<p>The digital evolution in the film industry has opened possibilities that was only to blockbusters before the digital age. I am talking about mass-scenes. Huge scenes with hordes of people often in huge battlefields. This was earlier in film history an extremly costly undertaking for the filmindustry and was a major reason why the large studio systems in Hollywood collapsed in the 60s. Now we can enjoy large scale battles created with CGI without costly extras, costumes and props. It’s all made with the computer and with ’blue screen’ technology. Is it possible to track the mass-scene back to some sort of origin or at least to who that defined the mass-scene ? If we look closer at mass-scenes used in contemporary movies then a clear pattern often emerges. These scenes can often be traced back to especially two propaganda films from the late 30s. Triumph des Willens by Leni Riefenstahl and Alexander Nevsky by Sergei M. Eisenstein. Of course there are others, but these two stands out from the others regarding mass-scenes. My opinion is that these two classic propaganda films have defined the mass-scenes as we have come to see and understand them in many comtemporary films from Star Wars to Lord Of The Rings.</p><p>In this thesis I will try to explore the usage of mass-scenes in comtemporary films and hopefully uncover the strong intertextual ties to Triumph des Willens and Alexander Nevsky.</p><p>I will also attempt to define the mass-scene and it’s usage in contemporary film.</p>

The digital evolution in the film industry has opened possibilities that was only to blockbusters before the digital age. I am talking about mass-scenes. Huge scenes with hordes of people often in huge battlefields. This was earlier in film history an extremly costly undertaking for the filmindustry and was a major reason why the large studio systems in Hollywood collapsed in the 60s. Now we can enjoy large scale battles created with CGI without costly extras, costumes and props. It’s all made with the computer and with ’blue screen’ technology. Is it possible to track the mass-scene back to some sort of origin or at least to who that defined the mass-scene ? If we look closer at mass-scenes used in contemporary movies then a clear pattern often emerges. These scenes can often be traced back to especially two propaganda films from the late 30s. Triumph des Willens by Leni Riefenstahl and Alexander Nevsky by Sergei M. Eisenstein. Of course there are others, but these two stands out from the others regarding mass-scenes. My opinion is that these two classic propaganda films have defined the mass-scenes as we have come to see and understand them in many comtemporary films from Star Wars to Lord Of The Rings. In this thesis I will try to explore the usage of mass-scenes in comtemporary films and hopefully uncover the strong intertextual ties to Triumph des Willens and Alexander Nevsky. I will also attempt to define the mass-scene and it’s usage in contemporary film.