Little Miss Sunshine (January)

A modern-day dysfunctional family struggles through life’s toughest challenges by coming together to celebrate the family. Each individual has his own “American Dream” and fails to accomplish it. As individuals, they failed, but they come together to succeed in a new American dream where the family comes together to help each other and become a functional family.
The individualistic dreams are more shallows dreams based around one big shallow dream of winning a beauty competition. This family is the only one that realizes the beauty competition has to do with inner beauty like family love and bonds, and the film demeans the physical and superficial American Dream.
The grandfather’s death symbolizes the family’s overcoming of death, and it brings them together. The director uses humor around the grandfather’s death to present the idea of hope and moving on with life.
There is also comedy in other parts such as the van they drive. The van represents all of the problems within the family. With each issue within the family, there is an issue with the van such as the horn going out or the car not starting. The van is a practice for the family to combine and solve a problem together. The innocence of the young girl is the driving force for the rest of the family to protect her from the real world and the failures it has brought to them.

The Hoax (April 6th)

This modern film depicts the actual actions of Clifford Irving as a man versus himself comical drama set in the 1970s. Irving’s dream of being rich and famous represents the new American Dream and how it fails to make one happy. We see a man clouded by his desires and unable to tell the distinction between truth and fiction. He fabricates so much so often that he begins to see events and people that are not there. We get to know more about Cliff than any of the other characters in the film because we can hear his thoughts and see how he acts alone. The director makes the viewers feel like we personally know Clifford Irving.
We see a flawed man who begins to see his lies as true events which demonstrate man’s weakness when he loses control of himself. Irving has himself on a pedestal with power over other people like the President, but the power he lost friends and family over only destroyed him in the end. Striving for the American dream of fame and glory, Irving loses sight of the dream he was already living with a wife who loves him and a best friend who would do anything for him. This portrays how modern society has lost sight of the original American Dream with superficial dream of power.
At first, the film is more comical and light, but as Irving continues deeper into the lies, the film becomes more depressing and serious. The title of the film represents how Irving viewed his scheme as a game he could win, and he had fun until reality set in. The more man lifts himself up, the harder he falls from being only human.

The Namesake (April 4th)

A combination of Bollywood and Hollywood, this movie tells the story about a couple from one culture raising a family in another culture. The film begins with an Indian man and woman meeting formally in India and becoming engaged to move to the United States and raise two children. Director Mira Nair emphasizes the family bond as the strongest bond existing and continuing from generation to generation.
We also see the family growing culturally and physically when the daughter marries an American man. The son, Gogol, struggles to find his individual identity only to learn that his family love and history gave him his identity. The film uses Gogol and his family’s story as a representation among many immigrants family struggle in a new country. The children of the immigrants want to fit in with their surroundings, but the parents are used to another culture and try to teach their children about their background while accepting the new culture as well.
The story is also a coming-of-age story where Gogol learns that every story can have two sides like his name. A visual technique used to portray this is in the airport when Gogol looks at the digital flight schedule at the airport that looks different from different angles. After Gogol learns the truth about his name, he realizes his father’s desire for Gogol to have the opportunity to choose how to live his life. He learns that people have more than one side to them too. Gogol has several failures to understand his father’s wisdom which represents the every man’s life lessons.

300 (April 14th)- extra

The unique part of this movie is the graphics combined with the editing. The story is a basic war hero story, but the graphics give it a unique edge. It has a comic book feel similar to that of Sin City where the blood has a cartoonish look, and then there is a lot of physical movement through the air. The comic book appearance is a new style of editing in the film industry. The slow motion effect also adds to this style. The colors made the setting appear like a mythical tale being told, and it ends up being a story told by one of the soldiers to build up the other Spartan soldiers before battle. The narration also refers to the common form of historical storytelling before people wrote books about such events. The music adds a lot of character to the film with use of guitars and computers along with classical instruments to create a new and intriguing sound that motivates the actions in the film.

Tiger and the Snow

This film has a similar feel to that of A Beautiful Life, but the story is completely different. Director Roberto Benigni demonstrates a man’s struggle to keep the woman he loves alive. He uses an actual event as the cause of his struggle. Even in the worst cases, Benigni manages to use comedy to look at the optimistic side of everything. Instead of giving up on the one he loves, he travels far and lies to beat the odds of her death. Also, he looks past the problems of mankind to see the beauty in life.
I remembered Children of Heaven and Babel when I saw this movie. Much of it is set in Iraq and religion and spirituality is brought up. The story of Babel is used to represent the reason for war between cultures. Many critics dislike his attempt to use comedy in the Muslim world, but I believe that he succeeds to bring a new positive perspective. Benigni brings optimism in the least likely places where many people such as the author Faud who gives his life up.
The title describes Benigni’s character Attilio. A tiger is usually not in a place where it snows, and a man does not go towards the place of danger but away from it. Attilio goes to an unlikely place where there is a war and the threat of death lingering nearby.
The film is also used to remind us about the innocent loss in wars. In the scene where he is in prison, we sympathize with him knowing he was an innocent bystander of war. The perseverance and achievements made by Attilio present life as full of miracles and surprises that come with love. Benigni pushes the idea of love back into a society where war ad politics have been pushing it out.

