Page 102 - Ekonomija i Biznis_noemvri 2015.indd

FРIУLБMРИКА
Exactly twenty years ago, two of the most
famous film directors of today, Lars von
Trier and Thomas Vinterberg, signed
the Manifesto titled “Dogme 95”, in the
form of a list of rules wherewith at the
threshold of the twenty first century, the
seventh art was supposed to experience
a radical reform – to transform itself
and to be exempted from the clutches of
industry, to become a pure art that does
not require huge budgets and an art with
no space for profiteers and hoaxers.
DOGME 1995-2015
Was that an outburst of honesty and a
strive towards new artistic achieve-
ments and liberation of the film art from
profiteers and bloodsuckers or a skillful
marketing move for self-promotion and diverting of
the attention of the world film public to a small group
of previously unknown filmmakers?
The Manifesto (in the words of Vinterberg, prepared
and written in 45 minutes), contains the following
rules:
1. Shooting must take place on a real location. The
props and sets must not be brought in, and if a particu-
lar prop is necessary for the story, a location must be
chosen where this prop is to be found.
2. The sound must never be produced apart from the
images in the location, and music must not be used un-
less it is present where the scene is being shot.
3. The camera must be hand-held.
4. The film must be in color. Special lighting is not al-
lowed, if there is too little light for exposure, the scene
must be cut or a single lamp can be attached to the
camera.
5. Optical work and filters are not allowed.
6. Violent actions are forbidden. Murders, weapons,
etc. must not be present.
7. The film must take place here and now. Any form
of temporal and geographical alienation is forbidden.
8. Genre movies are not acceptable.
9. The film format must be Academy 35 mm film size.
102 November 2015
Igor Ivanov
The author is a director
10. The director must not be credited (the director
would not be signed in the closing credits).
Amateurs are professionals of the future, stated
John Cage a long time ago. These were the reactions in
the established filmmaker circles – a time of amateurs
comes! Therefore – everyone can be a filmmaker. How-
ever, the young and spirited film public, and the Eu-
ropean academies and festivals not only welcomed the
Manifesto “Dogme 95”, but they also found their own
chance and future in this Manifesto. Barriers called
budget, large team, a unit, scene technique, grip trucks
with lights, rails and cranes, thousands of background
actors… All this fell apart before these ten simple rules
according to which it takes only an idea, will and time
to produce a film.
The first Dogme 95 film, titled “Festen”, directed by
(the unsigned) Thomas Vinterberg, made strictly ac-
cording to the Manifesto, experienced incredible suc-
cess and turned into a paradigm of the new film era.
Many young European authors joined the “Dogme 95”,
and from an initiative it has grown into a movement.
Creation instead of frustration. Art instead of mystifi-
cation!
However, what quickly confused and disappointed
the authors and the supporters of the new direction
is that the main protagonist, Lars von Trier himself,
presented movies where not only that the rules of the
Manifesto had not been respected (they had been re-
spected only partially and declaratively), but undoubt-