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Perfect Blue Kon Satoshi analysis
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Zach Love Kon Satoshi: Director of the Surreal My paper focuses on Kon Satoshi’s four anime movies that he directed. They are, in order of release, Perfect Blue (1997), Millennium Actress (2001), Tokyo Godfathers (2003), and Paprika (2006.) While I plan to analyze these movies from multiple angles, one of the main overarching topics will of course be Kon’s trademark surrealism. The way Kon blends realistic portrayals with other dream-like sequences is very interesting. These are honestly not some of my favorite films from a purely entertainment focused lens as I tend to prefer something a little more straightforward, but they are certainly interesting to analyze because of the sharp contrasts between reality and the surreal. All of Kon’s works are also very original stories This one is about a man (Genya) interviewing a retired actress (Chiyoko) that he greatly admires. Realities blend between past and present, using both Chiyoko’s real life as well as scenes from her movies. The actual plot isn’t as important for the analyzation of Kon as Perfect Blue’s was, but I will touch on it to provide a background for a few examples of how he continued to expertly use surreality in this movie as well. The story is based around Chiyoko telling Genya her about her life. It starts with her as a young girl in 1930s Japan being recruited to be an actress. Shortly afterwards, she meets a man who is running away from the police. She lets him hide at her house, and it turns out he is a painter and a revolutionary in the Second Sino-Japanese War. Eventually he has to escape, but Chiyoko wants to track him down. Chiyoko decides to accept the offer to become an actress so that maybe one day the man will see her in a movie and know how to find her. This all plays out with present day Genya and his cameraman (Kyoji) in the story, being able to view and interact with the story that is being told to them first
Film Noir, as Paul Schrader integrates in his essay ‘Notes on Film Noir,’ reflects a marked phase in the history of films denoting a peculiar style observed during that period. More specifically, Film Noir is defined by intricate qualities like tone and mood, rather than generic compositions, settings and presentation. Just as ‘genre’ categorizes films on the basis of common occurrences of iconographic elements in a certain way, ‘style’ acts as the paradox that exemplifies the generality and singularity at the same time, in Film Noir, through the notion of morality. In other words, Film Noir is a genre that exquisitely entwines theme and style, and henceforth sheds light on individual difference in perception of a common phenomenon. Pertaining
Statement of intent: This formal report was written with the intent of discussing the mise-en-scene element of film which is used in two of Wes Anderson’s most popular films. Both films The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014) and Moonrise Kingdom (2012) showcase the limited colour palette and costume aspects of mise-en-scene.
Movies come in different genres which are horror, romantic, comedy and even surreal genres. However, only a few directors were only working for films that were based on surrealism. Surreal films are the kind of films in which you found it strange and you will also think that this kind of films exists. Below is the list of the most surreal films.
Breton also mentioned in the manifesto that the combination of reality and dream could lead to “surreality”. 1 Un Chien Andalou possesses this combination in the way the camera captures the image, and partnering between the objects that we know in our own lives, that are real, with the loss of logic in the actions of the film, which corresponds with dream states.
Canadian filmmaker and cinephile, Guy Maddin once said, “I do feel a bit like Dracula in Winnipeg. I’m safe, but can travel abroad and suck up all sorts of ideas from other filmmakers… Then I can come back here and hoard these tropes and cinematic devices.” Here, Maddin addresses his filmmaking saying that he takes aspects from different film styles and appropriates them into his own work. In The Saddest Music in the World (2003), Maddin uses a combination of French Surrealist filmmaking and classical American Hollywood cinema, specifically melodrama, to create his own style. In an article by William Beard, Steven Shaviro talks about Maddin’s filmmaking, and he links Surrealism and melodrama together saying, “Maddin’s films are driven by a tension between romantic excess [melodrama] on the one hand and absurdist humour [Surrealism] on the other.” In regards to The Saddest Music in the World, the relationship between Surrealism and melodrama is not one of tension, as Shaviro suggests, but one of cooperation. This paper will analyze two films by filmmakers Maddin was familiar with —Un Chien Andalou (1929) by Luis Buñuel and Salvador Dali on the Surrealist side, and All That Heaven Allows (1955) by Douglas Sirk on the melodrama side—to showcase the important elements of each, concluding with an analysis of The Saddest Music in the World in conjunction with both film styles. Ultimately, it will be shown how Guy Maddin combines French Surrealist cinema and Hollywood melodrama in The Saddest Music in the World, to create his own unique film style.
Friedman, L., Desser, D., Kozloff, S., Nichimson, M., & Prince, S. (2014). An introduction to film genres. New York, London: W.W. Norton & Company.
In Black Swan, director Darren Aronofsky uses multiple tools and aspects of the medium of film to create a surreal narrative. The film Black Swan qualifies as art by Rudolf Arnheim’s standards because of the ways that the viewers’ experience of the film differs from our experience of reality. Arnheim’s body of theory suggests that the necessity of human intervention to implement plot, tropes, and culturally legible symbols raises a film to a higher level than a mere copy of reality, and that this interpretation and expression of meaning is “a question of feeling” or intuition on the part of the filmmaker. (“Film Theory and Criticism” 283) One consequence of effective directorial intervention is that differences in speed, stops and starts, and what would otherwise be jarring gaps in continuity can be accepted by viewers, because if the essentials of reality are present, then the illusion may take place.... ...
