Report Research - Dogme 95

What is it?

A film movement that has a manifesto with a set of rules that a film has to follow in order for it to be considered part of the movement. Introduced by two Danish directors: Lars von Trier and Thomas Vinterberg,

When?

On March 13th 1995 a conference was held to celebrate 100 years of film. It was here where Trier was invited to speak and where he revealed this manifesto, in front of many influential people. 

Aims

It intended to generate a greater focus on the values of traditional storytelling, performance and specific themes. With an emphasis on these core aspects of filmic storytelling, Dogme 95 was a backlash against the over-reliance on technology such as special effects and groundbreaking digital tools. In this way, the movement was in direct opposition to commercial studio filmmaking at the time, and was a clear attempt to give greater power to independent creative team.

Manifesto - Vow of Chastity

1. Shooting must be performed on location, without providing props or sets that don't logically exist within that setting

2. Diegetic sound only. Sounds must never be produced, such as music that does not exist within the scene

3. All shots must be handheld. Movement, immobility and stability must be attained by hand

4. The film must be in colour, with no special lighting. If there's not enough exposure, a single lamp may be attached to the camera

5. There can be no optical work or lens filters

6. No 'superficial' action (such as staged murders, elaborate stunts etc.)

7. Geographical alienation is strictly forbidden, meaning the film must take place here and now

8. No genre movies

9. Academy 35mm is the only accepted film format

10. Directors must not be credited

Three years after the manifesto’s announcement, the first official Dogme 95 film was released by Vinterberg. Titled The Celebration (Festen), the film was an instant critical success, winning the Jury Prize at the 1998 Cannes Film Festival. Total of 35 Dogme 95 films

Social Impact:

Dogme gave women a platform to make the films they wanted to make, rather than the films that were expected of them.

For Dogme as well as for punk, the minimal aesthetic lent itself to a DIY ethos. In an interview for Richard Kelly’s 2000 document of the movement’s early years, The Name Of This Book Is Dogme95, von Trier enthused about the potential for directors in nations without established film industries to “look at Dogme and think, ‘If that’s a film, then we can make films too.’ Instead of just thinking, ‘Oh, if it doesn’t look like Star Wars, then we can’t make a film.’” Dogme never officially spread to developing nations, but it did find adherents on four continents. And at home in Denmark, its democratizing imperative made it an ideal platform for female filmmakers, the same way punk’s rejection of rock ’n’ roll’s boys’-club elitism brought an influx of women into music 20 years earlier.

Dogme was a rare triumph for women in the avant-garde

 by the time the movement dissolved in 2005, women had directed four out of 10 Danish Dogme films: Lone Scherfig’s Italian For Beginners; Susanne Bier’s Open Hearts; Natasha Arthy’s Old, New, Borrowed And Blue; and Annette K. Olesen’s In Your Hands

In doing so, it accomplished something more radical than simply freeing women from the tyranny of the romantic comedy. Plenty of genres, like action and science fiction, assume a predominantly male audience; Dogme released creators and viewers from those gendered assumptions too. And by denouncing the high-priced spectacles and “superficial action” that have since reached their hysterical apotheosis in city-smashing, vehicle-exploding superhero franchises, von Trier and Vinterberg were countering a trend toward the hyper-masculinization of film. The manifesto’s exhortation to make low-budget films built around “characters’ inner lives” was a mandate to ignore superficial differences and find what makes each character different, as well as what is universal about all human experience.