content elements matter in different ways. External validation components – persuasive contents, are much more important than other ad contents for predicting revenues and returns. Thus, we provide an interesting insight to this debate.