Un Chien andalou is considered to be the most renowned surrealist film. It is a cooperative work developed by the two directors Luis Buñuel and Salvador Dali.
According to Allen Thiher’s article entitled Surrealism’s Enduring Bite: Un Chien andalou, is considered as the best known work of surrealist cinema. The known film, Un Chien andalou by Salvador Dali and Buñuel, aims to destroy the rigid rules imposed by the previous “cinematic games”, and to appear as a superior and transformed form of play. In the film, both Dali and Buñuel use parody in order to destroy the filmic conventions that had evolved in the previous years due to the two generations of filmmakers that emerged. The film also plays with the audience’s expectations and this can be seen since the very first scenes of the film. In the firsts sequence of scenes, Buñuel appears with the intention to sever an eye, with the calmness one would have when slicing “a ripe melon”. This specific sequence sets an image of a demolition of the vision that the audience would normally have and expect to find when watching the film. Different titles emerge during the course of the film. The first title to appear on the screen states, “One upon a time”, and tells the audience that it is the first step to a set of different events of the film which will occur and be shown following a chorological order. Both Buñuel and Dali affirm that not every object included in their film has a particular meaning, “ Dali and I would select gags and objects that would happen to come to mind. And we rejected without mercy everything that might mean something. I have kept this taste for the irrational”. The audience can interpret the film in numerous different ways; however, Buñuel affirmed that only ...
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...certain spaces within the scenes. This irrational transition and surprising conjunction is connected to Surrealism. Additionally, it also supports Buñuel’s thoughts on the potential of cinema, “It is the best instrument to express the world of dreams, of emotions, of instinct." Furthermore, most of the analysis of the film have identified the fact the film might be an interpretation of a dream. This consideration has led critics to view the film as a symbolic collection of images, which can reveal various meanings. The possible hidden and mysterious symbols can connect to the middle class behavior, sexual instincts, and anti religious attacks.
In the recent years, critics have shifted their attention and focus on the film’s development and change, and on the methods the film uses in order to convey certain meanings and messages developed by the two directors.
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
This analysis will explore these cinematic techniques employed by Pontecorvo within a short sequence and examine their effects on our understanding of the issues and themes raised within the film.
Perhaps an even stronger testament to the deepness of cinema is Darren Aronofsky’s stark, somber Requiem for a Dream. Centering on the drug-induced debasement of four individuals searching for the abstract concept known as happiness, Requiem for a Dream brims with verisimilitude and intensity. The picture’s harrowing depiction of the characters’ precipitous fall into the abyss has, in turn, fascinated and appalled, yet its frank, uncompromising approach leaves an indelible imprint in the minds of young and old alike.
In all, the presentation of the multiple, different perceptions of the same reality by the participants of the film (eg, who has won Nadine's affection, one person, everyone, no one?) is a subtle version of Rashmon's explicit presentation of clashing multiple realities. This also fits in well with the different presentations of the Abidjah between Moi, un Noir and La Pyramide Humaine.
Run Lola Run, is a German film about a twenty-something woman (Lola) who has 20 minutes to find $100,000 or her love (Manni) will be killed. The search for the money is played through once with a fatal ending and one would think the movie was over but then it is shown again as if it had happened ten seconds later and changed everything. It is then played out one last time. After the first and second sequence, there is a red hued, narrative bridge. There are several purposes of those bridges that affect the movie as a whole. The film Run Lola Run can be analyzed by using the four elements of mise-en scene. Mise-en-scene refers to the aspects of film that overlap with the art of the theater. Mise-en-scene pertains to setting, lighting, costume, and acting style. For the purpose of this paper, I plan on comparing the setting, costume, lighting, and acting style in the first red hued, bridge to that of the robbery scene. Through this analysis, I plan to prove that the purpose of the narrative bridge in the film was not only to provide a segue from the first sequence to the second, but also to show a different side of personality within the main characters.
With many different genres and types of filmmaking, it can result in a large variety of stories and conflicts. Nevertheless, film has always brought people together as a society. If there is one thing everyone can notice about films is the achievement in style and directing. The three directors talked about in this paper are the most successful at delivering a breathtaking style and direction to their films. Baz Luhrmann, Wes Anderson, and Martin Scorsese have produced and directed films over decades and each film as impacted not only the United States but worldwide. With the unmistakable trademarks that each director has, it is very easy to feel sucked into the world in which they are shaping around you and the story. Because of these three directors, the film world and industry has been revolutionized for many centuries to come.
