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The Silent Film, Broken Blossoms

D.W. Griffith's 1919 silent film Broken Blossoms is an allegorical, melodramatic tragedy about a teenager who lives with an abusive father, and is loved by a gentle, young Chinese man. All three characters come to tragic ends. Shot in a Hollywood studio, the small-scale story takes place in a London slum, and GriffithÆs cinematic techniques match the filmÆs narrative as the haunting story is told through an arrangement of moving images. The film is subtitled ôThe Yellow Man and the Girl,ö and its content deals with forbidden interracial romance, child abuse and broken dreams.

The story is told by interweaving two narratives. The structure is based on the classical three unities dramatic rule of Time, Place and Action. GriffithÆs use of parallel editing and inter-cutting unifies the narratives. For example, the idealistic Cheng Huan (Caucasian actor Richard Barthelmess made up to look like the ôYellow Manö) is shown at the beginning of the film leaving China to bring the word of the Buddha to residents of LondonÆs Limehouse district where he proceeds to lose his ideals and become a drug addict. The passage of time is indicated by a title card saying ôsome years later.ö Griffith then intercuts to the second part of the story showing the winsome 15-year old Lucy (Lillian Gish) in the home of her brutish, sadistic prize-fighter father Battling Burrows (Donald Crisp).

Although the film's narrative is simple, the emotions of the characters are complex and intertitles play an important role in providing necessary information (place and time), the charactersÆ choices and feelings, and the directorÆs point of view. The language of ôBroken Blossomsö is essentially an interplay of verbal (intertitles) and visual narrative. For example, an intertitle is used for setting the scene: At the turn-stiles of the East- The bund of a great Chinese treaty port.ö Another intertitle is used to express ChengÆs love for Lucy: There he...

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The Silent Film, Broken Blossoms. (1969, December 31). In LotsofEssays.com. Retrieved 13:27, March 28, 2024, from https://www.lotsofessays.com/viewpaper/1701362.html