...Film Form and Analysis Cinematography Cinematography describes the process by which a film strip is exposed to light to create an image. It encompasses many factors: the camera’s distance from the action, camera angle and direction, type of lens, camera movement, and lighting, among others. The art of cinematography also includes mise-en-scène—the arrangement of objects and movements in the frame. Shot Types The amount of visual information included in the image depends on the distance of the camera from the action and on the focal length of the camera lens. Throughout the history of cinema, filmmakers have favored certain combinations of camera distance and focal length, or shot types. * Extreme long shot: Captures a scene in its entirety; used for establishing location in exterior shots. Used frequently in epic genres such as westerns and war films, it reduces human beings to mere dots on the screen. * Long shot: Accommodates at least the entire bodies of figures (if that is all the shot includes, it is called a full shot). Captures movement, background, and broad gestures and expressions. * Medium shot: Contains a figure from the waist or knees up. It is a functional shot, favored in classical Hollywood editing, often used for scenes with dialogue. * Close-up: Includes very little if any background, concentrating on an object or, if an extreme close-up, a fragment of an object, such as the human face. Close-ups often accord great significance and symbolic...
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...Using Facebook to Teach Rhetorical Analysis Jane Mathison Fife The attraction of Facebook is a puzzle to many people over the age of thirtyfive, and that includes most college faculty. Yet students confess to spending significant amounts of time on Facebook, sometimes hours a day. If you teach in a computer classroom, you have probably observed students using Facebook when you walk in the room. Literacy practices that fall outside the realm of traditional academic writing, like Facebook, can easily be seen as a threat to print literacy by teachers, especially when they sneak into the classroom uninvited as students check their Facebook profiles instead of participating in class discussions and activities. This common reaction reflects James King and David O’Brien’s (2002: 42) characterization of the dichotomy teachers often perceive between school and nonschool literacy activities (although they are not referring to Facebook specifically): “From teachers’ perspectives, all of these presumably pleasurable experiences with multimedia detract from students’ engagement with their real work. Within the classroom economy technology work is time off task; it is classified as a sort of leisure recreational activity.” This dichotomy can be broken down, though; students’ enthusiasm for and immersion in these nonacademic literacies can be used to complement their learning of critical inquiry and traditional academic concepts like rhetorical analysis. Although they read these texts daily...
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...My analysis paper is based on mise-en-scene in Rashomon. The mise-en-scene, which means putting on the stage and it covers the setting, props, costumes, performance, lighting, and color. The way these elements are modified and are arranged within the film to appear on screen is the composition (Abrams et.al 96). In the scene of the fight between the samurai and the bandit, the setting and the light are indispensable; the shadow of the forest is used to contrast with the light that come from the sun and when the bandit is ready to finish off the samurai, the light is reflected in his face and immediately this light is contrasted with shadow that comes among the branches where rest the dead body of the samurai. I consider the setting, the use...
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...such as minerals or vitamins (Chen et al., 2002). Due to these reasons, chitosan films have been used as a packaging material for a variety of foods to preserve its quality (Park & Zhao, 2004). Recently, chitosan-starch...
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...Film i Engelsk Bilag 1a FILM ANALYSIS – an introduction (Source: http://www.filmeducation.org) – bearbejdet af Mi og LK, Favrskov Gymnasium Reading a film is just like reading a book, except that instead of looking at a written page we are looking at the cinema screen. Reading a film works in exactly the same way as a written text, or a picture, except that the tools that are used to create meaning are different. We call these tools film language. The opening sequence From the moment we first start watching a film, we begin to get involved. The first few minutes of a film (the opening sequence) are very important to us as they give us lots of clues about the film: 1) what will the film be about (conflicts/themes); 2) who are the most important characters (hero, villain, love interest); 3); what is the setting of the film (time and place); 4) the genre; and finally, 5) what sort of film language characterizes the film? We look at all these elements and begin to put them into context. Based on their environment, how they look, what they say and what we see them do, we make assumptions about the characters, their roles in the film and their relationship to each other. We also recognize so-called genre markers (things we associate with one particular genre) which tell us if we are watching a Western or a Sc-Fi film and, thus, form specific expectations about what is going to happen during the rest of the film. At the same time, we listen to the sounds and the music...
