Film Theory Final Presentation

The video is not embedding into the blog so here is the link to our Film Theory Final Presentation

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e3SZ6po4uaE

Un Chien Andalou

Un Chien Andalou
Total Running Time: 00:16:00
Director: Luis Bunuel
Language: (silent)

This short is a sixteen minute surrealist film by Luis Bunuel along with artist Salvador Dali. This was an extremely weird film and has no conventional plot. I don’t even believe there is an actual story to this. The film is very disjointed and unsettling and in jumps from once upon a time to eight years later without anything changing. The Characters also never age. the director Luis Bunuel told Dali at a restaurant one day about a dream in which a cloud sliced the moon in half "like a razor blade slicing through an eye". Dali then told him about a dream involving a hand crawling with ants. Watching this film made me think how it pretty much plays like a music video. The film is famous for its eye-cutting scene. In conclusion, this is just an extremely weird piece of art if I must say.

Desperately Seeking Susan

Title: Desperately Seeking Susan
Director: Susan Seidelman
TRT: 104 minutes
YEAR: 1985
AWARDS: BAFTA FILM Best Supporting Actress

Directed by Susan Seidelman, Desperately Seeking Susan stars Rosanna Arquette, Madonna, Aidan Quinn, and John Torturro. The story is about a suburban housewife named Roberta. Roberta seems bored with her life and becomes obsessed with this girl susan that she reads about in the personals. Roberta tries to set up a meeting with Susan but ends up being mistaken for susan and hits her head and gets amnesia and believes she is actually Susan. The film does a good job with showing what the 80’s were like and how people acted. Also, it is a very feminist film and madonna’s character, Susan, best represents that. In the film, she is a very independent and free woman who lives her life by her own rules. Roberta, on the other hand, feels more like a prisoner in her life and seeks to escape her lifestyle and live it up.

The first article I found if from Independent Film Channel. It is not a big article but it gives some interesting facts about the movie. This film was Seidelman’s second feature-length. This film is inspired by two other films which are Julie Go Boating and Jacque Rivette’s Celine. Also, for this film, she casted hipster extras, downtown personalities, and New York thespians. Furtermore, the big dance-club sequence was filmed at Danceteria. This was the place that helped launch Madonna's career. This scene from the film also helped propel "Into the Groove” onto the music charts.

The second article is from the Los Angeles Times titled “Los Angeles Film Festival: Susan Seidelman recalls making Desperately Seeking Susan.” The article opens up by stated “If the late John Hughes is considered the filmmaker who captured the dreams and angst of 1980s teenagers, then it's director Susan Seidelman who best caught the punk, free-wheeling vibe of the decade.” In the article, Seidelman says how she was nervous about the film’s release because by this time Madonna had become famous and they wondered if her new popularity would help or harm the film. Lastly, Seidelman says how she was able to relate to Madonna’s character and balance the characters of Susan and Roberta because she was already familar with the New York scene, punk, and New Wave.

This film was probably the most interesting and entertaining film we watched all semester. It was a very entertaining movie and was well paced and had just enough humor, action, and drama mixed in. The film did an excellent job with showing the New York punk scene at the time. However, it was a little weird to see a young Madonna in the movie playing pretty much a punk being see is from a pop background. The music in the movie was very good also and the cinematography, especially in the club, well well-done. This was a good film overall.

Sources:
1.)http://www.ifc.com/movies/13417/Desperately-Seeking-Susan
2.)http://articles.latimes.com/2010/jun/19/entertainment/la-et-desperately-20100619

