In this April 2013 lecture at SFU’s Vancouver campus, Donald Brackett, an SFU Continuing Studies instructor, explored the dynamics behind the creation of the 1950 film noir classic Sunset Boulevard, and the highly combustible and competitive partnership between its director, Billy Wilder, and its writer/producer, Charles Brackett.
The lecture also covered the film’s large social impact on popular culture—in particular, the fascination with fame that saturates our contemporary social networks and the film’s prophetic nature in showing—over 60 years ago— the dangers of unbridled star-adulation and self-absorption. Some cinematic works of art have such an intuitive prescience into the human condition that they seem as fresh and insightful today as when they were produced. Sunset Boulevard is just such a film.
As Charles Brackett’s nephew, Donald Brackett brings a wealth of personal knowledge and insight to this topic. He specializes in the history, theory, and practice of art, design, music, and architecture. He is also a well-known art historian and curator, and the author of many essays, articles, monographs, and books.
Learn more about SFU Continuing Studies:
http://www.sfu.ca/continuing-studies.
SFU Continuing Studies
Source
Donald's consistent millennial-bashing is uncalled for and irrelevant to the insight he has to offer here
He makes some curious mistakes in the lecture. A Foreign Affair is actually a comedy not a tragedy and Ninotchka was directed by Ernst Lubitsch not Billy Wilder. Charles Brackett's recently published diaries also reveals that he wasn't totally entranced with Garbo.
When he talks about Garbo and Ninotcka at around 23:47: "Billy was the director."
He would have been much easier to listen to if he had simply used his written lecture as notes instead of reading it verbatim. So much good information delivered in a tedious style.
Masterpiece! So much genius went into making this masterpiece. It has more layers than an onion.
half an hour in and sick of the bs and his cousin lol, reading not talking to us…. and a very superficial explanation of the story…. based on the obvious, nothing new here.
Thank you for uploading this program, events of such type are visited by Arty and High Class people and being none of the above there was no way I could ever experience this most interesting subject Sunset Boulevard.
Shut up you jerks
Commentators
i dont like this guys repeated reference to lennon and mccartney
rip. Greg Page… green eyes…