The milestone for genres

It is so interesting the fact that those old silent movies actually set characteristics for all known genres! Watching any of the contemporary--being them cult or bollywoodian or hollywoodian-- movies is easy to find elements from these old ones. That was the feeling that I had with Metropolis--which I haven't watched it for 12 years-- or with Sherlock Jr. Each of their scenes would remind me of many of my favourite movies. Take Metropolis for instance.

At first, it gives a theatrical feeling, as all other silent old movies, because of its credits as it was a play casting. I figure this happened because they were creating the entire techniques for this new art that most time they have to keep borrowing elements from other arts.

But the resemblance with theatre ends on the credits. All it is following it is shown, different from a play. And then it is when you get surprised with these first directors. They understood better than anyone else that movies are meant to bend reality only enough to tell a story. They would use only resources if it would move the history forward. That’s why I get really confused with the settings.

In modern movies setting are not only fast, but they are concise: they have to introduce the entire story: one way or another. But for old movies the setting takes place in too many places. In Metropolis the beginning, a classic for silent movies, is given through cards telling the story so the history can more forward as quick as possible as we already know in which universe we are inserted. That is the same with Sherlock Jr.: in ten second we already know what to expect from the reality in front of us because it was told in few words.

Metropolis quickly present itself as the first sci-fi ever made when puts men in the context of their relationship with the environment, while Sherlock Jr. Is clearly a comedy when present the character as caricature of the world that we live, being everything that we wanted to be inside his mind, and everything we don’t want to be in his actual reality.

But then, after an amazing set ups, these movies keep unnecessarily preparing over and over. They did not have the concept of actually prepare the story to work it as they advance the plot. It seems that to emulate life was to keep its flow as similar to life as possible. So after setting the problems with the “head and the hand” in Metropolis, they keep going creating Christian and Egyptian mythologies and other themes that keep popping as the film continues, Which makes the movie completely unpredictable, but too slow. (I slept during the part that Joh’s Son was living the life of 11811.) It is that or the people that filmed it were Rosicrucian.
Addendum: There were so many Christian mystical symbolisms that it seems too clear that they were trying to convey a Rosicrucian message on Metropolis. And that makes me think that those silent movies were all created by those more prominent societies to convey their messages. For instance Hospitality is a look in the leaks of the Christian morals in many levels when the physical space delimitate the actual place whether should you be a Christian or not. So the films were more than entertainment because groups wanted to pass the messages of their cause in ways that people could understand.
But even with these more structural problems, which were just probably resolved later on in the story of movies, the elements of genres were more vivid than any other thing. Again analyzing Metropolis: the urban spaces and things are characters as well and the will of men to overcome and to control the unknown have been set as standards by Metropolis! As well as the dystopian feeling and social values discussions. Even the use of other mythologies (being them conspiracy or not) became common ground to fantasy stories since then.
For Sherlock Jr. and Hospitality, the inclusion of the character in an odd and unsuitable environment is the standard for comedies because those things are really funny! The naive/smart characters, due destine sees himself in a situation that he was avoiding since the beginning.
I don’t know if it was pure geniality or it had to be like that, but those movies could explore all the elements that modern movies can only recreate or discuss, but never go too far away from them. The art was so young back then that its moviemakers love for moving pictures resulted in amazing experimentation, and if we love quite enough we can recreate genres ourselves.