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...decisions about the form and style of their movies. ✔ explain how shared belief systems contribute to hidden movie meaning. ✔ explain the difference between implicit and explicit meaning, and understand how the different levels of movie meaning contribute to interpretive analysis. medium. With so much experience, no one could blame you for wondering why you need a course or this book to tell you how to look at movies. After all, you might say, “It’s just a movie.” For most of us most of the time, movies are a break from our daily obligations—a form of escape, entertainment, and pleasure. Motion pictures had been popular for fifty years before even most filmmakers, much less scholars, considered movies worthy of serious study. But motion pictures are much more than entertainment. The movies we see shape the way we view the world around us and our place in that world. What’s more, a close analysis of any particular movie can tell us a great deal about the artist, society, or industry that created it. Surely any art form with that kind of influence and insight is worth understanding on the deepest possible level. ✔ understand the differences between formal analysis and the types of analysis that explore the relationship between culture and the movies. ✔ begin looking at movies more analytically and perceptively. Looking at Movies In just...
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...Film Theory and Approaches to Criticism, or, What did that movie mean? by Christopher P. Jacobs Movies are entertainment. Movies are documents of their time and place. Movies are artistic forms of self-expression. Movies we see at theatres, on television, or home video are typically narrative films. They tell stories about characters going through experiences. But what are they really about? What is the content of a film? DIGGING DEEPER: FOUR LEVELS OF MEANING Recounting the plot of a movie, telling what happens, is the simplest way to explain it to someone else. But this is neither a film review nor a film analysis. It’s merely a synopsis that anyone else who sees or has seen the movie will likely agree with. This level of content may be called the referential content, since it refers directly to things that happen in the plot and possibly to some aspects of the story that are merely implied by the plot. In John Boorman’s Deliverance (1972), four men from the city go on a weekend canoe trip that unexpectedly becomes a life or death struggle for survival of man against man and man against nature. Some characters survive, others don’t. Most films can be analyzed more thoroughly to reveal deeper levels of meaning. A review (perhaps 400-1200 words) typically includes personal impressions and evaluations of a movie’s content and techniques. A good review may be subjective, yet still touch superficially on topics that might be explored in more detail in a longer...
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...structural movement of comedy flows from an old society to the green world in response to a recognizable central conflict created by the power holding characters of the play. Once in the green world, there is a lack of societal rules and the conflict can resolve leading to the formation of a new society, indicated by some kind of party or festival (Frye 163). Frye further explains that this structural component of comedy is the origin of comedic form. At first William Shakespeare’s play, The Taming of the Shrew seems to have a clear message that the green world theory does not define the structure of the play and that Petruchio tames Katherine. While this could be an interpretation of the play, I find it unlikely that this is the case. The analysis of the film, 10 Things I Hate About You, opens the door visually to see the green world theory in action, which allows the reader to appreciate The Taming of the Shrew as a comedy as well as reinterpret its conclusion. The green world theory is the structural backbone of The Taming of the Shrew, and commands that Katherine and Petruchio change over the course of the play and ultimately both are tamed. The green world theory can be seen in 10 Things by analyzing Frye’s key elements of comedy, such as form, character type, and repetition. The movie opens in an old society where Kat and Bianca’s father, who plays the role of the senex (as Frye suggests, a character in charge of the plays society) and strictly controls the environment in a way that...