Ushpizin-March 29th

This orthodox Jewish film portrays the hidden miracles in life that come from the most unexpected places. The title means “holy guests”, yet the characters are escaped convicts who only want things without giving back. The continuous trials end in a happier and more fulfilled marriage between Moshe and Malli. Moshe has to face his past and go through the worst with his wife to gain her best trust and love along with a family. The convicts end up joining the Orthodox religion after ridding Moshe of all of his past sins.
The film depicts a culture closed off to most of the world, and makes the viewers want to join the main characters during their Sukkoth rituals. More and more miracles occur during the film, and each one is almost forgotten until the biggest one at the end. Director Gidi Dar shows how the least expected and difficult events can be the most rewarding.
The couple learns the deeper meaning of the traditional holiday in a country surrounded by crime and death. The director focuses on a small society where hospitality is a necessity. Dar displays a universal bind between mankind though kindness; he displays how people can come together to create miracles and a better society of friendship. Moshe depends on the holiday food, a citron, to answer his prayers. When the two guests use the fruit in a salad to return the kindness to Moshe, he misunderstands the meaning of the fruit for the holiday and gets angry at the destruction of the physical fruit. He realizes the use of the fruit was worth the money because it represents the convicts attempt to help and give back to a friend for kindness. The birth of the baby boy portrays a new hope for society to come together in faith and friendship.

Babel (March 2nd)

The first part of the film I noticed was the title. The bolded white words on the DVD menu are slightly crooked. After viewing the film, I decided to look up the title knowing it was part of a Bible story. The story marks the separation of people by making new languages after the people try to build a man-made tower, Babel, to heaven. God punished them by confusing their words thus creating new languages. The title can represent the crooked ways of human beings.
The discontinuity of time actually connects the movie as a whole bringing three stories around the world together. This represents man’s connection with each other even through cultural and distant differences. The ending f the film indicates man’s continuous struggle to get through the confusion of life. There is some closure with all three scenarios, yet none of them satisfy the viewer. The Japanese father realizes something is wrong with is daughter which is a step, but the issue is not directly addressed or fixed. The parents in Morocco make it to the hospital, but we do not see the wife recovered or returning to the United States. Their marriage is saved, but we do not see the family reunited. The Mexican nanny finds the police who find the children, but she is deported to Mexico. Babel shows the corruption within mankind today. We are all connected in one sense, yet we let our pride interfere and create more chaos and confusion.
The film makes a political statement about political issues in the world today. The director shows the clouded perception of what is moral and amoral in today’s society.

Pan's Labryinth (Feb. 22)

A story told during the Spanish Civil War with Franco and fascism controlling the nation in the 1940s. The blue tint of the film gives the story a morbid tone to represent the repression and death during Franco’s rule. The surrealism is used to show an escape from the real world to a heaven-like place under the hell of earth. It is ironic that heaven could be under hell, but the director could be relating the placement of the magical kingdom to that of a grave. The underground idea can also relate to the guerilla warfare where the underground army is fighting against the repression of fascism.
The title of the movie portrays the messenger’s struggle to help the underground army succeed, and she is also helping her family. The woman’s life is similar to Ofelia’s struggle to return to her family by undergoing tasks to prove her worthiness. Both females want to return to their home before the death and terror of fascism. To further the dreamlike scenarios in the film, a lullaby becomes a key factor in the film because it helps one fall asleep to escape the current troubles of the real world. The calming song shows how the world needs imagination and beauty to live. The blue tint of the film also represents night as the characters’ struggle through darkness actually helps them.
When it comes to Ofelia choosing between right and wrong, she uses her moral stance willing to give up a return to her peaceful happy kingdom. Ofelia represents what the Spanish people fighting underground want Spain to be, and the general represents the cold and selfish fascists running the country using pain and death. Even though Ofelia sacrificed herself, she returned to a place that is like what Spain used to be.

Factory Girl (Feb. 24th)-extra

The Autobiographical film depicts the life of one of America’s famous “it” girls who lived a life full of drugs and alcohol which lead to her death. The film uses very similar filming techniques to those used by Andy Warhol with Edie Sedgwick to combine the audience’s view of her from the media to the story of the rest of her life outside of the media’s eyes. She represents every socialite born into money but plagued by her past and desire for attention and friendship.
The film presents how the American media glorifies and praises “It” girls and then adds to their downfalls and quickly forgets them. People become like toys where the media has fun with it until it is bored and wants someone new to use. Edie is one of the first socialites whose fame was followed by a publicized fall.

