The films I will be examining both happen to have ties to Hollywood and the studio system, as the opening of Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore (1974) is shot and lit like a film you would see out of the studio era. The sets look like they were filmed on a soundstage and the bright red light is a perfect exaggeration of the sun setting, in short it looks like something you would see from a colorized version of The Wizard of Oz. The film even opens up with “You’ll Never Know” sung by Alice Faye, a classic 1940’s song that could have been used for the opening credits of an MGM musical. The point of mentioning all of this is what Scorsese’s intent was in making the opening of the film feel like a classical Hollywood film, and the best way to examine …show more content…
(2016) look and feel like classical studio film throughout. The cinematography and lighting is consistent, weather the audience is witnessing a “film within the film” or the narrative of the actual film The Coen’s and masterful cinematographer Roger Deakins use bright lighting to help make the colors in the film pop. This, along with the costumes and sets, allow the Coen’s to convey their attempt at making a throwback to old Hollywood films. Unlike Scorsese, The Coen’s aren’t concerned with depicting the difference between film and reality, instead they are purposefully creating both a film noir [the beach house that Baird Whitlock is held in looks like it comes right out of the climax of Murder, My Sweet (1944) or Kiss Me Deadly (1955)] and films made during the studio system. It reminds me of what Steven Spielberg was attempting to do when he made Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), instead of setting out to produce the next great American story, he simply wanted to make a film that homaged and recreated the adventure serials from …show more content…
is devoid of meaning, as there is a wonderful sequence near the end of the film where Eddie Mannix (Josh Brolin) is talking with his priest in a confessional about his career choice. The Coen’s maybe famous for their witty dialog, but this is an example of how amazing they can be as visual storytellers. The scene is shot from a low angle and with making the confessional seem larger and more intimidating space than it is. Eddie’s inability to make a decision is intensified by the darkness on his side of the confessional, whereas the heavenly glow from the priest's side signifies answers and enlightenment. In short we visually witness the conundrum in Eddie’s head, through the use of lighting and camera work, the Coen’s are telling us how Eddie is feeling and how we should see his
All through this film moods were continuously changed through lighting and music creating a symbolic meaning behind every scene. An example
Director Thomas Carter, incorporates an extensive range of film techniques into his film, that all influence the emotional, racial and
On the surface, The Big Lebowski might look like a simple stoner comedy, but with closer inspection the film possess sharp undertones of film noir. The Coen Brothers were inspired by film noir when making their movie, The Big Lebowski. Their main inspiration came from Raymond Chandler’s, The Big Sleep, with mix-match patches of other classic film noirs. The Big Lebowski is a playful, modernized, and loose form of noir film. With that said, The Big Lebowski, is a tribute to the themes of classic film noirs.
Beginning the mid 1920s, Hollywood’s ostensibly all-powerful film studios controlled the American film industry, creating a period of film history now recognized as “Classical Hollywood”. Distinguished by a practical, workmanlike, “invisible” method of filmmaking- whose purpose was to demand as little attention to the camera as possible, Classical Hollywood cinema supported undeviating storylines (with the occasional flashback being an exception), an observance of a the three act structure, frontality, and visibly identified goals for the “hero” to work toward and well-defined conflict/story resolution, most commonly illustrated with the employment of the “happy ending”. Studios understood precisely what an audience desired, and accommodated their wants and needs, resulting in films that were generally all the same, starring similar (sometimes the same) actors, crafted in a similar manner. It became the principal style throughout the western world against which all other styles were judged. While there have been some deviations and experiments with the format in the past 50 plus ye...
In any film, lighting and colour are very important, as film is mainly a visual form of media. In film A (By Dustin Hoffmann), the colours are very naturalistic. They make use of pastel colours and scenic shots. It has a sort of fantasy world quality.
Film Noir is a genre of distinct and unique characteristics. Mostly prominent in the 40s and 50s, the genre rarely skewed from the skeletal plot to which all Film Noir pictures follow. The most famous of these films is The Big Sleep (1946) directed by Howard Hawks. This film is the go to when it comes to all the genre’s clichés. This formula for film is so well known and deeply understood that it is often a target for satire. This is what the Coen brothers did with 1998’s The Big Lebowski. This film follows to the T what Film Noir stands for.