Erice's The Spirit of the Beehive

Title: The Spirit of the Beehive
Director: Victor Erice
TRT: 97 min.
Year: 1973


The Spirit of the Beehive is a Spanish film directed by Victor Erice in 1973. The film is set in 1940 right after Spain’s Civil War. Druing this time, there was rivalry between two different parties : The Nationalists and the Republicans. In the film, each girls represents a political party. The movie focuses on two young girls named Ana and Isabel. A mobile cinema brings the 1931 film “Frankenstein” to the town and two girls go an see it. Ana is horrified when she witnesses the Frankenstein monster killing the young girl in the film. Ana then becomes fascinated with the movie and she attempts to search for the monster believe that the monster actually exists.
The first article I found is The Guardian in the UK. It is titled, “Victor Erice: The Spirit of the Beehive: In the Shadow of Franco.” The article points out that when the film was made in 1973, Spanish Filmmakers had to hide their political messages in allegory such as Erice did with this movie. In the Movie, Ana discovers a Republican soldier who is hiding from Franco’s army. In Ana’s mind, The soldier is the Frankenstein monster from the film even tho the soldier is eventually found and killed. The article mentions that the film is about child-hood imaginings. Also, it is about “Franco’s long shadow cast over Spain.” The film plays as if the girls are in a dream world and is cloaked in quit and sadness. An interesting fact I found in this article is that the producer worried that Erice would never complete this film and Erice has only made very few films after. One of them is only half-completed.
The second article is simply titled “The Spirit of the Beehive.” The article points out that after the movie was released, Franco’s regime was “rotting from the inside” and Franco himself was near dying. Under Franco’s rule, political speech was restricted so people took to the arts to get their political messages across, such as Erice. Erice’s “The Spirit of the Beehive” became a calling card and showed that Franco’s regime was indeed vulnerable. The film also correctly portrayed the trouble Spanish Society and the psychological costs of it. In the film, Fernando tends to his bees and the family is pretty withdrawn from society and acts as it they are unconscious.
This film was alright. I like the story-line and how it was centered on Ana searching from the Frankenstein monster after they see the film. She believes he is a spirit in her world. The cinematography was very good with the use of muted colors and the shots were well conceived. However, I thought the film was a little slow and could have been paced a little better but I think the director intended it to be more of a reflection of the time. Overall, I think Erice did a good job with the film.

Sources:

1.) http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/1999/sep/16/derekmalcolmscenturyoffilm

2.) http://www.albany.edu/writers-inst/webpages4/filmnotes/beehive.htm


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Italian Neorealism and French New Wave

In class we talked about neorealism and French New Wave. Italian Neorealism is is a style of film characterized by stories set amongst the poor and working class. They were often filmed on location and frequently used nonprofessional actors. Famous directors who helped developed this style are Michelangelo Antonioni, Luchino Visconti, Gianni Puccini, Cesare Zavattini, Giuseppe De Santis and Pietro Ingrao. The first neorealist film was “Ossessione” by Luchino Visconti in 1943. It became famous globally in 1946 with Roberto Rosselini’s “Roma, citta aperta.” Neo-realism eventually went on to influence another type of film movement known as French New Wave.

French New Wave came about in the 1950s and 60s. It was influenced by Italian Neorealism and classical Hollywood cinema. These directors were experimental in their films. They rejected the normal conventions of filmmaking and tried new things such as with editing, themes, and shot compositions. Some famous directors include Jean-Luc Godard and Francois Truffaut.
In class, we watched scenes from the film “Breathless.” It was made in 1960 by director Jean-Luc Godard. It was his first-feature length film and one of the first ever created in the French New Wave era. It is about a small-time thief who steals a car and murders a police officer. It is also a love-story as he tries to renew his relationship with his old flame Patricia. It won the silver Berlin Bear for director Jean-Luc Godard.

