The Girl Chewing Gum

Last updated

The Girl Chewing Gum
Directed by John Smith
Release date
  • 1976 (1976)
Running time
12 minutes
Country UK
LanguageEnglish

The Girl Chewing Gum is a 1976 British short film directed by John Smith. [1] [2]

Contents

Background

The film, made as the ideological opposition to mainstream cinema, [3] [4] was inspired by a scene in François Truffaut's 1973 film Day for Night in which the director gives instructions to the actors, and even tells a dog to urinate on a lamppost. [5] [6]

Summary

At Stamford Road in Dalston Junction of east London, the camera follows pedestrians, cars and birds while a narrator, who appears to be the (fictional) director behind the camera, seems to direct their actions. [7] [8] [9] [10]

Legacy

The film is widely acknowledged as one of the most important avant-garde films of the 20th century. [11]

The Girl Chewing Gum was preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2019. [12]

Similar works

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alfred Hitchcock</span> English film director (1899–1980)

Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock was an English film director. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in the history of cinema. In a career spanning six decades, he directed over 50 feature films, many of which are still widely watched and studied today. Known as the "Master of Suspense", Hitchcock became as well known as any of his actors thanks to his many interviews, his cameo appearances in most of his films, and his hosting and producing the television anthology Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1955–65). His films garnered 46 Academy Award nominations, including six wins, although he never won the award for Best Director, despite five nominations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">François Truffaut</span> French film director (1932–1984)

François Roland Truffaut was a French filmmaker, actor, and critic. He is widely regarded as one of the founders of the French New Wave. With a career of more than 25 years, he is an icon of the French film industry.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jean-Pierre Léaud</span> French actor

Jean-Pierre Léaud, ComM is a French actor best known for being an important figure of the French New Wave and his portrayal of Antoine Doinel in a series of films by François Truffaut, beginning with The 400 Blows (1959). He has worked with Jean-Luc Godard, Agnès Varda, and Jacques Rivette, as well as other notable directors such as Jean Cocteau, Pier Paolo Pasolini, Bernardo Bertolucci, Catherine Breillat, Jerzy Skolimowski, and Aki Kaurismäki.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Henri Langlois</span> French film archivist

Henri Langlois was a French film archivist and cinephile. A pioneer of film preservation, Langlois was an influential figure in the history of cinema. His film screenings in Paris in the 1950s are often credited with providing the ideas that led to the development of the auteur theory.

<i>Breathless</i> (1960 film) 1960 French film by Jean-Luc Godard

Breathless is a 1960 French New Wave crime drama film written and directed by Jean-Luc Godard. It stars Jean-Paul Belmondo as a wandering criminal named Michel, and Jean Seberg as his American girlfriend Patricia. The film was Godard's first feature-length work and represented Belmondo's breakthrough as an actor.

<i>Day for Night</i> (film) 1973 film by François Truffaut

Day for Night is a 1973 romantic comedy-drama film co-written and directed by François Truffaut. The metafictional and self-reflexive film chronicles the troubled production of a melodrama, and the various personal and professional challenges of the cast and crew. It stars Jacqueline Bisset, Valentina Cortese, Jean-Pierre Aumont, Dani, Alexandra Stewart, Jean-Pierre Léaud and Truffaut himself.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">French New Wave</span> c. 1960s movement in French cinema

The New Wave, also called the French New Wave, is a French art film movement that emerged in the late 1950s. The movement was characterized by its rejection of traditional filmmaking conventions in favor of experimentation and a spirit of iconoclasm. New Wave filmmakers explored new approaches to editing, visual style, and narrative, as well as engagement with the social and political upheavals of the era, often making use of irony or exploring existential themes. The New Wave is often considered one of the most influential movements in the history of cinema.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Delphine Seyrig</span> French actress and film director (1932–1990)

Delphine Claire Beltiane Seyrig was a Lebanese-born French actress and film director. She came to prominence in Alain Resnais's 1961 film Last Year at Marienbad, and later acted in films by Chantal Akerman, Luis Buñuel, Marguerite Duras, Ulrike Ottinger, Francois Truffaut, and Fred Zinneman. She directed three films, including the documentary Sois belle et tais-toi (1981).