Specifically careful examination of events in the years leading up to the film’s release, in combination with its characteristics and tones and the comparisons
The film I chose to focus upon for the purposes of this reflection paper is titled What Dreams May Come. I have considered this piece to be my favorite since I first came upon it more than ten years ago, and was pleased to be assigned the responsibility of identifying conflict; as I had not realized that this content existed prior to the completion of this assignment. I had always highlighted the cinematography, emotional attachment of the characters, and progressive ideation of the afterlife when reflecting upon the film. I still value these attributes, though now I am more able to understand that the impetus for the characters’ closeness is often rooted in their ability to properly address conflict.
Surrealism, who has not heard this word nowadays? World of the dreams and everything that is irrational, impossible or grotesque, a cultural movement founded immediately after the First World War and still embraced nowadays by many artists. In order to understand it better it is necessary to look deeper into the work of two outstanding artists strongly connected with this movement, and for whom this style was an integral part of their lives.
In the beginning, Surrealism was primarily a literary movement, but it gave artists an access to new subject matter and a process for conjuring it. As Surrealist paintings began to emerge, it divi...
... movie stars like royalty or mythical gods and goddesses, viewing the drama between great archetypal characters in a personal psychic realm. By considering the statements made and their societal impact from a Marxist perspective, Benjamin’s method is highly effective, as it does not simply consider art in terms of pure aesthetics anymore, but considers art’s place in a society capable of mechanically reproducing and endlessly duplicating film, photography, and digital art. His qualm with losing the aura and mystique of an original work is negated by the cult of movie stars, the adoration of fame, the incorporation of soundtracks which embody a particular time period, cinematographic allusions, and time-capsule-like qualities of a film such as Basquiat, a 90s tribute to the 80s, produced both as a part of and resulting from the art movements and trends it addresses.
The link between expressionism and horror quickly became a dominant feature in many films and continues to be prominent in contemporary films mainly due to the German expressionist masterpiece Das Kabinett des Doctor Caligari. Wiene’s 1920 Das Kabinett des Doctor Caligari utilized a distinctive creepiness and the uncanny throughout the film that became one the most distinctive features of externalising inner mental and emotional states of protagonists through various expressionist methods. Its revolutionary and innovative new art was heavily influenced by the German state and its populace in conjunction with their experience of war; Caligari took a clear cue from what was happening in Germany at the time. It was this film that set cinematic conventions that still apply today, heavily influencing the later Hollywood film noir genre as well as the psychological thrillers that has lead several film audiences to engage with a film, its character, its plot and anticipate its outcome, only to question whether the entire movie was a dream, a story of a crazy man, or an elaborate role play. This concept of the familiar and the strange, the reality, the illusion and the dream developed in Das Kabinett des Doctor Caligari, is once again present in Scorsese’s 2010 film Shutter Island. It is laced with influences from different films of the film noir and horror genre, and many themes that are directly linked to Das Kabinett des Doctor Caligari shot 90 years prior.
More than the images, it was that brutal aspect of the material in the exhibition. The parallels established similarities where there was no connection. Banham (Unknown Year, p.10) Implied that “They were of a purely arbitrary and formal kind”. This review was then denied by Tom Hopkinson. The images showed that all things were also languages which were parallel and connected. That’s why it was possible to make connections between several images of the Exhibition. This was the essential meaning of Brutalism.
Where do dreams come from? Heaven? From the metaphorical corners of an individual’s heart? Perhaps both or neither, but in Hugo, a character named Georges Méliès opens his arms to his movie set and expresses jubilantly to “look around. This is where they’re made.” Hugo, an action-packed masterpiece directed by the all-time famous Martin Scorsese, truly captures the eminence of film history. With a most intricate plot, this film illustrates the art of movie-making, and further teaches an important life lesson regarding every individual in the existence of humanity. Flawless in all aspects of content, quality of filmmaking, and success in portraying the significant message intended for the viewers, Hugo makes its mark as a legend in the world
Classic narrative cinema is what Bordwell, Staiger and Thompson (The classic Hollywood Cinema, Columbia University press 1985) 1, calls “an excessively obvious cinema”1 in which cinematic style serves to explain and not to obscure the narrative. In this way it is made up of motivated events that lead the spectator to its inevitable conclusion. It causes the spectator to have an emotional investment in this conclusion coming to pass which in turn makes the predictable the most desirable outcome. The films are structured to create an atmosphere of verisimilitude, which is to give a perception of reality. On closer inspection it they are often far from realistic in a social sense but possibly portray a realism desired by the patriarchal and family value orientated society of the time. I feel that it is often the black and white representation of good and evil that creates such an atmosphere of predic...