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...Music has been in movies since the first “silent films” were made, and continues to be one of the most influential factors in determining how beautiful and lighthearted, or how horrific and tragic a film is perceived by the audience. This paper will provide an analysis of Hans Zimmer’s composition of the soundtrack to the movie The Dark Knight Rises. This dark, intense and emotionally pounding soundtrack pairs perfectly with the tension between the mysterious Batman character and his latest evil nemesis Bane. We will examine the musical characteristics of two selections from this soundtrack, “Gotham’s Reckoning” which has become Bane’s primary theme music that will forever connect the audience with feeling of impending doom and “Rise” the epic closing number in the movie that connects us to the previous films in the trilogy. There is a reoccurring rhythmic pattern used throughout this soundtrack that seemingly connects each piece in the work. The chant heard throughout the score gives a primitive depth since the words are unrecognizable. Hans Zimmer uses synthesizers and samplers to create this modern score which is closely tied to the music previously written for the two prior films from this trilogy. There are even some parts of the new musical pieces that contain excerpts or samples from the prior films soundtracks. Zimmer uses this technique in order to recreate the emotions from the prior films to establish an immediate connection with the familiar characters. ...
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...mise-en-scene in one of the early scenes in the film American Beauty, directed by Sam Mendes. Mise-en-scene, a French term translated as "putting into the scene", refers to properties of a cinematic image that exists independently of camera position, camera movement, and editing. The story centres on Lester, played by Kevin Spacey, a father who is experiencing a mid-life crisis. Despite employing a traditional Hollywood plot structure that focuses on a problem and a protagonist’s quest in resolving the issue, the film is special. The problem in the film is special as it is Lester’s entire state of life – his unhappiness and dissatisfaction of the way things are in his life. The film’s theme centres on the definition of happiness, more specifically in the context of the American Dream. The characters of the American Beauty seem to have confused material well-being with happiness. The plot is pushed by the main protagonist, Lester, in trying to find meaning and happiness in his life that was before dictated by the American expectation. We will be looking at the second scene of the film, which begins when Lester enters Brad’s office to discuss his performance at work. Brad is the company efficiency expert who was recently hired. The scene will be discussed separately based on two different locations. The essay will examine the use of settings, costume and make up, staging, lighting and lastly the use of space and time for each location. Analysis of mise-en-scene components (Office) In...
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...----------------------------------- NANYANG TECHNOLOGICAL UNIVERSITY CHARACTERISATION AND DEGRADATION OF ABA TRI-BLOCK WITH DISRUPTED ENDS Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Bachelor of Engineering of the Nanyang Technological University By Foo Yong Quan School of Materials Science and Engineering 2012 ABSTRACT Four tri-block copolymers composed of poly(L-lactide)-poly(caprolactone-co-L-lactide)-poly(L-Lactide) (PLLA-PCLLA-PLLA), with disrupted ends were characterised according to individual’s mechanical and thermal properties. The tri-block copolymers consist of amorphous PCLLA middle block, at constant composition of CL and LLA being 60% and 40% respectively. The end blocks consist of either a semi-crystalline PLLA or various compositions of P(LLA-DLLA). Factors such as high overall crystallinity and effective crosslinking of arms led to the high modulus values of polymers. A 16-week degradation study was done to investigate degradation behaviour. The number average molar mass, mass loss, water uptake and the changes in mechanical and thermal properties were investigated at each designated time points. Experiments revealed that the polymers degraded via bulk degradation. The 16-weeks period only showed the initial stage of degradation whereby...
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...Johnston Film Essay Avatar The critical acclaim that followed the box office destroyer, Avatar, out shined most films since the creation of Hollywood and the American cinema composition. Coming in at the second highest grossing film of all times only behind Titanic, James Cameron and his crew of artistic creators surely gave their audiences something to talk about. The film takes place in two separate worlds, the industrialized earth and the beautiful and plush avatar infested world of Pandora. The controversy of the film is centered on the humans mining the world of Pandora for a highly valuable element worth an estimated $20 million dollars a kilogram. The artistically drawn battle between the humans and the natives of Pandora, bring about a reminder of several classically organized stories that seem to follow along the same paths that Avatar treads upon. With this controversy that is being brought to light, the issue of race, racial tolerance and other problems dealing with color are brought up throughout the film in a multitude of ways. Whether it be embodied in the thoughts and processes of the characters, through the actual actions of the film, or the eerily similar comparisons that can be made between Avatar and other racially charged films, race is definitely a subject that was vividly dug up when the film crossed the minds of the viewers. Many reviews of the film Avatar put most of the racist charges and blames of inequality onto the writers of the film and...
