Bazim's Realism

When your dealing with the standards that Bazim puts in film, it's almost unreal to create a piece of work that comes to remotely interesting. Words like montage were not found in Bazim's dictionary due to his dedication of capturing film to the absolute realist extent. By following Bazim's standards, it reverses the Cognitive effect in that films cannot intentionally capture a viewers emotion in that it's up to the viewer to interpret what is shown on his/her own grounds. This method of realism makes the director's job ten times more difficult than it already is by eliminating editing, which is an important tool for the director to know what is being filmed. The effect that Bazim hoped to convey on audiences was to experience every day life through film, almost as the screen wasn't there. Yet, I'm pretty sure people can distinguish the difference when they hear the yawns of audiences members around them. Though Bazim encouraged deep-focus cinematography and panning, it becomes redudant if used as the basis for your entire film ( Citizen Kane even had individual shots/editing). When you talk about the typecasting side of realism, films like Open Water and The Blair Witch Project succeed in trying to convince viewers that even ordinary people can experience danger. Overall, Bazim realism is a difficult task to reach and a myth that most directors tend to avoid ( Hitchcock learned the hard-way)

Law Abiding Citizen- Contemporary Film Theory

After watching, Law Abiding Citizen by F. Gary Gray, under the cognitive film theory, the audio/visual interpretations I began to develop were diverse to say the least. This is one of those films, like Silence of the Lambs, where you rooting for the bad guy during the course of the movie. Why this reaction occurs is because of the intent of the director and how he portrayed actor Gerard Butler into a character with a bad ass persona. Viewers also felt excitement in response towards the number of explosions that occurred during this film. Desire could also be an emotion running through the viewer's head as shown from the power that Butler's character has over the justice system and how having that power is somewhat envious. When Butler's character begins to tear open a victim, limb by limb, this evokes a natural disgust reaction within the viewer and this reaction is only complemented by the desperate screams of the victim. The movie itself moves at a constant pace of suspense due to the unpredictability of Butler's character as he is put in situations where the odds are more than against him and as the viewer, you interpret this suspense with curiosity. The use of hard lighting on Gerard Butler shows the director's understanding of the psychoanalytical theory. The voyeurism behind this is the portrayal of the body and how it sends off signals of sexuality towards a female demographic. This film also has a bit of the Ideological theory in how it relates to the broken justice system that affects society in the eyes of the director. Though this film was not critically receptive, it did manage to keep the interest level high for me disregarding the performance by Jamie Fox.

The Treasure of Riverside Park

http://www.thirteen.org/sites/reel13/shorts/short-treasure-of-riverside-park/2301/

The Treasure of Riverside Park is a black-and-white short film that focuses on how ones misfortune can lead to another man 's treasure. One of the challenges of filming with absence of diegetic sound is conveying to the audience the message your trying to express. With that comes the acting in terms of how they express their emotions with no dialogue. This tests the actor's true ability as it focus more on the body language the actor uses to express what he/she is feeling. With the short time and no audio, this film does a great job of expressing a clear message to it's audience. The director also shows a diversity of classicism in the shot where the homeless man passing the wealthy man on the bench which really caught my eye. Also the use of black of white, in my mind, adds to this in that black and white are two different colors as are both the wealthy man and the homeless man. I enjoyed the simplicity of the score and how it transcends to a horror feel when the man enters with the knife. From my interpretation, I see that throughout the film, the diamond ring loses it's meaning due to the actions from the upset husband. So essentially, the diamond ring becomes a symbol of hope for the homeless man at the end indicated by the smile of his face. I think when your using a dolly, which this film does many times, your camera movement should be fluid and smooth. In this case, some of the dolly shots should have been either put on a smoother surface or not even put at all. Reason being, unless the shakiness of a shot is the intention of the director to capture realism and suspense, i.e. The Bourne Supremacy, than the camera should be still especially when the tone throughout this film was very simple. Overall, I really enjoyed the simplicity of the film, almost like seeing a French film, and that fact that it was able to express a great deal of ambiguity with removal of audio.

Roger Ebert's 3-D

This article shows the hatred of an aspect of theater projection, 3-D, by the film critic Roger Ebert. This article reads like a editorial in that it expresses one mans opinion on a particular subject with a purpose to leave the reader something to think about. Although it stresses a opinionated article with repetitive uses of "I", it does present interesting points and back these points up with hard facts. Such as the surcharge of 5-7 dollar that 3-D films charge as opposed to the standard 2-D films. From this the author brings up a correlation between the power of advertising and the surcharge which I thought was very interesting. A movie that emphasizes on 3-D in their trailer will most likely attract audiences to their film because of it's 3-D aspect to the film. To what extent does the film show instances of 3-D and how there executed is never mentioned leaving the viewer of the film disgruntled and the executive studios 5-7 dollars richer and happier. When the author brought up how the projection from 3-D films can leave the viewer experiencing nausea and headaches according to medical research, I had a personal experience. After seeing the movies Clash of the Titans and Avatar (2nd time), I left the theater not reflecting on what the movie I saw showcased, rather I reached in my medicine cabinet, pulled out the Advil, and went to bed. I also agree with Ebert on how the Oscar contenders are slowly fading away if this trend of studio executives demanding their directors to film 3-D more as opposed to quality films.

