II-B. Spike Lee, through his undoubtedly inventive yet obtrusive camerawork, embodies emotional impact. From lateral panning and jumpy camera sequences to his use of perspective, Lee inspires intensity and apprehension. An odd synchronicity between the camerawork and subject matter fosters these emotional reactions and inspires inquisition; the viewer conceptualizes the camerawork to uncover a significance the narrative cannot deliver. The cop sequence retains suspense and effortlessly transfers Flipper’s anxiety; a “voyeuristic” perspective stimulates the former while rapid camera shifts and altering points of view maintain the latter. The scene in which Flipper asks for a promotion illustrates Lee’s emphasis on viewer impact and impression, sometimes at the cost …show more content…
of dialogic substance. The viewer becomes utterly aware of the fact that he/she is watching a movie, loses sight of the discussion, and is, instead, hypnotized by the camera’s movement. What is the effect of such a purposefully distracting delivery? What message is Lee attempting to convey? Spike Lee’s camera work is flagrant and unorthodox; however, rather than rendering his scenes meaningless, they become provocative, if not, more meaningful. Beginning with the sequence in which the cops arrive, a medium shot is intermittently dispersed with an aerial perspective that appears to originate from a neighborhood window.
This perspective is used when Flipper and Angie are play¬–fighting. Because we know Angie and Flipper are in Brooklyn’s white mans’ land, this undoubtedly causes anxiety–who’s watching, what if he has a gun? This rather voyeuristic perspective is frequently employed (Flipper and Angie’s intimate scene and Drew’s discussion with her girlfriends) and always seems to create the same “Big-Brother is watching you” effect. Jungle Fever’s narrative paints Spike Lee’s disapproval of interracial relationships by trivializing them to mere “jungle fever;” therefore, I interpret this as society’s judgmental eye according to Lee’s beliefs. The perspective makes the couple’s relationship a spectacle rather than a matter of the heart. This scene also creates apprehension for this playful bout can be easily misinterpreted as a violent encounter. Lee simultaneously delivers a subtextual message and creates fear through the same tactic; however, this would have been merely an indication of trouble to come had the angle not been previously
used. When the cops arrive, the camera shifts from one cop to the other so swiftly that the scene blurs. This is extremely destabilizing and makes it hard to gather ones thoughts. An apprehensive confusion seamlessly transfers from Flipper to the viewer. We experience his consciousness. He begins spitting out sentences, explaining himself, etc. We only further take on his apprehension when the gun is up to his face and the perspective seems to mimic Flipper’s peripheral sight: we view the scene from the brick wall his face is up against and look outward towards the cop. Later in the sequence, the gun seems to point directly at the camera, functionally placing us in Flipper’s predicament. This scene is unfocused and slightly over the top but I feel as if I begin to inhabit the film space. It’s destabilizing nature only augments its anxiety-provoking purpose and helps to transfer the terror Flipper is presumably undergoing. Though the cop sequence allows the viewer to experience a level of Flipper’s anxiety, the camerawork does not trump the dialogue ¬¬–the synchronicity between the panicked discourse and the shaky camera movement establishes the terror. However, When Flipper asks for a promotion, the camerawork seems to command all the viewer’s attention and communicate the message virtually in lieu of the dialogue . The camera pans in a lateral direction despite Flipper’s insistence on moving in the vertical direction (as discussed in class). It’s as if the camera is saying his request is moot: he will not move up but rather continue to work diligently, “run circles around the others,” yet never receive due compensation. The camera’s lateral movement creates a circular effect and then even switches direction when Flipper’s bosses respond. This moves the power out of Flipper’s hands and into his bosses’. What is most interesting about this scene is its level of distractibility. I found this continuous circular motion so captivating in its slow and deliberate movement that I missed much of the conversation. I became completely aware of the fact that I was watching a movie. The question is: was this purposeful? By reducing the dialogue to a secondary position and upgrading the camera to the main communicative force, Flipper’s words become unessential. The bosses’ words become unessential. And rather, the scene stands to express Flipper’s presumable position according to a white-dominated workplace. In the end, he has no power (camera switching directions). The camera does the articulation. Spike Lee rejects the orthodox standards of Hollywood continuity editing and delivers themes and subtextual ideas unlike any other director. He is completely unconventional and his camerawork is frequently outlandish and distracting; however, Lee’s scene execution always seems to have some purpose. He has a reason for drawing one’s attention to the camera. Whether it is to comment on society, foster inquisition, or enmesh his viewers in the scene, it nonetheless commands attention and peeks curiosity. When one has to ask why, he is forced to search for an answer.