The portrayal of art cinema is to some extent accurate when considering the time period of this film. Art film was first introduced to the American film industry during the period of time when this film came out. Art cinema utilizes its own set of artistic expression. Hollywood classical films on the other hand, are at odds with the artistic concept, and are considered to be mainstream. When we look at Classical films, we think of the basic Hollywood movie where there is a beginning, middle and end, and the whole movie comes together at the end, with a little bit of romance. In this specific movie, the audience is faced with a confusing dilemma of choosing whether this movie is an art film or a classical film. Most even think it has a documentary approach, but what makes this movie even more successful and even more entertaining, is that it is both art cinema and classical cinema.
One of the most prominent and influential directors in New Hollywood was Italian-American Martin Scorsese. His first major critical success, and what is often considered his “breakthrough” film, was 1973’s Mean Streets. This film helped to establish Scorsese’s signature style in regards to narrative and thematics as well as aesthetically. Scorsese developed a unique and distinct directorial flair to his films, with reoccurring themes, settings, cinematography, and editing techniques, among other elements. This led a number of film critics to declare Scorsese an “auteur,” similar to Jean-Luc Godard, Francois Truffaut, and other auteur directors of the French New Wave.
In today’s society, pre-existing assumptions and stereotypes of other ethnicities and individuals play a large part in the way we see others. This social construct of stereotypes has placed restrictions on many people’s lives which ultimately limits them from achieving certain goals. In this sense, stereotypes misrepresent and restrict people of colour to gain casting within the Hollywood film industry. The issue of how casting actors to certain roles and how these actors are forced to submit and represent these false stereotypes is one worthy of discussion. White Chicks (2004), directed by Keenan Wayans, illustrates this issue through the performance of Latrell, performed by Terry Crews, and his performance of the hyper-sexualised “buck” will be a prime example in this essay to discuss the racial politics and stereotypes in Hollywood casting.
Martin Scorsese truly captures the film with his evocative directing where he often use slow-mo camera shots and dark, eye-wielding camera angles to capture the decay of New York City. Scorsese is in top form with his directing where he makes the camera use as a viewpoint of Bickle¡¯s character or as a third party watching Bickle¡¯s descent into paranoia and madness. Even with the film¡¯s final act whe...
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
The musical piece “Alice’s Theme” was composed in 2010 by composer Danny Elfman. This piece was written for Walt Disney Pictures’ “Alice in Wonderland”. Danny Elfman has represented Alice as lonely, questioning herself and anxious until the end of the film where she discovers her true purpose. Her journey is gradually revealed and represented through the different sections, instruments and lyrics. This is through the successful use of all the musical elements. These musical elements include duration, expressive devices, pitch, structure and texture.
It is no doubt that Martin Scorsese has heavily influenced the emulating of American film making from European influences. He is a prime example of a ‘New Hollywood Cinema’ director, not only from his ethnicity and background, but from his sheer interest in this form
Jewish opposition to the gospel has not subsided. Even today many Christians deal with the backlash of preaching the Gospel just as Paul did with the Jewish people of his time. As Paul preached in the synagogues, people began to believe in and receive Jesus Christ, causing much of the Jewish community of the time to resist the teachings of Paul. Paul’s response to the Jewish resistance was to simply preach to the Word of God to all that would hear it, including Gentiles. The more people that the Gospel would be preached to, the more the Word of God would begin to spread.
Alice in Wonderland belongs to the nonsense genre, and even if most of what happens to Alice is quite illogical, the main character is not. “The Alice books are, above all, about growing up” (Kincaid, page 93); indeed, Alice starts her journey as a scared little girl, however, at the end of what we discover to be just a dream, she has entered the adolescence phase with a new way to approach the mentally exhausting and queer Wonderland. It is important to consider the whole story when analyzing the growth of the character, because the meaning of an event or a sentence is more likely to mean what it truly looks like rather than an explanation regarding subconscious and Freudian interpretations. Morton states “that the books should possess any unity of purpose seems on the surface unlikely” (Morton, page 509), but it’s better to consider the disconnected narrative and the main character separately, since the girl doesn’t belong to Wonderland, which is, as Morton says, with no intrinsic unity. Whereas, there are a few key turning points where it is possible to see how Alice is changing, something that is visible throughout her journey. Carroll wants to tell the story of a girl who has to become braver in order to contend with challenges like the pool made by her own tears, or assertive characters, like the Queen.