Blood Simple

 

  Blood Simple

Annie Hall

1) Relate what was discussed in class or the text to the screening.

One thing that we discussed in class that can relate to the screening, Annie Hall, is about point of view that is in chapter. 9. The camera functions as a tool that allows the audience to be the viewer's eyes and provides a point of view. When their is a first person narrator it can be onscreen and or off-screen. In Annie Hall, Woody Allen's character does a great amount of point of view shots. When he is being interviewed by the camera and when he is doing some scenes where he is watching himself in the film doing his daily routines. 

2)  Find a related article and summarize the content.  (on the film, director, studio, actor/actress, artistic content, etc.) You can use the library or the internet.  Cite the article or copy the url to your journal entry. Summarize in your own words the related article but do not plagiarize any content.

Woody Allen's character, Alvy Singer, looks at the word miserably. The writer named Vincent in this article discusses, "Alvy Singer's freewheeling, self-deprecating, funny, and sorrowful search for the truth about his on-again, off-again affair with a beautiful young woman who is as emotionally bent as he is." The film also goes into a little detail about how Alvy never truly commits to his love for Annie Hall. At the end, when it is too late, it is esenctially too late.

 http://www.nytimes.com/movie/review?res=EE05E7DF173AE562BC4951DFB266838C669EDE

3) Apply the article to the film screened in class.   How did the article support or change the way you thought about the film, director, content, etc.?

 This article really did not support or change the way I thought about this film. It was a very simple film and easy film to watch. This is because of the flow of the film and how Woody Allen's character got to talk to you during the scenes as if he was giving the viewers an inside scoop. 

4) Write a critical analysis of the film, including your personal opinion,  formed as a result of the screening, class discussions, text material and the article.  I am less interested in whether you liked or disliked a film, (although that can be part of this)  than I am in your understanding of its place in film history or the contributions of the director.

Annie Hall is a very interesting film that has caught a lot of people's eyes over the past decades. It was said, in the article, that Woody Allen has a great way of casting roles for his film. Even in Annie Hall hos cast may or may not be famous then but those are a group of people in that film who are still very relevant in today's film world. 

Living In Oblivion

1) Relate what was discussed in class or the text to the screening.
There where many different things that we discussed in class that were related to the screening we saw in class.For one example was in Chapter.5 which discussed the use of Sound. As it said in the chapter, early microphones and recording devices were nothing like the sound devices we use today. Along with the sound devices came with noisy microphones came loud cameras. As the years had gone by the use of overhead booms emerged. These booms would follow around the actors and actresses on set. In this screening of "Living In Oblivion" it was very apparent that the film the actors were directing and creating was an independent film because of the professionalism they had. In one scene, the director played by Steve Buscemi, had to cut the scene short because the overhead boom mic man kept getting the boom into the screen. Another part of the scene was when the audio producer had to have everyone remain quiet for at least 30 seconds so he could get just some recording of silence. 

2)  Find a related article and summarize the content.  
http://www.tomdicillo.com/blog/trivia/living-in-oblivion-2/
This article was written by the actual director and writer of the film. He discussed in the beginning of the article how he actually wrote this while he was "teetering somewhere between homicide and suicide." He then created this film that was the basis of the old saying about how if all the things that could go wrong actually do. This film was the feeling that people who are in the film industry are often feeling the same love/hate relationship with the whole career. This film was created by the help of the actors themselves. Those actors who wanted to participate in the film had to pay if they wanted a part in the film itself. The director explained at the end that the film was created so perfectly he ended up writing a book about the whole experience. 

3) Apply the article to the film screened in class.
 It is actually pretty ironic how this film was created because it really resembled how the plot of the film itself was like. This film was about creating a film. The director, Tom DiCillo, seemed like this was his last shot at creating some remediable. As a viewer of the film you can see how this film was constantly moving and flowing from one side, angle, position, view, etc to another.   

 4) Write a critical analysis of the film, including your personal opinion, formed as a result of the screening, class discussions, text material and the article.  I am less interested in whether you liked or disliked a film, (although that can be part of this) than I am in your understanding of its place in film history or the contributions of the director.

A great amount of the actors and actresses who were casted in this film were very lucky. They were casted because they wanted to be apart of it but also because they invested in it. This film was created in 1995 and half of the film itself was in black and white. The film showed a person, if never interested in the film industry before, a very basic side of how filming something happens. This was a very different type of film that you could tell was going for that independent film look. After seeing that the director created a book about this film really goes to show that how he explains film making in the movie is actually a real thing. He discusses alot of elements when it comes to sound, filming, lightening, and even how the actors/actresses should be facing, looking and feeling on the camera. Overall, it was a great film to teach and go though if you are in a film class. 


