A、They could dance to the music like human beings. B、They had both human and animal characteristics. C、Their sounds and images i

Okay, we’ve been discussing films in the 1920s and 1930s, and how back then film categories, as we know them today, had not yet been established. We said that by today’s standards, many of the films of the 20s and 30s would be considered hybrids, that is, a mixture of styles that wouldn’t exactly fit into any of today’s categories, and in that context.
    Today we are going to talk about a film-maker who began making very unique films in the late 1920s. He was French, and his name was Jean Painleve. Jean Painleve was born in 1902. He made his first film in 1928. Now in a way, Painleve’s films conform to norms of the 20s and 30s, that is, they don’t fit very neatly into the categories we use to classify films today. That said, even by the standards of the 20s and 30s, Painleve’s films were unique, a hybrid of styles. He had a special way of fusing, or some people might say confusing, science and fiction. His films begin with facts, but then they become more and more fictional. They gradually add more and more fictional elements. In fact, Painleve was known for saying that science is fiction.
    Painleve was a pioneer in underwater film-making, and a lot of his short films focused on the animals living in water. He liked to show small underwater creatures, displaying what seemed like familiar human characteristics—what we think of as unique to humans. He might take a clip of a jellyfish going up and down in the water and set it to music. You know, to make it look like the jellyfish were dancing to the music like a human being—that sort of thing. But then he suddenly changed the image or narration to remind us how different the animals are, how unlike humans. He confused his audience in the way he portrayed the animals he filmed, mixing up on notions of the categories of humans and animals. The films make us a little uncomfortable at times because we are uncertain about what we are seeing. It gives him films an uncanny feature: the familiar made unfamiliar, the normal made suspicious. He liked twists, he liked the unusual. In fact, one of his favorite sea animals was the seahorse because with seahorses, it’s the male that carries the eggs, and he thought that was great. His first and most celebrated underwater film is about the seahorse.
    Okay, before we continue to the next part, do you have any questions?
16. What is the focus of the professor’s lecture?
17. What does the professor say about Painleve’s films?
18. What confused the audience about the underwater creatures in Painleve’s films?
19. What do we learn about Painleve’s most famous underwater film?