In the first scene of Paul Morrissey’s 1968 film Flesh, the viewer is taken on a brief journey through the streets of New York City. The perspective taken is that from a passive observer looking into the life of the main character. The camera does not tamper with the images nor try to impose new meaning on them – we see the sequence of events as it actually unfolds. Throughout the film clip, a main theme is centered on the banality of the protagonist’s existence, and his restless state is reflected within both technical and organic aspects of the clip.
The opening shot looks like it was taken with a handheld camera, as it is somewhat shaky and we can hear a background noise. We are introduced to the character right away. We see a reflection of him at first, and then the camera proceeds to pan up until we can see his whole body. His head is turned away, so we can only see his profile. He is wearing casual clothing and a red headband. We know he is in New York City because we can see Queensboro subway station behind him. He looks to the side of the camera as it makes a few quick cuts. He crosses the street and the camera is behind him, a safe distance away. It zooms in and out and makes another series of quick cuts as it observes him reading a newspaper. He is never really in the centre of the shot and does not appear to be the main focus of the camera. We see people pass by and block our view and we even see him from the back. The next shot, at 1:50, shows his back as he’s having a conversation with somebody, whose face we also cannot see. The next shot is him sitting on a car, smoking a cigarette. Another man approaches him and they proceed to talk briefly. We cannot hear what they are saying. After another series of cuts, w...
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...ere also plays with the notion of suture in regards to the role of the audience. We enter into a dialogue with the film (using the shot/reverse/shot technique cutting/excluding/??), but then we realize that something is missing, the camera is hiding something from us (faces, names, speech, etc.). The scene is not complete, and we as an audience can only be passive observers. This is further demonstrated by the camera angles and how the camera seems to follow the protagonist as opposed to being side-by-side with him.
Paul Morrissey has created an atypical piece of cinema in which we view a character’s banal existence through the focal point of a choppy and broken editing style. This clip takes the viewer by surprise as it does not follow the conventional norms that we as an audience are familiar with, such as smooth transitions, clean editing, and sound dubbing.
Australian artist Eddie Perfect’s play, “The Beast” was presented by Melbourne Theatre Company in association with Melbourne Festival and Melbourne International Comedy Festival in late 2013. It premiered at the Southbank Theatre (home of Melbourne Theatre Company) and ran from October 3 through to November 9 of 2013. This dark satire is a modern day rant on the middle class, and the dreadful things people do in order to be seen to be good, as opposed to actually doing good. It’s the story of a close group of couples that vow to take on a more sustainable lifestyle in the country after experiencing a close shave with death. When they are forced to kill a free-range calf that they purchased for “nose to tail eating”, tensions boil over as they come face to face with alarming truths.
In another budgetary adaptation, the film crew, lacking the funds for cranes and dollies to do moving and panning shots, quickly switched between multiple shots for dynamic dialog, giving a certain frenzied feel to the dialog interactions (Hervey 38). The style this lends to th...
I have discussed how Francis F. Coppola exploits a wide array of audio and editing techniques to create suspense, tense, and anxiety in the sequence to affect the audience’s feelings. Despite the simple fabula, this multifaceted film requires certain intellectual involvement and efforts of the audience to grasp fully its underlying meanings and subtle nuances.
During the opening six minutes of Nicholas Roeg’s film Don’t Look Now, the viewer experiences a dynamic mixture of film techniques that form the first part of the narrative. Using metaphor and imagery, Roeg constructs a vivid and unique portrayal of his parallel storyline. The opening six minutes help set up a distinct stylistic premise. In contrast to a novel or play, the sequence in Don’t Look Now is only accessible through cinema because it allows the viewer to interact with the medium and follow along with the different camera angles. The cinematography and music also guide the viewer along, and help project the characters’ emotions onto the audience because they change frequently. The film techniques and choppy editing style used in Don’t Look Now convey a sense of control of the director over the audience and put us entirely at his mercy, because we have to experience time and space as he wants us to as opposed to in an entirely serial manner.
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.
