F.W Murnau was one of the greatest directors of all time. His style of storytelling and technical innovations changed the cinema forever. The first film that I would like to focus on with Murnau is The Last Laugh. Lotte H. Eisner described The Last Laugh as a “German tragedy that can only be understood in a country where uniform is King” (Eisner). Murnau’s attention to detail is remarkable in this movie when it comes to the symbols that he uses to signify the doorman’s despair. The first symbol of importance is the revolving door. The most important symbol in this movie is the uniform. The shooting of the film took place during the time of the Weimar Republic; a period in German history when the Nazi’s rose to power; the Nazi’s used uniforms as a symbol of status and …show more content…
Murnau also innovates the use of the camera with the chained camera. In one of the most famous scenes in the film, Murnau achieves the doorman’s drunken point of view by hanging a camera to the ceiling and letting it twist and turn to capture this unique perspective. It creates this dreamlike state that is a main principle in German Expressionism. The film that is the perfect representation if stimmung is Murnau’s Nosferatu. Although Bram Stoker’s wife ordered all the negatives of Nosferatu be destroyed, because of copyright issues; several copies have survived (Short History of Film). Murnau brought his own style to the vampire genre that leaves viewers in awe to this day. One example of Murnau’s artistic expression in this film can be seen with the carriage ride to Orlak’s castle. A film negative is inserted into the sequence. In the same scene, the carriage ride is sped up, there is no way a horse drawn carriage could move as fast as it did in the film. These two instances are examples of crossing from reality over into the supernatural by way of
Although modern science has allowed us to develop many complex medicines, laughter is still the strongest one available in the real world and in the book. Laughter proves to be a strong medicine in more ways than one and is completely free, allowing anyone to use it at anytime. It allows us to connect socially with people, it can be used as a way of overthrowing power, and it is good for your health. As Randle McMurphy showed in the novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, laughter can lighten the mood in the darkest situations.
The film illustrates the common social and sexual anxieties that the Germans were undergoing at that period of time. It also employs cinematic aesthetics alongside with new technology to create what would be considered as one of Germany’s first sound-supported films. Furthermore, it was the film that popularized its star Marlene Dietrich. The film is also known for combining elements of earlier expressionist works into its setting without becoming an expressionist film itself. It is important also to point out that the visual element has helped to balance the film easily against the backdrop the nightclub lifestyle that Lola leads the professor to fall into.
I will be analyzing Justin Lin’s Fast & Furious 6: particularly, the Jump scene. Lin uses pathos in this scene by capturing the emotion of love and hope. The famous actor Van Diesel plays the leading role of a retired professional street racer who also happens to be a leader of a hijacking crew. Diesel plays the character Dominic Toretto. Toretto gets in a mission where he is offered to get involved with the police, which is Ironic since they were trying to catch him in the past for his endless crimes such as illegal street races and car hijacking. In fact, they offered him a great deal; if he and his crew decide to help them capture an unstoppable criminal named Shaw and put him and his crew behind bars; they would erase their criminal records and earn them back their freedom. However, one of the criminal members of Shaw’s Crew is Toretto’s girlfriend Letty, who was supposed to be dead since part 4 of the film’s sequence, after going through a major car wreck where she could’ve been burned inside her car if it wasn’t for Shaw who saved her. As a result of the incident, she had sever...
Calhoon, Kenneth S. “Horror vacui.” Peripheral Visions: The Hidden Stages of Weimar Cinema. Wayne State University Press: Detroit, 2001.
This fictional character was soon to be famous, and modified for years to come into movie characters or even into cereal commercials. But the original will never be forgotten: a story of a group of friends all with the same mission, to destroy Dracula. The Count has scared many people, from critics to mere children, but if one reads between the lines, Stoker’s true message can be revealed. His personal experiences and the time period in which he lived, influenced him to write Dracula in which he communicated the universal truth that good always prevails over evil. Religion was a big part of people’s lives back in Stoker’s time.
script, the viewer needs another way to interpret the film. The 1922 silent film Nosferatu
A noticeable difference in the way movies have changed over the years is evident when comparing and contrasting two films of different eras which belong to the same genre and contain the same subject matter. Two vampire movies, Dracula and Bram Stoker's Dracula, present an interesting example of this type of study.