During the course of this essay it is my intention to discuss the differences between Classical Hollywood and post-Classical Hollywood. Although these terms refer to theoretical movements of which they are not definitive it is my goal to show that they are applicable in a broad way to a cinema tradition that dominated Hollywood production between 1916 and 1960 and which also pervaded Western Mainstream Cinema (Classical Hollywood or Classic Narrative Cinema) and to the movement and changes that came about following this time period (Post-Classical or New Hollywood). I intend to do this by first analysing and defining aspects of Classical Hollywood and having done that, examining post classical at which time the relationship between them will become evident. It is my intention to reference films from both movements and also published texts relative to the subject matter. In order to illustrate the structures involved I will be writing about the subjects of genre and genre transformation, the representation of gender, postmodernism and the relationship between style, form and content.
Think about your favorite movie. When watching that movie, was there anything about the style of the movie that makes it your favorite? Have you ever thought about why that movie is just so darn good? The answer is because of the the Auteur. An Auteur is the artists behind the movie. They have and individual style and control over all elements of production, which make their movies exclusively unique. If you could put a finger on who the director of a movie is without even seeing the whole film, then the person that made the movie is most likely an auteur director. They have a unique stamp on each of their movies. This essay will be covering Martin Scorsese, you will soon find out that he is one of the best auteur directors in the film industry. This paper will include, but is not limited to two of his movies, Good Fellas, and The Wolf of Wall Street. We will also cover the details on what makes Martin Scorsese's movies unique, such as the common themes, recurring motifs, and filming practices found in their work. Then on
In Hollywood today, most films can be categorized according to the genre system. There are action films, horror flicks, Westerns, comedies and the likes. On a broader scope, films are often separated into two categories: Hollywood films, and independent or foreign ‘art house’ films. Yet, this outlook, albeit superficial, was how many viewed films. Celebrity-packed blockbusters filled with action and drama, with the use of seamless top-of-the-line digital editing and special effects were considered ‘Hollywood films’. Films where unconventional themes like existentialism or paranoia, often with excessive violence or sex or a combination of both, with obvious attempts to displace its audiences from the film were often attributed with the generic label of ‘foreign’ or ‘art house’ cinema.
Antirealism in film transcends and brainstorms the fantasies that never become reality. Even though antirealism is apprehensive with a smaller amount then actual stuff, our observation for an...
We see distinctive dialogue in all of Kubrick’s films such as the NASA jargon in 2001: A Space Odyssey, the Nadsat argot (Russian slang) in A Clockwork Orange, the drill sergeant's rants in Full Metal Jacket and some improvised dialogue in Dr. Strangelove. Overall, Kubrick’s combination of one-point perspective, realistic lighting, and distinctive dialogue creates a simultaneous “poiesis” for the audience. Poesis, according to Philp Kuberski, is “an integral overlay of imagery....speech—that exceeds rational exegesis or paraphrase. It is the illumination that Kubrick aimed for in his films” (11). Therefore, Kubrick’s films are hard to digest at first because of their complex subject matter. Films like 2001: A Space Odyssey, A Clockwork Orange, and The Shining were perceived as enigmatic ones for their time, yet they gained a cult following and became part of popular culture. In Kubrick’s film adaptation of Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange, the different locations in the movie such as “The Korova Milk Bar”, Alex’s bedroom, the police interrogation room, and the changing room at the prison all have a similar bright lighting scheme. The lighting schemes together with the theatrical settings like the stage at the Ludovico Center where Alex’s new “nature” is demonstrated to the press suggests the artificial nature of this futuristic setting as there is an absence of a natural lighting source in the film like the moon or sun. Moreover, in the dystopian setting of A Clockwork Orange, human nature is altered through conditioning by drugs and celluloid just like what they did to Alex in the film in order to change his murderous ways. In this sense, Kubrick raised questions in his films about human nature in
Since the late 1890’s films have been constantly changing the history of pop culture and the way people view war, politics, and the world as a whole. As the timeline of the history of film progressed, there were many different phases: gothic noir, slapstick comedy, tragedy vs. love, romance, and many more. Towards the more recent times, the central ideas of films started drifting to the greatness of the directors. Directors such as Stanley Kubrick, Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, and many more were noted as outstanding directors of action and cinematography. In this paper I will speak about Wes Anderson, Martin Scorsese, and the ever so infamous Baz Luhrmann. These directors have changed the way filmmaking has been and will be looked at from this point on.
McDonald, Keiko I. Cinema East: A Critical Study of Major Japanese Films. Rutherford, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson Press, 1983.
The films of Japanese director Akira Kurosawa have had wide ranging influence over contemporary films, with his ronin films Seven Samurai and Yojimbo influencing countless westerns and mob movies. Arguably, however, Rashomon has been the most instrumental of all Kurosawa’s films because it asks a question that lies near the heart of all cinema: what is reality? Today, any consumer of television or cinema has seen various permutations of the plot of Rashomon numerous times, probably without realizing. In the film, a rape and consequent murder are told five different times, by a woodcutter (Takashi Shimura) who seems to have witnessed the event, a bandit (Toshiro Mifune) who committed the rape, the wife of a samurai (Machiko Kyo) who was raped, and the ghost of the samurai (Masayuki Mori), who is channeled by a medium after his murder. In each telling, the viewer is presented with five realities that, through the use of various frame stories, are totally incompatible with one another. Throughout, Rashomon is a study in simplicity. The beautiful yet frugal cinematography of Kazuo Miyagawa and the minimalist plot, skillfully directed by Kurosawa, force the viewer to contend with two dissonant notions: that everything they have seen is real, but that none of it can be true.