Cocteau's Beauty and the Beast

Title: Beauty and the Beast
Director: Jean Cocteau
Year: 1946
Awards: Ranked #26 in Empire magazines "The 100 Best Films Of World Cinema" in 2010

Beauty and the Beast is a 1946 French film directed by Jean Cocteau. An interesting fact about the director, just to throw in there, is that he is also a poet. The film is about a girl named Belle. One day, her father gets lost in the woods. He eventually comes upon a castle, home to the Beast. He takes a rose and is caught. the Beast tells him that he for doing this, he must die, or one of his daughters must. Belle learns of this and sacrifices herself to the Beast. The Beast falls in love with her and every night he asks her to marry him. The theory used here is psycho-analytical as it deals with human nature, like Rashomon.
The first article is Cocteau’s Beauty & the Beast: The Poet as Monster. The article starts out by talking about how the beginning and end of the film opens and close with the flight of an arrow. The first one is fired by Avenant and lands next to Belle. The final arrow is fired by the statue of Diana, goddess of chastity, and lands in Avenant’s heart. This arrow sets off a metamorphosis where the Beast and Avenant switch. The ending of the film was created by Cocteau himself. It symbolizes that in the end, in terms of appearance, Belle is not back to the same starting point as the Beast now looks like Avenant. It also shows the whole plot is a trick by destiny and to force her to grow up because in the beginning of the movie, she turns down Avenant over her ill father and leaves him. Another interesting thing in the article is the difference between how the Beast actually became the monster. In the original story, “a wicked fairy condemned me to keep this appearance until a beautiful woman agreed to marry me.” In the film, he is condemned to this appearance because his parents didn’t believe in fairies and only the look of love can save him. This is an idea that parents have to have the same simple faith as children do.
The second article I found is titled “Beauty and the Beast (La Belle et la Bête).” This article basically talked about the synopsis off the plot but It does has an interesting quote from Cocteau about the music in the film. "At my request, Georges Auric has not kept to the rhythm of the film but cut across it so that when film and music come together it seems as though by the grace of God.” Auric is the film’s composer and Cocteau wanted a score for this film that broke all the rules. he all set out to do the same with the cinematography. "People have decided once and for all that fuzziness [soft or out-of-focus shots] is poetic," he wrote. "No, since in my eyes poetry is precision, numbers. I'm pushing Alekan in precisely the opposite direction from what fools think is poetic." Clearly, Cocteau was trying to push the boundaries of film-making in an entire new direction.
I personally liked this movie. I thought it was a very interesting take on the story and nothing like the Disney version. The visual effects were neat and seems impossible for the year that it was made in. I like the storyline and the characters and thought the Beast was a very tragic character with his longing to be loved. However, the ending of the film was a little over the top and sort of out there but in a way, it makes sense. When I was watching the movie, i kept thinking that the music doesn’t go with the film at all but after finding out what he wanted with the music from the article, I can see why it is that way. Overall, it was very enjoyable to watch.

Sources:
1.Popkin, Michael. "Cocteau's Beauty and the Beast: The Poet as Monster." Literature
Film Quarterly 10.2 (1982): 100. Communication & Mass Media Complete. EBSCO.
Web. 29 Nov. 2010.

2. http://course1.winona.edu/pjohnson/h140/beauty.htm

Watchmen

Director: Zack Snyder
TRT: 162 min.
Year-2009

Based upon the graphic novel written by Alan Moore and illustrated by Dave Gibbions, “Watchmen” is set in an alternate universe where Richard Nixon has forced all costumed superheroes into retirement. When one them, The Comedian, is murdered, a rebellion vigilante named Rorschach sets out to find who is responsible for his death. The movie is directed by Zack Snyder.
An article I found that talks about the difference between the book and movie is from the AV Club. It is titled, “Book vs. Film: Watchmen.” in the book, the story has a comic within a comic called “The Black Freighter.” in the movie, Zack Snyder has cut this storyline out completely except for a second or two when we see the kid by the newsstand reading the comic.
Snyder also changed scenes from the book in the movie. In the movie, Dr. Manhattan replicated himself in the bedroom with Silk Spectre while they are hooking up. This scene happened in the book as well but it has been altered by Snyder. In the book, she is alarmed and appalled in a way that he did this. Clearly, he has never tried this with her before. In the movie tho, Dr. Manhattan has done this before with her. Seeing that she isn’t happy, he goes “I thought you liked this.”
Another difference between the book and movie is the dialogue. The dialogue is altered between the book and movie. For example: Rorschach answers the question, “We got a jail full of guys out here who hate your guts. What in hell do you got?” with “Your hands, my pleasure” instead of “Your hands, my perspective.”
Also in Watchmen, the ending of the movie is changed from the book. In the book, the villain, Ozymandias uses Dr. Manhattan to unleash an alien into New York City which kills hundreds and hundreds of people. In the Movie, Snyder has it that a bomb goes off and does. Snyder did this to make the film more relevant and realistic.
I have read the graphic novel myself. I can see why Snyder would change the things around like he did. The book was very detailed and drawn out. It also had a lot of sub-plots. To put this all in a film, would be implausible. Snyder stayed very faithful to the book as best as he can and did a good job.

