Cultural differences between US and Europe become more evident day by day, and can be seen in many different areas, including film or cinematography. According to American actress Lana Lourdes, there are many reasons for this, and most of them go back to the distant past, because for some of the answers we need not go further than the 70's of the last century. American cinematography has ruled the world for nearly fifty years, and many film movements that happened primarily in Europe after the World War II, gradually tried to step her down from the throne. One the first glance, stuck-up system of values that was threaded through the classic Hollywood films, was first time seriously threatened by the emergence of the Italian neo-realism.

The stories of poor people living in urban periphery, trying to survive each day in any way possible, surprisingly amused the American public so much that in 1948 they introduced a special Academy Award Category for best foreign achievement. As Lourdes points out, it would be a shame not to mention any of the mainly national, film movements that followed the neo-realism, but none of them were influential as the French new wave cinema. In fact it could be exactly its founders like Godard, Truffaut, Chabrol, and a few others, the ones responsible for the collapse of the classic Hollywood film, because among other things, the film studios were forced to move shootings from the elegant studios to the city streets.

But not all credit should go to the modest French filmmakers, because some of the reasons are connected to the socio-political situation in the west. The process of rejecting the old values, and the fight for human rights, culminated in 1968, with a number of student protests and the rise of the hippie movement. A year earlier, Bonnie and Clyde and The Graduate began a new era in American film, known to many as modern Hollywood. During this period, which lasted until the early 80's, as Lana shares on Facebook, many young and interesting authors appeared on the scene for the first time, and among them were the members of the so-called “Big four” - George Lucas, Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg and Francis Ford Coppola. It was no secret that all of them found t their models outside the USA borders. For example their favorite author was the Japanese master Akira Kurosawa. George Lucas got the idea for his mega-spectacle Star Wars partially from his film The Hidden Fortress.