Representation of New York in Manhattan and Sex and the City
Manhattan, the city of New York, is often depicted in the media by
images of skyscraper buildings and yellow taxis. I am going to analyse
the representation of New York by looking at and comparing the opening
sequences of the series "Sex and the City" with the film "Manhattan".
I will be looking specifically at how the directors achieve their
interpretations of New York by the images of New York and the
cinematic devices that they use. Both directors have a similar idea of
portraying New York as a city of two halves but they both have very
different ways of doing this.
John Thomas, director of "Sex and the City", uses a range of cinematic
devices including camera shots, pace, editing and some images and
stereotypes to show Carrie as a metaphor for New York. In the first
few frames of the clip Carrie is in a close up shot with the
background around her blurred and not in focus. The focus here is on
Carrie's emotions; she is confident, relaxed and happy which
represents the bold vibrant and colourful side to New York. The clip
is divided into two halves, separated by a shot in the middle of
steering through the centre of a traffic jam from a low angle looking
up. Although this is quite an ambiguous shot and could also represent
New York as looking down on Carrie as being mysterious and
intimidating showing the other side to New York itself, to me it shows
a journey back to reality from the stereotypical side of New York
representing a change or a definitive border between the two halves of
New York. Towards the end of the clip tension is built up by the music
to a clim...
... middle of paper ...
...rall impression that is expressed to the audience
shows the reality of New York.
I conclude that although "Manhattan" and "Sex and the City" were
filmed in completely different decades and in completely different
styles they still have a lot in common about the way that they portray
New York City. Both directors are portraying the suburban reality and
the stereotypical romance as two very different sides of New York. The
fact that the directors show these sides of New York in a different
order suggests that they are giving hindmost impressions last. "Sex
and the City" concludes in reality with Carrie being splashed but
everybody carries on regularly with their busy everyday lives. However
"Manhattan's" ultimate image is of fireworks over the New York skyline
suggesting the romantic and stereotypical view of New York.
Throughout time, women in movies and other similar texts are shown to be generally focused on men. This might make sense if every movie ever made was set in a time where women had absolutely no rights but of course, that is not the case. Older and more modern depictions of women in media, both show women whose lives revolve around men. Even movies that market their female characters as strong and powerful are still shown to be dependent on the male leads and puts them first. Also, since women in movies have more of a focus on men, female to female relationships suffer in the same films. There are very few exceptions to this unfortunate truth.
Ellis portray New York as a city where it is horrible to live, filled with homeless men,
Each gender has its little tells and associations, the movie Victor Victoria depicts gender cues very accurately and well. Victor Victoria is a movie about a woman, who wants to have a successful singing career, but in order to do so she must pretend to be a man pretending to be a woman. This movie takes place in the 1930’s in Paris, France during the winter time. One gender cue I noticed was how women and men wore their coats differently. Men tended to wear their coats over their shoulders without putting their arms in the sleeves and women, wore their coats a help their coats together with their hand placed close to their chest, indicating they feel cold. Another gender cues I noticed was when Carole "Toddy" Todd, played by Robert Preston,
Roman Polanski weaves together several aspects of literary design and film noir in his 1974 Chinatown in order to tell the film’s engaging story inspired by the California Water Wars. These include the film’s unique use of structure, constant jarring plot twists, the development and depth of the film’s many characters, and multiple symbols and motifs. Most clear of these is the film’s use of water as a motif to represent the constant power struggle between the film’s characters, and character flaws in Gittes and Evelyn that adds an element of humanity and empathy between the film and the viewer as well in addition to strengthening the depth and complexity of the relationship between the film’s main characters.
New York City has always been an example of how diversity can exist in a successful and peaceful place. Full of action, enthusiasm, and a combination of many cultures, New York is rich in every sense of the word. For example, taking a walk down the busy streets not only opens your eyes to the small but meaningful details of the city and the different people that revive it but also the numerous worlds that are somehow fused in this magical city, like Little Italy, Chinatown, Little Syria, Korea Town, and many others.
Five star general and 34th president, Dwight Eisenhower once said that, “this world of ours... must avoid becoming a community of dreadful fear and hate, and be, instead, a proud confederation of mutual trust and respect”. When established in 1624, New York was only a very small colony of French Huguenots from the Netherlands where everyone was seen as equal to one another. However, as New York began to develop and change, a wealth gap developed between the wealthy and those who lived in poverty. This wealth gap led to many domestic problems emerging in the city. In George Templeton Strong’s journals, he outlines what the city New York needs to do to become a healthy functioning city. In doing this, Strong is confident that New York will make the necessary changes in order to have a very bright future ahead where many more opportunities will be available for its citizens.