Spike Lee does many fascinating things from a directorial standpoint, which makes his film (dare I say, joint), Do the Right Thing so interesting to watch. Writer, director Lee makes much use of the high and low angle shots. He does this to draw clear contrasts between the two elders of the block, Da Mayor and Mother Sister and to make conflict more apparent.
Spike Lee’s first student production, The Answer, was a short ten minute film which told of a young black screenwriter who rewrote D.W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation. The film was not well accepted among the faculty at New York University, stating Lee had not yet mastered “film grammar.” Lee went on to believe the faculty took offense to his criticisms towards the respected director’s stereotypical portrayals of black characters (1). For his final film project, Lee wrote, produced, and directed Joe’s Bed-Stuy Barbershop: We Cut Heads. The film won him the 1983 Student Academy Award for Best Director and the Lincoln Center chose the film as its first student production. The film was lo...
The film Wendy and Lucy, directed by Kelly Reichardt, presents a sparse narrative. The film has been criticised for its lack of background story, and as a short film, much of the story is left to the viewer to infer from what is presented in the plot. However, Wendy and Lucy is able to depict the intimate relationship between Wendy and her dog as well as reflecting more broadly on the everyday, and commenting on the current economic state of the film’s setting in America. This essay will examine how film form contributes to the viewer’s awareness of the story in Wendy and Lucy and allows a deeper understanding of the themes presented. The aspects of mise-en-scene, shot and editing and sound in the film will be explored.
Do the Right Thing is a dramatic comedic film that was directed by Spike Lee. The movie was released in 1989. Lee served in three capacities for the film: writer, director and producer of the movie, Ernest Dickenson was the cinematographer and Barry Alexander Brown was the film’s editor. For this film, Lee garnered together some notable actors and actresses, including Ruby Dee and Ossie Davis, Rosie Perez, Samuel L. Jackson, John Tuturro and Martin Lawrence. The setting of the movie is in Bedford-Stuyvesant; which is a neighborhood in Brooklyn, New York. This particular neighborhood is made up of several ethnic groups that include African Americas, Italians, Koreans, and Puerto Ricans. The movie takes place on a particularly hot day during the summer time. The extreme heat causes tensions between the different races in the neighborhood. In this paper, I will attempt to show how mise-en-scène, camera work, editing, and sound are used to convey “explicit” and “implicit” meaning in one scene in Do the Right Thing.
Conflict Theory is a theoretical orientation emphasizing the opposition among individuals, groups, or social structures. In the movie, the conflict theory was the black community verses the white community. For example, in the movie, Vernon Johns decided to enter a restaurant that was labeled whites only. As a black man by law he was not allowed to enter. At his own risk, he went inside anyways. As he entered, the white people inside suddenly stopped what they were doing. They all stared him down with an unwelcoming look. They shouted racial slurs at him as he sat down at the counter. There was a conflict between the two communities all because of the color of their skin
Namely, he gets his message across to his audience with the use of imagery. Even so, he says that when he’s out walking the streets of Brooklyn at night, he finds that women “set their faces on neutral”, place their purses “across their chest bandolier style”, and “forge ahead as though bracing themselves from being talked” (Staples 543). With this use of imagery, Staples is able to place an image in the reader’s head of a young women walking the streets- alone, tense, and skittish- all because of man who, unbeknownst, means no harm to her. This denotes the theme of racial profiling in society because it shows the woman’s fear of an African American walking the streets, whom of which has not made one advance or threatening move towards the woman. The woman’s ability to assume the worst in the blink of an eye shows how society has been drilled with the influence of stereotypes and racial profiling. This leads to the fact that an innocent man is being ridiculed for the color of his skin while he had done nothing to cause such actions. Moreover, the description of the woman’s reaction to Staples makes the audience pity him because of his innocence in the cruel and unfair situation and unwillingness to be anybody other than an innocent bystander. Additionally, Staples’ use
If this movie were to be summarized in one sentence, one may say that no matter who you are, everybody holds preconceptions and stereotypes against other people. For example, in this movie, an upper-class white woman sees two black men so she clings to her husband, showing she is scared of them. Even though this woman had no idea who they were, she still jumped to a conclusion that they were going to harm her because of the color of their skin.
