Film Report: Wings of Desire (1987)
Wings of Desire (1987), by Wim Wenders is a fantastical Franco-German romantic film that depicts the lives of those who populated Berlin during the time of Franco and the Berlin Wall that separated West and East Germany. In the film, reality is separated into two dimensions in which humans and angels are isolated from each other and exist on separate planes of existence. The angels gaze over the inhabitance of Berlin and attempt to comfort people in distress; however, because of their separate existences, the angels cannot influence the actions of the human world. Wenders noticeably relates the separation of existence between the angels and humans in Wings of Desire with the isolation felt by the people of West and East Berlin with his use of acting style, color grading, symbolism.
Throughout the film, the two angels played by Bruno Ganz and Otto Sander travel around Berlin and observe the citizens with dull blank faces. They produce no emotional response to their surroundings, even when they are in the setting of a cheering crowd at a carniva...
As the camera cuts away from the room where Xiao Yun’s mourners grieve in solemn silence, it returns to the skyscraper featured early in the film. The camera tilts gently upward, directing its gaze higher and higher as more of the skyscraper comes into view. The film, its exposure of proletarian suffering complete, arises from the slums and returns its gaze to the higher levels of society – to the bourgeois audience itself. Street Angel has explored the hardships of proletarian life with contagious sympathy, melodramatically criticizing the capitalism that defined 1930s Shanghai. Now, Yuan asks his audience whether it will join him in challenging the injustices engendered by this economic
Angel, one of the main characters, is thrown into the middle of a battle between the indigenous Native Americans and the American government. One tries to protect their land, while the other wants to exploit the land’s natural resources. Hogan writes, “For us, hell was cleared forests and killed animals. But for them, hell was this world in all its plentitude”. For Angel, it is a journey of reconnection with the way of life in order to uncover her hidden past. The idea that the land is sacred differs drastically from the idea taught to her as she grew up. She is reunited with forgotten relatives, who teach her how deeply rooted their people depended on the natural environment; a dependence that was sown into everyday life. Which brings about “that human culture is connected to the physical world, affecting it and affected by it” (Glotfelty). There is a sense of similarity between Angel’s growth and the transformation of how she starts to perceive things. At first, Angel sees nothing more than scene...
Canadian filmmaker and cinephile, Guy Maddin once said, “I do feel a bit like Dracula in Winnipeg. I’m safe, but can travel abroad and suck up all sorts of ideas from other filmmakers… Then I can come back here and hoard these tropes and cinematic devices.” Here, Maddin addresses his filmmaking saying that he takes aspects from different film styles and appropriates them into his own work. In The Saddest Music in the World (2003), Maddin uses a combination of French Surrealist filmmaking and classical American Hollywood cinema, specifically melodrama, to create his own style. In an article by William Beard, Steven Shaviro talks about Maddin’s filmmaking, and he links Surrealism and melodrama together saying, “Maddin’s films are driven by a tension between romantic excess [melodrama] on the one hand and absurdist humour [Surrealism] on the other.” In regards to The Saddest Music in the World, the relationship between Surrealism and melodrama is not one of tension, as Shaviro suggests, but one of cooperation. This paper will analyze two films by filmmakers Maddin was familiar with —Un Chien Andalou (1929) by Luis Buñuel and Salvador Dali on the Surrealist side, and All That Heaven Allows (1955) by Douglas Sirk on the melodrama side—to showcase the important elements of each, concluding with an analysis of The Saddest Music in the World in conjunction with both film styles. Ultimately, it will be shown how Guy Maddin combines French Surrealist cinema and Hollywood melodrama in The Saddest Music in the World, to create his own unique film style.
