Oral Pres - Self Assessment and Commentary

Time to reflect on the Oral presentation.

I believe I used precise film language in my analysis. I tried to use language related to shot variety (such as CU, ECU, WS, etc) and terms related to editing such as formalism and classicism. In this, I related how all three of these came together to create more of a significant meaning. Additionally, I added some socio-cultural commentary as to why The Godfather was important during the time it was created. I stated that the movies focuses on family values as well the genre conventions of the american gangster and mafia film. In terms of cinematography, I mentioned how the influences of the noir in the extract I chose as well as throughout the movie. For the rationale (and the movie), I stated why the I chose it and how it was significant in the large picture. I embedded only one clear opinion of another critic. This was one of the aspects that I could have improved on as to making it clear that it is what other opinions thought. I mentioned how the movie can can be seen as a critique of capitalism and greed, but I did not dwell too deep into it. Going further into this socio-cultural analysis could have improved the chances go me getting a better score. I could have been more persuasive in the way I articulated my analysis.

Oral Presentation Part 1: Genre and Audience

The Godfather 

I would classify The Godfather as a movie following many of the conventions of the crime and drama genres in film. I would like to argue that the film took many ideas and followed conventions followed by Noirs. Overall, the film can be easily said to be a gangster film. The lighting is one of the biggest elements that expresses that The Godfather is a noir. Many of the scenes are underexposed. Even when the sun is clearly out and the events are joyous (like the wedding), there still is a dark tone present that is always looming over the characters. There are shadows everywhere. Single point lighting only one side of the face portrays the transforming of a character from a side of goodness to a side of evil.

It is one of the biggest launching points for mob/gangster movies in America due to its legacy and impact on the industry. Francis Ford Coppola was the director of the film. The film was based on the crime novel published in 1969 by the same name. It was written in San Francisco in the North Beach District in the building now known as the Coppola tower. The district was and still is known as the Italian community in San Francisco. The writer was influenced by this community. Both the direcor and the writer wanted to explore the themes of family and revenge. Most of Coppola's other work is similar to the ideas and dark themes portrayed in The Godfather. He finished the Godfather trilogy by directing all of the three films. In a addition, he made films such as Apocalypse Now, The Outsiders, however, he has experimented with comedies like Jack. A common idea in all of his movies shows gangs, family, fulfillment, and in general people being oppressed. Still, he's varied enough in his work that this statement is not true for a lot. The audience for this film would be anyone interested in the crime mob genre. Family values are closely tied to this, but they are explored in a violent manner. This violence is key because there is always danger present (it seems) in every scene of the film. The story does not allow for the audience to rest or think as if everything is going to restore to its natural state. Once the audience does that, the impact of the violence is even more impactful. The death of Lucabrazzi is a clear example of this. The audience thinks that they know what is going to happen, but his death is unforeseen and unexpected.

Film's themes:
- The importance of family 
- Business vs. Personal life
- The desire for revenge 
- The need for respect 

Auteur Theory Documentary - George Lucas and Star Wars

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Graphic Organizer- Info graphic: Advanced Editing Notes

Location as Character

Location

Camp Loma Mar - forest in the morning

List of 2-3 Emotions we would like to capture:

- Peace
- Calm
- serenity

Minimum of 10 shots "dream shots" you would like to capture or experiment with that addresses the "mood" or "feeling" of the location.
- negative space with trees
- low angles at trees
- rack focus on minute detail
- macro shot of bug/plant
- graphic match of trees
- ELS
- Rule of Thirds
- Lines
- Texture
- Negative Space

Realism/Classical/Formalism

Realism 
Realism is all about showing the truth. This is done by not altering the sequence in any way. One of the conventions use to do this is the lengthy duration of a shot. A shot is, many times, held for a long period of time; longer than it is necessary to convey a message. It would be incorrect to say that a shot is always stationary because the camera itself could be moving for a long time. This form of editing derives from the earliest days of filmmaking. Filmmakers only captured real life events. Nothing was dramatized. One of the earliest examples is Louis Lumière's 50 second short film Arrival of the Train. The Munich Abendzeitung (a German newspaper) stated that "at the time, people, appalled by Arrival of the Train, were said to have leaped from their chairs" (source). Lotte H. Eisner, a French film critic, was quoted saying that "the spectators in the Grand Café involuntarily threw themselves back in their seats in fright, because Lumière's giant locomotive pulling into the station seemingly ran toward them." One thing that can be taken out of this is that many times, realism can terrify audiences. Sometimes we are not used to seeing an event happen from a different perspective that a camera can show. We get terrified by the familiar as easily the unfamiliar.




