Gelas Film Analysis

Bert Haanstra’s ‘Glas’ is a short film made in 1958. The film focussed on the process of glass making where two different methods of the process have been screened. Firstly it showed how human beings i.e. skilled individuals are blowing the glasses and making artistic pieces out of it like decorative materials, bottles, and cups etc, followed by the large scale mass production of bottles carried out by machines. A closer look into the film reveals that there are three clearly defined chapters. In the first chapter we see the improvisatory method of glass blowing where artisans are applying their individual artistic abilities in order to create glass objects with a unique art impression whereas the second chapter demonstrates the mechanical

For example: the sound of bottles being kept or taken or touched. These sounds of touching, taking or keeping a bottle are having a rattling tale which I think is because of the use of short delay. Here short delay is added may be to give a sense of apprehension because short delays are heard in closed places like prison cells or caves. This is done to give a sense of apprehension of what happens when everything is taken over by machines or when something is happening on machine which is unattended by human beings. The only use of human voice element in Bert Haanstra’s ‘GLAS’ is the counting of the bottles and the shouting of a man ‘hey check out’ when the bottles break. This also emphasises the absence of human beings. In the previous chapter we see men at work, they are working with glass and suddenly we see everything is done by machines and then we start hearing human voice when the glass breaks and the machine can’t handle it! This emphasised the absence of human beings even more as human intervention is required. Then the accompanying sound track smoothly fades out and a soothing music again fades