Industrial conditions favored the arrival of fresh talent. Whereas American film attendance had declined after 1947, elsewhere audiences did not significantly dwindle until the late 1950s. Then, with television providing cheap entertainment, producers aimed at new audiences—sometimes through coproductions, sometimes by making erotic films. They also tried to attract the “youth culture” that emerged in most western countries in the late 1950s. In western Europe, sexual liberation, rock music, new fashions, the growth of soccer and other sports, and new forms of tourism such as Club Med became hallmarks of the generation coming to maturity around 1960. Trends toward an urban, leisure-class lifestyle were strengthened by an economic boom after 1958 that raised European living standards. Similar patterns emerged in Japan and eastern Europe.
Who could better attract this affluent audience than young filmmakers? Film companies began to open up production to beginning directors. These opportunities coincided with the expansion of professional film training. After the late 1950s, existing film academies in the USSR, eastern Europe, France, and Italy were joined by national film schools founded in the Netherlands, Sweden, West Germany, and Denmark. Throughout Europe, young directors (around their thirties) made their
20.1, left Istvan Szabo’s The Age of Daydreaming (1964): shooting on the street, using a long lens that flattens perspective.
20.2, right Shallow depth in a closer view, yielded by the telephoto lens (Walkover, 1965, Jerzy Skolimowski).
First features in the years 1958 to 1967. Brazil, one of the most westernized countries in South America, also reflected this trend in its Cinema Novo group.
Youth culture accelerated the internationalizing of film culture. Art theaters and cine-clubs multiplied. The list of international film festivals now included San Francisco and London (both begun in 1957), Moscow
(1959), Adelaide and New York (1963), Chicago and Panama (1965), Brisbane (1966), and San Antonio and Shiraz, Iran (1967). Festivals in Hyeres, France, and Pe-saro, Italy (both begun in 1965) were deliberately created as gathering points for young filmmakers.
World History