A great example of the usage of realism in a film is Children of Men. In this scene from the movie, the characters are moving in their car when they are suddenly attacked by a mob of people. Not having seen the movie myself, this shot alone gets the audience invested in the characters by creating "real" danger. I say "shot" because it was all done in one single take, without any edits. The danger feels real to even those who only watch this scene because you are part of the action. Nothing takes you out of the car itself (not until the ending at least). When the woman gets shot, it is instant. The shock on the faces of the characters is also immediate. Deep focus is used to keep everything in focus and keeping all of the action visible. The intricate camera movements change the shot from close up to medium shot, to over the shoulder, to long shot to point of view shot and so on. Furthermore, there is no score playing in the background. Any noticeable music that is playing is coming out of the car, which helps to enhance the realism of the scene. The director, Alfonso Cuarón, loves to use realism in his films. The most recent one I saw was Gravity and if I recalled correctly, the very first visible "cut" was made after almost 20 minutes into the move.

Classicism 

Classicism condenses all of the action without leaving any crucial information out. It is quick and right to the point. This is the style of editing used in most productions. It tries the tell the story the best way possible and focuses only on the characters rather than the filmmaker's techniques. For this reason, any edits made in the sequence cannot be a distraction in any way. Every cut is used to enhance the emotion of the scene. This form of editing is directly linked to classic Hollywood. 

The perfect example of classicism in action is when you don't even see the cut happen. This scene from Schindler's List is a great example of keeping the filmmaker's technique to him/herself and focusing on the action at hand. With every cut, the tension increases. Every cut reveals something new in terms of the characters or the emotion. Every single cut is disguised. For example, between 0:11 and 0:17 in the clip, the jump cut is almost non-existent. When the officer turns around to talk to the Jewish man under his command, the audience's eyes automatically turn to that man. For this reason, the cut between the two shots is not very noticeable. Something similar happens again at between 2:28 and 2:32. In this specific shot, it eventually turns from an over the shoulder to a close up. Again, the cut was made specially to heighten the emotion in the scene. This last shot specifically shows the frustration of the officer in his failed attempts to kill the Jewish worker. There is clear cause and effect. The effect is the release of the officer's anger at 2:43 when he finally just hits the man. Again, the shot changes; this time it becomes a long shot which also brings relief to the audience along with the poor Jewish worker.

Formalism 

Formalism is the director's style to bend reality. Formalist directors don't want to preserve reality; they want to show the world through their own eyes or the eyes of a character. Most of the time, formalist shots,scenes, or sequences make no sense to the common person so they can come off as a bit disturbing, but sometimes they can be beautiful in their own way.

 

When I think of good visual directors, one of the first people who come to mind is Zack Snyder. He's the man behind movies such as 300, Man of Steel, and Watchmen. Although 300 did this before the slow motion used in Watchmen stands out the most in its storytelling. Snyder uses his directorial techniques in  this opening montage from the movie to provide some back-story into the characters of Watchmen. Snyder bends time with slow motion and an effect called "bullet time" to allow the audience to take in the all the information being thrown at the screen. In this formalist sequence, the passage of time connects with letting go of the past as the heroes transform from great figures to nothing more miserable people. The camera movements are intricate, yet slow in order to show the world of Watchmen. Although this montage lacks the conventional jump cuts and fast edits as made famous by the Odessa Step montage sequence from Battleship Potemkin, it is a montage nonetheless. In contrast to that, this sequence is slow yet it still blurs reality. It still serves its purpose of having an emotional impact. The audience goes from feeling like being on top of the world to being despised, hated, and feeling worthless.

Contemporary Media Analysis

1. What does the media say about the world we live in?

I could have been very graphic with this picture, but
that would defeat the purpose of my argument of the
acceptance of violence. 

The media can do its best to represent the world we live in, but it can never be a complete and real representation of the world we live in. That being said, if I had to pick one thing that I think the media is saying about us, I would say that media says that we love violence. Not only seen through the films and TV shows, it also references violence happening in real life. There were talks about Syria and whistle blowers in multiple presentations. People are not sure if someone should be classified as a hero or an enemy. Our media glorifies war and violence and we love it. That is completely obvious after a close inspection of the box office from the previous years. There is a reason the top 100 highest grossing movies of all time (as seen here ) primarily consists of violence filled movies. I find it shocking that most of these movies came out in the last decade. This just goes to show our world's obsession with violence today.