Akira Kurosawa's Rashomon

Title: Rashomon
Director: Akira Kurosawa
TRT: 1hr 28 min
Year-1951
Awards: 1951 Venice Film Festival Golden Lion: Akira Kurosawa

Directed by the great Akira Kurosawa, “Rashomon” is actually based on two stories by Ryūnosuke Akutagawa. The first one is Rashomon which provides the setting for the film and the second is In the Grove, providing the film with the characters and plot-line. The film tells the story of a rape of a woman and the murder of her husband. The story is told from different viewpoints such as from the bandit, the woman, the murdered husband, and the narrator. The theory of film that this falls under is psychoanalytical. Kurosawa focuses on human nature and what people will in the name of honor as well as in shame. In the movie, the woman wants her husband murdered because of the shame she has do to being being raped by the thief.
The first article I found is an online article entitled “Rashomon (Film). It is a very in depth article about the film. One of things interesting about the article is that it talks about the motivations of each character in the film. In the bandit’s version, he accepts blame but tells that duel between him and the samurai was an honorable one. In the wife’s version, she feels morally guilty so she says that she stabbed her husband. In the husband’s version, who is dead at the time they are each telling their story, is told through a medium, he is ashamed to what happened in the woods. The article also talks about other things suck as how Kurosawa was influenced by silent films. He states, “I like silent pictures and I always have ... I wanted to restore some of this beauty. I thought of it, I remember in this way: one of techniques of modern art is simplification, and that I must therefore simplify this film." One last tidbit from the article is that it talks about the lighting in the film. The film uses sunlight to symbolize evil and sin in the film. An example is when the woman sees the sun and gives in to the bandit’s desire.
The second article is from Literature Film Quarterly entitled “Light and Darkness in Rashomon.” In the article they look at the different things about human nature. The light side (the good side) and the dark (the bad side). The film also shows the light through the use of sunlight and the dark by the rain and the ruined Rashomon gate. The article states the light represents reason and the dark represents human impulses. An example of the light. At the end of the movie, the woodcutter leaves with the infant they find at the end of the movie in his arms. This represents the potential harmony.
I have seen Rashomon a couple of times. It is an extremely well-made movie. It also shows how great of a director Akira Kurosawa is. He is able to use only three settings which are the ruined gate, the woods, and the courtyard and weave and interesting and complex story out of them. The cinematography with the use of sunlight is remarkable and the dialogue is sharp. This film has also influenced other mother with its use of telling stories from different points of view. One recent movie I can think of off the top of my head is Vantage Point that uses this. Rashomon is one of the best foreign films ever made.

Sources:

1.) http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/Rashomon_(film)

2.) McDonald, Keiko I. "Light and Darkness in Rashomon." Literature Film Quarterly 10.2 (1982): 120. Communication & Mass Media Complete. EBSCO. Web. 29 Nov. 2010.