New York City is one of the most significant city in the world. It started out as a small Dutch city and grew to what it has become today. It didn’t “just happen” right away but instead, it took a long time to be called as “The Big Apple” or “The City that Never Sleeps.” The character of the place has gradually changed over time and really came to become a global power city during the early twentieth century. For example, 1783 to 1835 was also an important time period in the history of New York City that laid a strong foundation to become an industrialized city. However, considering the developments that happened from 1898 to 1945 to be more organized and effective, the most iconic and quintessential period was from 1898 to 1945 in the history of New York, which we haven’t reached it in our course so far.
A Tale of Two Cities In every great novel, there is a theme that is constant throughout the story. One of the better known themes portrays the fight of good verses evil. Different authors portray this in different ways. Some use colors, while others use seasons to show the contrast. Still, others go for the obvious and use characters.
Archetypal Characters: Characters are presented from the start of the novel as good or evil. There are no characters that the reader see as good and turn out to be evil at the end or vica versa. Their goodness or evilness is clearly shown from the beginning. 	
The classic network era is one of the most easily recognizable and distinct eras in television history. Both Bewitched and I Love Lucy were huge sitcoms that took up issues of gender representation and patriarchy in their programs through the representations of the main male and female characters of their respective series. While both of these series pushed boundaries when it came to the representation of women, in the end, the costuming of these men and women, how the main characters are introduced, and the domestic environment that the atmosphere takes place in, all serve to reinforce traditional gender norms and reveals that patriarchy is dependent on maintaining dominant ideas about masculinity and femininity.
People often give up their life to save another as an act of courage or valiancy. In the novel Tale of Two Cities, Sidney Carton’s death saved Charles Darnay. However, when Carton gave his life it was not a noble act nor did he die merely to save Darnay. Carton committed suicide to immortalize himself in the eyes of Lucie Manette, Charles Darnay’s wife and Sidney Carton’s obsession. The fact that this event saved Charles Darnay’s life was just a fortunate coincidence.
Women were represented in different ways throughout the movie Metropolis, but the underlying theme was women were seen as purely sexual. Maria was seen as the nurturer in the film, but also as a sexual object. She was the one who preached for peace and harmony down in the catacombs to the workers. Maria was also the nurturing maternal figure that was seen walking into the garden with all of the poor children. The vamp, on the other hand, was portrayed blatantly as a sexual object. This whole movie was seen through the eyes of the male perspective, which usually portrays women as sexual objects, and robs them of any identity. Lang shows Frederson as having fear of femininity which involves women's emotion and nurturing.
The Manhattan Project was a project that was a simple research and development project that lead to the creation of Atomic Bombs during World War II. It was a project lead by the U.S. with help from Canada and the United Kingdom. The scientists (including Albert Einstein) became aware of Nazis making efforts to create atomic bombs. The Nazis were creating atomic bombs to attempt to purify Uranium-235 (An isotope of Uranium that makes up about 0.72% of natural uranium that is said to be fissile or can sustain a chain reaction) . The project was devoted to finding a way to create a successful atomic bomb.
There is no such thing as silence here. Everything jumps out at once, like the feathers on a peacock, immediately catching your attention. There are uncountable masses of colorful blobs moving, but within that great glob, there are many people, each person moving with the powerful confidence of a lion. The buildings all loom over the people, a grand oak tree above thousands of ants, tying together this concrete landscape. There is a tangible atmosphere of wonder, and you are left in awe of such an astonishing place. This magnificent place is none other than Times Square in New York City.
In the shadows of the lower world known as Erebos lived two brothers of great importance, the gods of death and sleep: Thanatos and Hypnos. In the sleepy twilight world in which they lived, the gentle guardians of dreams and death watched the world of man from below. Thanatos and Hypnos were twins, born to Nyx, goddess of the night; though twins, they did not look very much alike. Hypnos was youthful with dark curls, while Thanatos looked to be an older man with ashy blond hair. Though they did share two traits, pale skin that bordered on a rather morose shade of grey and hazy violet eyes that could punctuate the veil of fog and dusk in the lower lands. Very few times did they leave their home, their grasps reached far past their world and could travel through many others. Most times were spent lying on satin black couches under the shadows of half-concealing dusk, either sleeping or reading to one another the poems of mortal men. When they did leave however, they flew off on ivory wings; attached to Thanatos’ shoulders and back, and crowning Hypnos’ head. They were content with their half-lucid existence, fated to dwell in Erebos until men no longer dreamed or withered in age. It wasn’t until one day, when death realized lives was worth so much more than their ends, and fell in love with a girl he could never touch. . .