Neill, Alex. “Empathy and (Film) Fiction.” Philosophy of film and motion pictures : an anthology. Ed. Noel Carrol and Jinhee Choi. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing, 2006. 247-259. Print.
With the opening scene spike lee was able to show me something that was different from all the movies we watched this semester. A woman was dancing in the opening scene to diegetic sounds and was moving in rhythm to this sound as the credits for the movie played. Most movies open up with a scene that drops the audience to the movie instead the audience watched an actor dance for almost five minutes. Another technique that was used by spike lee was camera angles. In the scene where a black man was trying to buy batteries for his speakers from an Asian man. Spike lee was able to use camera angles to show each actors view on the other one. When the black man is speaking or yelling the camera is looking down at the Asian man. This shows that the black man looks down on the Asian man. When the Asian man speaks to the black man the camera is pointed up looking towards him. Another scene that caught my eye is when spike lee showed different shots of the people. Each close up of a person was followed by them saying racist remarks about the previous person shown. Once again showing racism or how each culture views the other
The director Antoine Fuqua vision for this film was to bring that intense love-hate relationship onto the big screen and showcase it for the world to see. To ensure a convincing film setting, Fuqua shot on location in some of the most hardcore neighborhoods in Los Angeles. Fuqua also wanted to show the daily struggles of officers tasked to work in the rougher neighborhoods of cities and how easy it can be to get caught up in a street life filled with killers and drug dealers. Overall the film displayed the city of Los Angeles in a different perspective. One which m...
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
As an audience we are manipulated from the moment a film begins. In this essay I wish to explore how The Conversation’s use of sound design has directly controlled our perceptions and emotional responses as well as how it can change the meaning of the image. I would also like to discover how the soundtrack guides the audience’s attention with the use of diegetic and nondiegetic sounds.
In any film, filmmakers use the beginning to expose the audience to its style and organization along with storyline, society, and characters of the film. The ending evokes emotions from the audience and drives home the essence of the film. Within the two films High Noon and Don’t Look Now, the parallels in the beginnings and the endings of the films exhibit purposeful framing that speak to the outcomes of the films dependent on the characters’ actions. The favorable beginning and ending of High Noon contrasts with the tragic beginning and ending of Don’t Look Now, highlighting the importance of a strong set of values, and the dangers of being consumed by your own thoughts.
“Entertainment has to come hand in hand with a little bit of medicine, some people go to the movies to be reminded that everything’s okay. I don’t make those kinds of movies. That, to me, is a lie. Everything’s not okay.” - David Fincher. David Fincher is the director that I am choosing to homage for a number of reasons. I personally find his movies to be some of the deepest, most well made, and beautiful films in recent memory. However it is Fincher’s take on story telling and filmmaking in general that causes me to admire his films so much. This quote exemplifies that, and is something that I whole-heartedly agree with. I am and have always been extremely opinionated and open about my views on the world and I believe that artists have a responsibility to do what they can with their art to help improve the culture that they are helping to create. In this paper I will try to outline exactly how Fincher creates the masterpieces that he does and what I can take from that and apply to my films.
“We fight each other for territory; we kill each other over race, pride, and respect. We fight for what is ours. They think they’re winning by jumping me now, but soon they’re all going down, war has been declared.” Abuse, Pain, Violence, Racism and Hate fill the streets of Long Beach, California. Asians, Blacks, Whites and Hispanics filled Wilson High School; these students from different ethnic backgrounds faced gang problems from day to night. This movie contains five messages: people shouldn’t be judgmental because being open-minded allows people to know others, having compassion for a person can help people change their views in life, being a racist can only create hate, having the power of the human will/goodness to benefit humanity will cause a person to succeed at any cost and becoming educated helps bring out the intelligence of people.