Cinematic Visual Styles

Dictionary entry

1. Film Noir 1940s–1950s / later revivals / Style

   Cuts distrust, isolation and fatalism into the frame with low-key lighting, deep shadow, oblique composition, the city at night, reflections.

2. German Expressionist Film 1919–1927 / Style

   Turned inner states into landscape itself — warped sets, painted shadows, extreme contrast — bringing 'scenery of the mind' into cinema.

3. Soviet Montage 1924–1930s / Technique

   An editing theory that generates meaning from the collision of opposing shots — meaning lives not in the image but between images.

4. Italian Neorealism 1943–1952 / Style

   Left the studio to film non-actors in the street, making postwar poverty and daily life the very subject — cinema on reality's side.

5. French New Wave 1958–1968 / Style

   Critics took cameras to the street — handheld shots, jump cuts, self-reference — turning film grammar itself into a playground.

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