CHECKLIST FOR PLAGIARISM 
1) (x) I have not handed in this assignment for any other class. 
2) (x) If I reused any information from other papers I have written for other classes, I clearly explain that in the paper. 
3) (x) If I used any passages word for word, I put quotations around those words, or used indentation and citation within the text. 
4) (x) I have not padded the bibliography. I have used all sources cited in the bibliography in the text of the paper. 
5) (x) I have cited in the bibliography only the pages I personally read. 
6) (x) I have used direct quotations only in cases where it could not be stated in another way. I cited the source within the paper and in the bibliography. 
7) (x) I did not so over-use direct quotations that the paper lacks interpretation or originality. 
8) (x) I checked yes on steps 1-7 and therefore have been fully transparent about the research and ideas used in my paper. 
Name: Colleen McGovern      Date: April 13, 2015

Short Film Group Podcast

Persepolis Review

  Persepolis

Eisenstein Essay 1 Group Presentation

When Harry Met Sally

1) Relate what was discussed in class or the text to the screening.

                There are many different aspects that we have discussed in class or in the text that can connect to the screening of When Harry Met Sally. One aspect that was very relevant during this film was the director and cinematographer’s use of colors. During this movie, which talked a great amount on relationships, the colors each character wore truly spoke to the audience on how they were feeling at the time. Bill Crystal’s character, Harry, goes through a tough divorce and is usually shown wearing dark colors like dark blues, blacks, and greys. These colors suggest sadness or sometimes even being tranquil. However, Sally for most part of the movie wears lighter colors. White, pink, even red were colors Meg Ryan’s character Sally was wearing. When times got rough between the two main characters, Sally was wearing the color black at the very end during the wedding scene and on the New Year’s Eve scene. She was very distressed and the coloring helped establish the characters feelings.

2)  Find a related article and summarize the content.  (on the film, director, studio, actor/actress, artistic content, etc.) You can use the library or the internet.  Cite the article or copy the url to your journal entry. Summarize in your own words the related article but do not plagiarize any content.

                This really unique article talks about the relationship between the two subjects in the film and how it was showed with how they were spaced. The writer Jesse Fox explains that in the first scene when Harry and Sally are traveling to NYC they are in the car and the amount of space between them too is huge. What is unique about this scene that is not just about the space is what is between them physically which is all their luggage and baggage that they are traveling with. These two characters in the beginning are meeting with two totally different viewpoints. When Sally drops Harry off in NYC for the first time and they go their separate ways you notice how big of a gap is being created between them two that is even greater now than before. Fox than adds how once the meet again 5 years later and Harry tells Sally he is not married again she takes one step closer to him. This is making the space between them smaller which is creating a friendship that they have always talked about.  Because this couple did not have sex till the end of the movie, once sex is a conversation piece it always creates some space between the two characters. Once they had developed a relationship with other people then in another scene they are not even in the same frame as one another.  In the final scene, the director wanted them to be shown closer than ever which is why when they finally kiss the close up is very close.

http://www.vulture.com/2014/07/when-harry-met-sally-visual-spacing.html

3) Apply the article to the film screened in class.   How did the article support or change the way you thought about the film, director, content, etc.?

After reading the article and seeing the film, I have discovered that there is a lot of medium and close up shots. This film is about relationships. This is whether it is physical dating relationships or just friends. A shot and the spacing of characters together really can give a great description of people’s relationships. A lot of medium shots that we talked about in class are really used for scenes where dialogue is used. Some medium shot dialogue scenes are in the airplane scene, when they are crouching down in Harry’s apartment when they are putting the rug out and when they are in the diner eating. The director and cinematographer also favored natural lighting. This is also called available lighting.

4) Write a critical analysis of the film, including your personal opinion, formed as a result of the screening, class discussions, text material and the article.  I am less interested in whether you liked or disliked a film, (although that can be part of this) than I am in your understanding of its place in film history or the contributions of the director.

The whole flow of the film was very well put together. Nothing seemed confusing in this film because of the dialogue went really well with the cinematography. The article really made me respect the director’s use of spacing. Usually when watching a movie, people really see a person’s body language and dialogue to figure out a person’s relationship with another person. Some people do not really think to talk about a person’s spacing throughout a film like this director did.  There were a lot of proxemtic patterns shown in the film.  A great amount of intimate scenes were shown. This is having to do with the great amount of thought put into the spacing again. If the couples showing are having a kissing scene usually the director would not do a long shot for this particular scene he/she would use a close up.  

CHECKLIST FOR PLAGIARISM

1) ( x ) I have not handed in this assignment for any other class.

2) (x  ) If I reused any information from other papers I have written for other classes, I clearly explain that in the paper.

3) ( x ) If I used any passages word for word, I put quotations around those words, or used indentation and citation within the text.

4) (  x) I have not padded the bibliography. I have used all sources cited in the bibliography in the text of the paper.

5) (  x) I have cited in the bibliography only the pages I personally read.

6) (x  ) I have used direct quotations only in cases where it could not be stated in another way. I cited the source within the paper and in the bibliography.

7) ( x ) I did not so over-use direct quotations that the paper lacks interpretation or originality.

8) ( x ) I checked yes on steps 1-7 and therefore have been fully transparent about the research and ideas used in my paper.

Name: Colleen McGovern Date: 2/27/2015