2. Do you notice any one trend that keeps resurfacing through multiple media forms?

One of the trend that resurfaces in different forms of media and also was present in the presentations was the concept of "blurred lines." Although it was only one group who put emphasis on this, multiple groups talked about enough that it should be mentions. Media today cannot put into just black or white areas. No longer do we live in a time where movies and TV shows make the "bad guy" full on evil or the "good guy" the perfect human being. Although this has been happening over the years, it is more common now than ever before. TV shows today explore deeply troubled protagonists who have gotten themselves in some sort of trouble because of their own doing. So many TV shows have not dived into the troubled mind of a character like they today in shows such as 24, Breaking Bad, The Wire, Supernatural, Game of Thrones, Justified, The Walking Dead and so on. The protagonist is no longer an all-knowing being whose troubles are over by the end of the episode. TV shows have become more cinematic than ever before and therefore are in deep competition with film.

Another common trend that came up was the acceptance of violence. Men kill other men to show that killing other men in wrong. Okay, it may not be that simple. But, still. A majority of the highest grossing films of the past years (especially those who past the $1 billion mark) have been action movies. One of the movies that comes to mind is The Avengers. Don't get me wrong, I loved that movie...on my first watching. Second time around, I realized how much mindless action there was in the movie. The final battle, although incredibly epic and put on a grand scale, fell flat because there was no fallout from the fights. The heroes were barely getting injured. I just didn't feel like I should be fearing for these character because I was thinking something along the lines of "they can't kill him. They still need this character to milk out some more cash." Similarly, Man of Steel had the same issues, but I was bothered by it just on my first watching.

One group mentioned that media loves to expose American stupidity. Even though that may be true to an extent, it is somewhat misleading. Some people love to see something "stupid" once in a while. This could refer to shows like Here Come Honey Boo Boo where a family is exploited (they seem fairly oblivious to the impact of what they say), specifically the daughter. This is reality TV show and it adds to the conversation of stupidity. However, it would be incorrect to just say American stupidity. Stupidity exists everywhere. It's just that the media has exploited it here in the States more than anywhere else in the world. Also, it is a false representation of society. It only goes to heighten the stereotype that Americans and fat and dumb. As Gino's group mentioned, many times the people on the show are told to act a certain way simply to get the shot the filmmakers want to get...and here is was thinking that THIS IS REALITY TELEVISION. I guess even our sense of reality is falsified in media today.

3. What do you see as the best and worst of what media portrays?

The media can do its best to influence society, but it can never represent it as a whole. That is where the major fault for the media lies; it exaggerates human interests. There are channels, TV shows, video games, and movies for every type of audience. Most of the reality TV shows, which as apparently supposed to show events happening in some real person's life, shows fake people. Shows like Keeping Up With the Kardashians does have real people, but these people are so not grounded to reality that they are living in their own world. Most people don't live their lives like the Kardashians do because most people don't have so much money. Additionally, the family rarely faces big issues and they usually just become bitter over small things like Kim not feeling like talking to anyone. In that sense, this show (Along with many many more) shows the worst of of media's portrayal.

One of the best thing media has started to portray today is a general acceptance of all kinds of people. By that I am referring to all the LGBT people in the world. Shows like Glee are leading the way in this cultural change where acceptance in not just preached, but also acted upon. In TV Shows and movies, the LGBT group is represented more and more. That, I believe, is one of the best things media has done today with its portrayal of society today.

4. Where do you see yourself contributing to the conversation?

My group talked about the acceptance of violence over sexuality, specifically in American culture. We live in a world where it is unacceptable for a child to see someone's butt, but being literally ripped apart from limb to limb is a little more acceptable. As mentioned, European TV shows are more lenient on expressing sexuality than showing extreme violence. Although women are shown to wear very minimal clothing in much of American media, it is still frowned upon if any sexual acts are shown. A documentary called This Film is Not Yet Rated, made an attempt to look inside the MPAA which includes members who control what the rating for every single movie will be. The documentary explains that they say that they are trying to protect children with this, but they associations accepts violence far more easily than they accept sex. Because of this, filmmakers who wanted their films to be rated R get NC-17 and many theaters refuse to play them. Due to this, all the hard work the filmmakers put into their film goes down the drain simply because the MPAA says the content was too graphic. The media could potentially play a powerful role here by exploring this issue.