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...Hal Ashby’s Harold and Maude is a cult classic from the 1970’s. Harold and Maude is a romantic comedy that centers around a young boy, Harold Chasen, an elderly woman, Maude and their odd relationship. Harold has this unusual obsession with death, and Ashby demonstrates his fascination through the comedic twist between Harold’s mother and Harold. However even Maude is also fascinated in death. She lives her life to the fullest attending funerals where Harold also goes simply because they enjoy “death”. Throughout the movie, Maude influences Harold and changes his perspective about death and the two of them eventually evolve into a romantic relationship. Ashby begins the film introducing Harold Chasen, with a close up tracking his feet, not allowing the viewers to see his face, until two minutes in the film, however even then, his face is hard to make out because the only source of light comes from the window. The moment we do see his face, Ashby reveals the relationship between him and his mother. From the moment we meet Harold, it is obvious that he is anything but joyful. He is pale, dead looking, wearing fancy suits and ties black, grey and brown. Black being a color of grief helps to show his obsession with death has him looking like death. Ashby takes the audience along with Harold to one of his favorite spots, a cemetery. Here we are introduced with a vibrant, old woman named Maude. They come into contact at a funeral and we notice their distinctive personalities. Maude...
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...Analysis of Moulin Rouge Deidra Lyyski ENG 225 Introduction to Film Instructor Kenneth Newton April 10, 2013 Analysis of Moulin Rouge Many films use a stylistic system to structure a narrative around a main thematic idea. Baz Luhrman’s 2001 Oscar winning masterpiece Moulin Rouge (Luhrman, 2001) is one such film that contains each of these narrative elements: sound, cinematography, mise-en-scene, and editing. A more in-depth analysis requires that mise-en-scene to be broken down into the categories of setting, color usage, costume, makeup and hairstyle, and props. Through these elements, the movie’s theme of Bohemian inspired ideals of beauty, freedom, truth, and above all things: love is illustrated. Along with highlighting the prominent themes and symbols evident in the film, I will analyze how each of the above mentioned are used. The film is set in the village of Montmarte, Paris during the pre-war era between 1899 and 1900. Christian (Ewan McGregor), an impoverished poet, comes to Paris and falls in with a group of Bohemians who want to sell a musical number to Harold Zidler (Jim Broadbent), the owner of the Moulin Rouge. Zidler needs a financial backer to transform the bordello into a modern theater; the rich Duke of Worcester (Richard Roxburgh) is persuaded to back the renovations as well as a spectacular new show, written primarily by Christian, in return for Zidler’s guarantee that the Duke retains the exclusive favors of Satine (Nicole Kidman), the club’s star...
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...Product placement in the film’ * Beats head phones individual experience of sound * Samsung S6 * Skype * Marvel’s Cinematic Universe (MCU) –Ironman led to Incredible Hulk, Iron Man 2, Thor, Captain America: The First Avenger, The Avengers. . .); consider cross-over, interwoven narratives; idea that characters in one film might share a universe with those in another, seemingly unrelated film * Characters back stories * Continuity within all the characters * A lot of popular culture reference within the film * Marvel’s recognizable brand * “Look” of the film (its mise-en-scene, for example) to graphic novels (comics) * Character backstories—use of flashbacks * Constructions of masculinity/femininity in the film (Black Widow’s character, in particular) * Celebrity billing/role of celebrity in creating the blockbuster film * Cameos (of celebrities and other superheroes) * Trailers/the para-film experience * Audience composition * Music—the film’s score * Engagements with issues of race/gender identity/sexuality * Power relations among the superheroes * b * Rating criteria (language, nudity, violence) * CGI/the ending * Director Joss Whedon’s celebrity status and following (for Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Much Ado About Nothing etc.) * Strong for female leads * Idea of a super hero being strong and be unique is important * REdemention arch in a hero film in terms of a hero having...
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