The fundamental characteristic of magical realism is its duality, which enables the reader to experience both the character’s past and the present. In the novel, Monkey Beach, Eden Robinson uses this literary device to address the the trauma and mistreatment of the Haisla community in Canada by unveiling the intimate memories of the protagonist, Lisamarie, and the resulting consequences of this oppression. Monkey Beach illustrates how abuse in the past leads to another form of self-medication in the future - a neverending, vicious cycle for the members of the Haisla community. Many characters in Monkey Beach are scarred from childhood sexual abuse and family neglect, and resort to drug and alcohol abuse as a coping mechanism. These appalling memories are an account of the impact of colonization on the Haisla territory which continues to haunt the Aboriginal community throughout generations.
An Uncommitted Child The novel, High Fidelity by Nick Hornby, describes the life of a man who lives through his music and his childish ways. Rob Fleming is a man who struggles with commitment when it comes to what he needs, yet commits to what he wants. This lack of commitment leaves Rob struggling with the relationships with the people in his daily life. Living his life in a careless and childish manner, Rob Fleming burns the bridges with those who are close to him, and as a result realizes how much he truly cares for them when it’s too late. There were many jobs that Rob had taken over over the years; with each job he has there is a lack of passion and drive which results in his lack of commitment.
For this assignment I have chosen to analyze a scene from the 2001 film The Royal Tenenbaums, directed by West Anderson, where Richie Tenembaum, portrayed by Luke Wilson, attempts to commit suicide. This scene provides a shift from the previously established editing style of the film, its mood, pace, and camera movement as the filmmaker presents the climax in this one character’s story. This is done through the use of a specific mise en scène and an editing style which conveys the emotion behind the character’s actions.
Most of the film was shot with 50mm lenses on 35 mm cameras. This technique carefully lets the audience see the film as though watching a ‘live scene’. This has the effect of drawing the audience closer into the action.
Maya Angelou once said, “you may not control all the events that happen to you, but you can decide not to be reduced by them.” Jean Paul Sartre devotes his second chapter in Being and Nothingness on ‘The Body,’ demonstrating his historical knowledge, following an influence embedded in Hegel’s theory. In the film, Cleo From 5 To 7 , director Agnès Varda demonstrates a reflective perspective on freeing oneself from the bias of what others view as the ideal vision of beauty. Sartre shows that the being-for-itself, or the human being starts to become more aware of his or her own moral existence, only when he or she sees themselves being perceived by another being for-itself. Sartre says that we become more aware of ourselves in the hands or comparison
In the article “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema,” Laura Mulvey discusses the relationships amongst psychoanalysis (primarily Freudian theory), cinema (as she observed it in the mid 1970s), and the symbolism of the female body. Taking some of her statements and ideas slightly out of their context, it is interesting to compare her thoughts to the continuum of oral-print-image cultures.
This film then turns out to be a story of his life where we are shown with the camera angel going around him in a 360 view. The screen shot pauses completely and is frozen as the camera rotates around Rocket. You then realize this entire film will revolve around this one character and what he is about to set out to do and how he will achieve his goals. The camera uses a close up to Rocket to emphasis his expression witch shows some sort of displacement with his neighborhood. The camera angles and movement show this character in a complete different way than what the director showed in the other people of this town. When we are introduced to the town’s people, the gang, and head of the gang, life seems harsh and intense but when the camera moves to rocket the audience is able to feel a sense of relief. That maybe this characters world does not revolve around violence, in fact it revolves around what could be the complete opposite, art. The calm camera movement shows this character as a deep breath of relaxation after a chaotic run in the slums. The different camera angles of this scene emphasize to the audience who is in power, For instance, there is a shot that is behind the gang leader, over his back you see everyone is behind him and that in reality this specific character is gang leader, he is in complete power, even over the
Livingstone, Paisley & Carl Plantinga. The Routledge Companion to Philosophy and Film. London: Routledge – Taylor & Francis Group. 2009. Print.
While Shakespeare doesn’t have the cinematic luxuries of lighting and shadow at his disposal, he proves that Mulvey’s argument that desire is expressed in voyeuristic and scopophiliac fashion, but also that these innate desires of an audience transcend mediums and can in fact be fulfilled and appreciated in written form as much as within the intricacies of modern film.
In Wim Wenders’ 1984 film, Paris, Texas, we find its theme of loneliness harboured in Travis Henderson, but very much so in the film’s imagery, eloquently captured by Dutch cinematographer, Robby Müller, “When I choose to work on a film, the most important thing to me is that it is about human feelings. I try to work with directors who want their films to touch the audience.” And his imagery does just that in Paris, Texas.