什麼是電影

將膠片上的一連串靜態照片以很快的速度持續放映在銀幕上。電影通常用電影攝影機拍攝，對行動中的人和事物迅速進行曝光；再由電影放映機放映，通常以同步的方法使影像與聲音重現。發明電影機器的人主要是美國的愛迪生和法國的盧米埃兄弟。20世紀初，電影製作集中在法國，但到了1920年代美國成為電影業的主宰。導演和明星紛紛遷往好萊塢，電影攝影場一家家開設，在1930年代和1940年代達至顛峰，同時他們一般擁有廣大的戲院連鎖系統。1950年代和1960年代時，拍攝電影象徵了一種新的國際主義，獨立製片也開始興起。至今美國電影工業挾其龐大的技術資源仍繼續主宰了全世界的市場。亦請參閱Columbia Pictures Entertainment, Inc.、Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Inc. (MGM)、Paramount Communications INC.、RKO Radio Pictures, Inc.、United Artists Corporation、Warner Brothers。

motion picture

Series of still photographs on film, projected in rapid succession onto a screen. Motion pictures are filmed with a movie camera, which makes rapid exposures of people or objects in motion, and shown with a movie projector, which reproduces sound synchronized with the images. The principal inventors of motion-picture machines were Thomas Alva Edison in the U.S. and the Lumière brothers in France. Film production was centered in France in the early 20th century, but by 1920 the U.S. had become dominant. As directors and stars moved to Hollywood, movie studios expanded, reaching their zenith in the 1930s and '40s, when they also typically owned extensive theater chains. Moviemaking was marked by a new internationalism in the 1950s and '60s, which also saw the rise of the independent filmmaker. The sophistication of special effects increased greatly from the 1970s. The U.S. film industry, with its immense technical resources, has continued to dominate the world market to the present day. See also Columbia Pictures, MGM, Paramount Communications, RKO, United Artists, Warner Brothers.