Adrian Lyne is an English film director. Lyne is known for sexually charged narratives, conflicting passions, the power of seduction, moral ambiguity, betrayal, and the indelibility of infidelity.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Day for night</span> Technique to film night scenes in daylight

Day for night is a set of cinematic techniques used to simulate a night scene while filming in daylight. It is often employed when it is too difficult or expensive to actually shoot during nighttime. Because both film stocks and digital image sensors lack the sensitivity of the human eye in low light conditions, night scenes recorded in natural light, with or without moonlight, may be underexposed to the point where little or nothing is visible. This problem can be avoided by using daylight to substitute for darkness. When shooting day for night, the scene is typically underexposed in-camera or darkened during post-production, with a blue tint added. Additional effects are often used to heighten the impression of night.

John Smith is a British avant garde filmmaker noted for his use of humour in exploring various themes that often play upon the film spectator's conditioned assumptions of the medium.

Néstor Almendros Cuyás, ASC was a Spanish cinematographer. One of the most highly appraised contemporary cinematographers, "Almendros was an artist of deep integrity, who believed the most beautiful light was natural light...he will always be remembered as a cinematographer of absolute truth...a true master of light".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dani (singer)</span> French actress and singer (1944–2022)

Danièle Graule, known as Dani, was a French actress and singer.

<i>Fahrenheit 451</i> (1966 film) Film by François Truffaut

Fahrenheit 451 is a 1966 British dystopian drama film directed by François Truffaut and starring Julie Christie, Oskar Werner, and Cyril Cusack. Based on the 1953 novel of the same name by Ray Bradbury, the film takes place in a controlled society in an oppressive future, in which the government sends out firemen to destroy all literature to prevent revolution and thinking. This was Truffaut's first colour film and his only non French-language film. At the 27th Venice International Film Festival, Fahrenheit 451 was nominated for the Golden Lion.

<i>The Wild Child</i> 1970 film by François Truffaut

The Wild Child is a 1970 French film by director François Truffaut. Featuring Jean-Pierre Cargol, François Truffaut, Françoise Seigner and Jean Dasté, it tells the story of a child who spends the first eleven or twelve years of his life with little or no human contact. It is based on the true events regarding the child Victor of Aveyron, reported by Dr. Jean Marc Gaspard Itard. The film sold nearly 1.5 million tickets in France.

<i>The Last Metro</i> 1980 film by François Truffaut

The Last Metro is a 1980 historical drama film, written and directed by François Truffaut, that stars Catherine Deneuve and Gérard Depardieu.

Zénaïde Rossi was a singer, actress, and entertainer, also known under the stage name Irene Reni.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Suzanne Schiffman</span>

Suzanne Schiffman was a French screenwriter and director for numerous motion pictures. She often worked with François Truffaut. The 'script girl' Joelle, played by Nathalie Baye in Truffaut's Day for Night was based on Schiffman. It accurately portrayed her close collaboration with Truffaut and other directors.

Morris Engel was an American photographer, cinematographer and filmmaker best known for making the first good-quality, internationally-recognized American film "independent" of Hollywood studios, Little Fugitive (1953), in collaboration with his wife, photographer Ruth Orkin, and their friend, writer Raymond Abrashkin.

<i>Hitchcock/Truffaut</i> 1966 book by François Truffaut about Alfred Hitchcock

Hitchcock/Truffaut is a 1966 book by François Truffaut about Alfred Hitchcock, originally released in French as Le Cinéma selon Alfred Hitchcock.

References

  1. BFI
  2. From Warhol to Steve McQueen: a history of video art in 30 works|Video art|The Guardian
  3. LUX
  4. John Smith “The Man Girl Phoning Chewing Mum Gum” at Tanya Leighton, Berlin — Mousse Magazine and Publishing
  5. Joe Moran. "The girl chewing gum", Moran's blog, 16 June 2010. Retrieved 8 November 2012.
  6. Reading the Everyday - Google Books (pg.90)
  7. Film at Lincoln Center
  8. Can The Girl Chewing Gum Save the World? — ALT/KINO
  9. Reality and Artifice in John Smith’s “The Girl Chewing Gum”|Artsy
  10. CLOSE-UP|John Smith: Introspective (19720=-2022)
  11. Reporting back on Tony Conrad screening|UAL
  12. "Preserved Projects". Academy Film Archive.