Current Events Article

The first article, “Film of Paul Bowles Short Story Rediscovered,” is a pretty interesting article. It tells how director Sara Driver, got a call from a stranger about how her first film “You are Not I” was found. It was neat to see how the director, with a shoe-string budget of only $12,000 and no rights to produce Bowles’ story, went about and made it anymore. She shipped a copy of the film to Bowles’ himself and he liked it. He even wrote her a critique on it and granted her the rights to the story. Another interesting fact in the article is that she filmed it in Western New Jersey and only in six days. Overall, it was a good little piece on the movie and how it came back around after so many years of believing it was lost.



The second article, “Brazil’s Best, Restored and Ready for a 21st-Century Audience is about the film “Limite” It is a 1930 film by director Mario Peixoto. It is showing at the World Cinema Foundation Festival. The article describes the movie as visually poetic and abstract in a way. It is also a movie more talked about and seen and is an independent film. When the film came out, it was detested by the cultural right wing and distributors thought it was too difficult for the audience. This was Peixoto’s only film he made. Walter Salles, Director of Central Station, describes the moves as “ a film of transcendent poetry and boundless imagination.” The writer never goes into what the movie is about, perhaps trying to get the reader intrigued to what it is all about.

The 400 Blows

Title: The 400 Blows
Director: Francois Truffaut
TRT: 99 minutes
Year-1959
Awards: Winner of Best Director, OCIC Award at Cannes Film Festival

Truffaut’s The 400 Blows was very influential for the French New Wave movement. It rejected the traditional cinematic structure. Like with Eisenstein’s films such as The Battleship Potemkin, it went against the typical hollywood style. The movie featured jump cuts. The visual style was also different as Truffaut used different and odd angles for shot instead of the typical long, medium, and close, shot. Truffaut instead focused on long tracking shots such as Antoine running at the end of the film.

The first article I chose is entitled “The Aesthetics of Absorption: Truffaut’s ‘The 400 Blows’. The article is talks about the directing style of Truffaut and about the different shots such as panning in the film that he uses. The article also talks about the French New Wave and compares and contrasts Truffaut to another director, Jean-Luc Godard. One of the scenes the article talks about is the jogging scene. In this scene, the gym teacher takes the class running through the streets and one by one the kids disappear. Truffaut places the camera high above the street to allow the viewer to see this unfold whereby a person walking on the streets would not be able to see (jenkins). Also, in the screening, Truffaut draws attention to the camera and Truffaut’s doesnt try to hide it over its narration.

The second article I chose is from Literature Film Quarterly entitled “The Existential Play in Truffaut’s Early Films. The article talks in details about Truffaut’s three early films which are The 400 Blows, Shot the Piano Player, and Jules and Jim. The article focuses on different themes and shots from each movie. The last shot of the film is a freeze frame of Antoine. The article relates it to the mug shot the police made of Antoine (thiher). Like the other article, this one also talks about Truffaut’s camera movements. These camera movement help the audience to foreshadow what Antoine does in the film. An interesting thing this article talks about how the music in the film doesn’t necessarily fit what is happening in the film (Thiher).

The 400 Blows was a good film in my opinion. I like the way he used the tracking and panning shots. I also like how the story was more existential of short in its way of thinking and wasn’t like the typical clear-cut Hollywood films. The sporatic opening shots of Paris which he did used jump cuts and tracking shots showed how the film was going to unfold with Antoine getting into mischief and how things will change in his life drastically. I also found it very interesting with Truffaut’s choice of music in his scenes because the music did not go at all sometimes because of the character’s emotions or tone of the scene. Lastly, I did like how Truffaut decided to end the film with the freeze frame of Antoine instead of giving us a typical Hollywood ending.



Citations:

Jenkins, Chadwicke. "The Aesthetics of Absorption: Turffaut's 'The 400 Blows'." n. pag. Web. 10 Oct 2010.
http://popmatters.com/pm/tools/print/70934

Thiher, Allen. "The Existential Play in Truffaut's Early Films." Literature Film Quarterly 5, no. 3 (Summer 77 1977) :183.
Communication & Mass Media Complete. EBSCO. web 10 Oct. 2010.