Practically speaking, the artistic maturing of the cinema was the single-handed achievement of David W. Griffith (1875-1948). Before Griffith, photography in dramatic films consisted of little more than placing the actors before a stationary camera and showing them in full length as they would have appeared on stage. From the beginning of his career as a director, however, Griffith, because of his love of Victorian painting, employed composition. He conceived of the camera image as having a foreground and a rear ground, as well as the middle distance preferred by most directors. By 1910, he was using close-ups to reveal significant details of the scene or of the acting and extreme long shots to achieve a sense of spectacle and distance. His appreciation of the camera’s possibilities produced novel dramatic effects. By splitting an event into fragments and recording each from the most suitable camera position, he could significantly vary the emphasis from camera shot to camera shot.
Griffith also achieved dramatic effects by means of creative editing. By juxtaposing images and varying the speed and rhythm of their presentation, he could control the dramatic intensity of the events as the story progressed. Despite the reluctance of his producers, who feared that the public would not be able to follow such a story, Griffith persisted and experimented as well with other elements which have become standard ever since.
Besides developing the cinema's language, Griffith immensely broadened its range and treatment of subjects. His early movies included not only the standard comedies, melodramas, westerns, and thrillers, but also such novelties as adaptations from Browning and Tennyson, and treatment of social issues. As his success mounted, his ambitions grew. When he made a new movie in 1911, he insisted that a subject of importance could not be treated in the then conventional length of one reel. One of his movies reached the unprecedented length of four reels, or one hour’s running time. Griffith’s introduction of the American-made multi-reel picture began an immense revolution.
1.The primary purpose of the passage is to（）
2.The author suggests that Griffith’s film innovations had a direct effect on all of the following except （）
3.It can be inferred from the passage that before 1910 the normal running time of a film was （）
4.It can be inferred that Griffith would be most likely to agree with which of the following statements?
5.The author’s attitude toward photography in the cinema before Griffith can be best described as（）