While studying the diabolical figures in the devil, the idea of presenting Dracula came to mind. Dracula represents the devil in many similar ways. Dracula remains as a character in many diabolical movies and films. For instance, Van Helsing provides a good interpret of how Dracula remains noticed in the past and in present day. Although Dracula’s character obtains different views in every movie and film, he plays an important role in Stephen Sommers Van Helsing movie. In the movie, he acts as many different things. Demonstrating both the kind and evil inside, Dracula portrays his character as a mystery. Different views of Dracula throughout the movie include harsh, strong, powerful, evil, the devil, and unstoppable. The studies of Dracula
While the script is often one of the most crucial elements in a film, the brevity of speech and precise movements of the primary character accentuate the changing nature of his integrity. As viewers follow Captain Wiesler of the East German secret police, it is soon clear that he only says what is necessary, such as when noting his surveillance partner’s lateness or setting instructions for the surveillance bugging team (“twenty minutes”). It is important to note that Wiesler does not say a single word when Axel Stiegler cracks a joke in the cafeteria about Honecker, or when Grubitz himself makes a joke. Only
F. W. Murnau’s Nosferatu was a powerful commentary on disease and lust for its time. The character of Count Orlok himself was a metaphor for most evils such as disease, lust, and death. Towards the end of the film, people began to get sick from a disease that originated from Transylvania. What also causes widespread epidemics is that people unknowingly carry them into their home countries. Paranoia of the disease is also a crucial element of the film. The film’s innovative use of shadows and lighting also add more depth and suspense to the film and adds on to the commentary and social themes of the film. The iconic scene where Orlok went up the staircase and you saw nothing but his shadow stuck out to audiences all around for good reason.
Laughter is an interesting topic. Mainly because of the lack of thought that goes with it as to why we laugh. In an article titled Laughter: An Essay on the Meaning of the Comic by Henri Bergson, the theory behind why things are funny is explored. He mentions many different things in his article pertaining to the comic, however, there are a few that stand out more than others. He talks directly about the fact that things are only funny if they relate to humans. Then he touches on the idea that accidents are funnier than planned events. Finally, he speaks on laughter being directly related to social setting. The 1992 film Noises Off is a perfect demonstration of everything that Bergson writes about. Henri Bergson’s essay on laughter is perfectly supported by the film Noises Off.
Black smoke stained the sky and scarlet blood darkened the earth, as global war, once again, ravaged twentieth-century society. The repercussions of the Second World War rippled across the Atlantic and spread like an infectious disease. As the morality of humankind appeared to dissipate with each exploding bomb, anxiety, frustration, and hopelessness riddled the American public and began to spill into the art of New York City’s avant-garde (Paul par. 4). By the mid-1940s, artists reeling from the unparalleled violence, brutality, and destruction of war found a shared “vision and purpose” in a new artistic movement: Abstract Expressionism (Chave 3). Critics considered the most prominent artists of the movement to comprise the New York School
Griffin explores Heinrich Himmler and the secrets that are hidden within him. Throughout his childhood Himmler’s secrets and thoughts were hidden, overshadowed by a mask or barrier formed by his upbringing and culture.
Abstract Expressionism started in America as a post World War II art movement. It was the first art movement that arose from America and put New York at the center of the art world. The term Abstract Expressionism was first applied to American art in 1946 by art critic Robert Coates. It is most commanly said that Surealism is it’s predecessor because of the use of spontaneous, automatic and subconscious creations.
Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis is similar to Expressionism in many ways, German Expressionism and Kafka’s story distorts reality and shows that there is another meaning underneath what the painting or story is. Throughout The Metamorphosis, Gregor goes through many stages of isolation from his family and he starts to lose touch with humanity because of it but in the end he helped his family by his transformation. Kafka’s story relates to German Expressionism because many paintings during this era have to do with reality being distorted into something else. In The Metamorphosis, the plot of the story would be Gregor being transformed into a vermin but the underlying story is that Gregor’s transformation changed the emotional reality of Gregor’s family.