To escape the invented world that is presented to society, creating a more critical distance is necessary. Instead of allowing the media to use civilization, understanding the meaning and effect it has on them will enhance their perception. This directly correlates to Super Sad True Love Story, in which the populace has to grow through a collapse to fully grasp what is wrong within its society. Similar to The Truman Show, as Truman tries to escape Christof’s manipulations, he is blocked at every turn. The movie hinting to the viewers that they have to take a mental journey to secure their freedom. These cases are evident in the issue of the Paris attacks, reported in the article “Does Paris Matter More Than Beirut?” as the only people that are wondering why Westerners do not seem to acknowledge Beirut are critics. The media therefore draws society in, able to easily deceive and manipulate. As a result, the illusions created by the people ought to be escaped solely by
Angels in America is a moving piece of literature and film. The characters are created with such debt, and background that they came to life. The dream-like structure overlaps with the realistic powerful scenes, truly giving them play a heavenly glow. The conflicts are heartbreakingly truthful and yet how the characters over come them are moving. I have read very little plays thats have had such a powerful effect on me. I highly suggest everyone finds an opportunity to enlighten themselves by both watching and reading Angels in America.
The Blue Angel is a 1930 film that was directed by Josef von Sternberg. The film main stars were Emil Jannings, Marlene Dietrich and Kurt Gerron. The story of the film was based on Heinrich Mann's novel “Professor Unrat” that was published in 1905.
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.
Overall as the director, I would have liked to seen a great emphasis through dream scenery. Throughout this whole play, I thought of it has a large dream and everything was happening for a specific reason. I would also like to have seen the costumes represent the characters portrayals. Angel outfits, wings, political attire for men, a nurse outfit for Belize, and some shabby clothing for the women. Identity had given Angels in America the ability to reach the viewer. It supported the production and made things easier to envision and more realistic to our society. Many of the characters had differences that set them apart just like our society, but on the other hand those differences just like the “spine” were the backbone of their culture.
Besides an initial voiceover narration introducing Ray Kinsella (Kevin Cosner), his beloved wife Annie (Amy Madigan), and their young daughter Karin, this is the first scene in Field of Dreams, released in 1989 and directed by Phil Alden. The voice-over establishes the expectation of the film as being a sensible story about a loving couple trying to run a family farm in Iowa, and the subsequent scene (pictured above) quickly deconstructs that expectation. While working in his field one night, Ray hears a voice whispering “If you build it, he will come.” From then on, there are no more misconceptions about Field of Dreams being anything but an unapologetic fantasy in which an Iowa farmer mows down his fields to build a baseball diamond where
In summation, the interconnection of people and events that one might ordinarily see as disconnected or unrelated is successfully applied in Angels of America. The use of dual roles, in correlation with dialogue and character interaction allow Kushner’s to interconnect four of the major characters established persona and communities, all the while fulfilling the requirements of other characters to further the play. Consequently, Kushner is able to expand or sustain, rather than renegotiate, his characters for the audience so that the messages, triumphs and struggles of one character may be evolved even while an actor is represented in another character.
Setting: Pelayo and Elisenda's house, in a South American town, especially in the wire chicken coop, where the angel was locked with the hens.
Where Schlondorff, Wenders, Herzog, Fassbinder and Kluge once investigated the extremities of the German character and the Americana that infested West German culture through the New German Cinema of the late 60s, 70s and early 80s, the Germany of today has through its cinema acknowledged past hardships but with a more positive emphasis placed on the possibilities of forgiveness, redemption and hope for what can be made of tomorrow. Bibliography A Reversal of Fortunes? Women, work and change in East Germany. Rachel Alsop.
“The Mission” is based on a true story that occurred around the borderlands of Argentina, Paraguay and Brazil in the years 1750’s according to the film and history. The Treaty of Madrid of 1750 with the Spanish and Portuguese caused both havoc and death for the people of the Guarini and the members of the Jesuits. The Jesuits, members of the church, tried to bring Christianity and civilization to the natives while keeping at peace with Spain and Portugal. The Jesuits were the teachers for the natives; Teaching them not only the Christian religion but also civilization. Father Gabriel, a Jesuit, is first introduced in the film when he is showing his respects to a former Jesuit priest killed by the natives. He walks through the South American
Dark City, a film by Alex proyas is a tremendous visionary accomplishment, and a motion picture so authentic and innovative, it provokes your wildest imagination. If these words speak the truth, as the German Director Werner Herzog presumes, that human beings live in an era emaciated of fresh concepts, then Dark City is a picture to enrich us. Not a tale so much as an incident, it is a exultation of art direction, cinematography, set design, special effects and of course, imagination.
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.