Top 5 Films that would be worse if changed to 3-D
1. The Godfather
2. Dawn of the Dead
3. Jason and the Argonauts
4. The Dark Knight
5. Balto

Locust Valley Film Festival

After watching each and every film that came out of the Film Festival, there was one film that caught my eye in terms of how they presented themselves. The Other Half by a student from Wheatley High School . The main factor that attracted me to this short film was the cinematography for one thing. It was very pristine the way that this student set up the film composition as apposed to a unbalanced mess by some other students. The Other Half was the psychological breakdown of how a surplus amount of schoolwork can ultimately decide the fate of a young student. The opening shot of the dolly in through the school hallways demonstrates the students understanding of lighting. The lighting in this shot is interesting as it appears as the camera moves forward it leaves behind a path of shadows casting on the lockers to the sides where the light is focusing on the main subject, which is the student in this case. The narrative in the background also gives a subtle explanation of the character analysis of this young student as well. The film also explores low key lighting where the subject appears to be in the light while the background is compiled with shadows. In the part where the students appears to be doing his HW in his room, the camera tilts up slowly to add to the calm tone of the audio. You could also note in the classroom scene that the camera dollys to the subject being the student almost as he's the central focus and no one else around him is important with the quick editing dissolve. The young student also does a great job in terms of acting as he using "body language" to his advantage by the clinching of the fists, throwing of the desk and grabbing of his hat. By this gesture, the audience has a better understanding as to what the character faces in terms of emotions. The scene where the student is writing near the library bookshelves shows how ambient lighting can act as an appropriate source of light for the film as well as the dolly. I admired when the director decided to film the fence in the foreground while the actor walks in the mid ground almost symbolizing the way character feels, almost locked up and has no where else to turn to. I find it interesting the director is more of a fan of pans/tilts rather than close ups in this film. The framing of the hand dripping a pool of blood couldn't have been frame much better and with the audio, Mad World, in the background almost creates a perfect environment of what this director is trying to express. Alot of people have disagreed with the way this film ended and to that i disagree. The ending where the student is laying on the his bed covered in his HW sheets reminds me of Robert Deniro in Brazil. Both examples are similar in that these HW papers cause the downfall of this character and are what drive this character to the point of disappearance. For Brazil, it was more of Deniro's despise of capitalism that the very thing he despises, receipts for example, ends up the cause for his disappearance. While both examples may cause an area for questioning each scene accomplishes it's goal in subtle symbolism. My only concern of this film however is that the plot structure is unclear to most audiences and that it could have used more work. Either than that, this film is very poetic and presents a unique style that for a student's work, it surpasses my initial expectations.

The Blind Side

I think it was interesting to see a different outlook on this film as opposed to the majority of criticism that I hear. It's interesting how loose this film is related toward the actual book by Michael Lewis, in the way the main character, Michael Ohrer, acts in the book as opposed to the modified version in the Blind Side. When movies say " based on a true story", they never really say to what extent is it based on. The Texas Chainsaw massacre claims the events that occurred in the film were based on "true events" when in actuality, it was loosely based on the killings of serial killer Ed Gein, by only a small portion. What really set off this in author in particular was how a film like this can be Academy Awarded with a story that is so flawed. I also think that his movies have it's traditional values all mixed up and drift toward the line of what's realistic and whats not. It leaves the audience with the message that with a big heart and a bigger wallet that you have the ability to change someones life. In a different perspective, the director of this film wanted to make a film that targeted a specific audience. He rather cater to a large audience of middle aged Americans than to the minority of people who actually read the book and distinguished the flaws. If you compare the two movies, Dangerous Minds, and , Lean On Me, you notice although they have similar plot structure, there execution is much different. Reason being is in my mind the thought of Morgan Freeman, someone who has has been in the perspective of those inner city kids, has a better understanding as the problems there suffering. For that, i think Morgan Freeman is a more believable character than Michelle Phieffer as a ex-marine, and that audiences can relate to Freeman's character better. As you can see the Blind Side shows it's effort in appealing to a broader audience, yet falls short to believable realism in the plot structure.

Mr.Wells Reviews a Current Film

Metropolis can be classified more than another science fiction film due to the fact that it tackles a great amount of detail which needs to be recognized. The film brings not only film elements to consider but offers movie buffs a great deal of psycho-analytical factors to explore. The H.G. Wells article tears apart Metropolis in a negative way by dissecting flaws in the film's plot as well as accurate information. The major flaw that separates the film and this article is that the article fails to notice the cinematic achievements that Metropolis accomplishes. They rather exploit the "architectural" failures that this film is unreliable with. It also presents an argument involving the worker's ideology and their connection to the "efficient" machine. I especially like how he manages to refer to this movie as "dull" when you have transformation scenes like Mary's, where the lightning is poetic and the effect look impressive for the standards of 1920. The architecture of Metropolis shows signs of Expressionism in which the shots of the futuristic city in the film resemble paintings that came out of the Expressionist era. Wells also forgot to see the intent of the director rather than basing his criticism on "invalid facts" that the film contains. Lang was powerful in showing the dark side of capitalism through shots where the machines would malfunction to the point where it would drive people to insanity. Lang shows his quirkiness through Freder as his character is portrayed comical (wardrobe and facial expressions), yet love struck over Maria to the point where he becomes one of the workers that she shows sympathy towards. Metropolis is an example of pure cinema at it's finest with innovative architecture, influences on future films ( Blade Runner, Brazil), and a certain presence that cannot be matched simply by other sci-fi films