8 1/2 (Feb 12th Mon)

This surrealistic film made me quite confused from the beginning. This confusion presents the making of a movie as a hectic and stressful process. Director Fellini mixes the reality with unrealistic events to portray the extent to which the main character Guido is mentally overwhelmed. It is hard to find the exact line between the real and unreal. Nothing is as clear as black and white, yet the film itself is black and white giving the film irony.
8 1/2 is a satire about filmmaking with an ending where everybody is singing and holding hands to mock the common narrative film from Hollywood where there is usually an unrealistic ending. The happy ending comes after the climax of the movie where Guido “shoots himself” to escape the real world. The idea of one shooting himself or anyone else is a play on words because the director “shoots” a film. The actors are creating a pretend world in the movie leaving the real world while shooting, so the director decides to shoot himself to leave the real world.
Another major aspect of filmmaking this movie presents is the view of women in films. We see the use of women for sexuality in film with the fantasies of Guido the Director. It is much harder for women to continue in the movies for a long time because most directors want young and beautiful women like Claudia to play roles. The older women must “go upstairs” and leave the spotlight with another woman taking her place. After dreaming about the women, he realizes that woman have caused his downfalls and decides to leave all of the women in his life.

Children of Heaven (Feb 8th Thurs)

I went to see this Iranian film expecting to see some extremist Muslim approach to life because of the title. I was quite surprised to see a film about childhood innocence and love in a place with little technology and many family values.
The choice of characters for the roles of the children is key to be successful in portraying true compassion and deep felt emotions in the film. I discovered that the children were not professional actors, so the star system has no use in this film. This is similar to Italian neo-realism where the plot is also very realistic to the times and culture of the country.
In the opening scene, we see a pair of hands fixing a small pair of a girl's shoes. The director immediately emphasizes the props to the audience. The shoes are the key motivation for both characters throughout the movie teaching responsibility and loyalty.
In the American society, kids are worried about getting the right video game or Barbie doll and want better toys than their friends. This film represents an unselflessness and love of children in poorer societies who see beauty in the smallest gift such as a pen. Even the boy in the wealthy part of the town, where Ali and his father do garden work, enjoys the company of Ali. Ali and his father are shut out by the upper class until a young boy has his grandfather invite them in. The adults of high society live in a bubble where the lower class is locked out from any help. The children break the barrier between the two and remind us how to help others remembering that we are all human beings.
Another instance of innoence is when the sibling are playing with the bubbles by the water outside of their home. They do not care about responsibilities or how harsh their lives are because they are enjoying that moment. The director is trying to tell audience to live in the moment because life can end anytime, represented by the mother's illness. Also, Alli uses his tears to persuade people to understand his side of the story and escape punishment.
One of the sound techniques I noticed was the emphasis sounds and echoes made by the children such as running on teh street or the writing of a pen. In reality, those noises are not as loud as they were made in the film, but they added to the props' importance.

Some Like It Hot (Fri Feb 2)

I went to see Some Like It Hot directed by Billy Wilder. One of the main parts of the film that stick out to me is the costuming. Marilyn Monroe’s dresses are quite revealing for 1959, but it shows how Hollywood uses sex to sell the movie. Marilyn Monroe sets a new standard for women in Hollywood by making curves popular in the movies and the United States. The film shows the change in the movie industry to more sexual content. We see more kissing than in previous movies like the scene between Joe and Sugar on the yacht.
It also makes fun of the female standard by using the joke of two straight men dressing up as women as an escape. Women are represented as pretty items to accompany men. Even the all-girls band the main characters join is average and not up to par with an all-male band. Sugar points this out when she is talking to Jerry and Joe on the train.
The comedy of the film is what made it successful. The movie is filled with one-liners from beginning to end including the final line “Nobody’s perfect” from Osgood which pokes fun at man’s imperfections. Jerry tried so hard to keep up with his feminine character until he decides to give up, and he discovers he made things harder on himself than needed. Also, the audience is built up to believe that Jerry will lose Osgood when he confesses he is a man, so the unusual response surprises the viewers and makes it funny.

Bicycle Thieves/Thief

First of all, I would like to discuss the title. I personally think the plural one is the best choice. Because the film is realism, it makes more sense to label all people in society as a thief, or at least those in the lower class. The end of the movie portrays a desperate man's actions to survive. Throughout the movie, we see how society and the justice system turn their backs against the main character, so he then decides that stealing is the only way to get back at society. He fails in the process, but family hope is presented when the son and father hold hands and walk together.
The film succeeds in showing using the same editing and filming techniques. We almost never see the father and son in a close-up unless it is an emotional climax or realization. The best example is the end of the movie where we go back and forth between the two characters, a desperate man and his son or conscious. The contrast between the two gives along with the music builds to the climax of the whole movie as the audience's suspense builds. This scene is separated from much of the movie because there is no discussion between the two, and we see the characters by themselves versus part of a crowd. It is the most intimate scene in the film.
The director uses contrast of people to demonstrate the emotions of the characters. For instance, in the nice restaurant, the son looks several times back at a wealthier boy. We can see how the son wishes to be able to enjoy a better lifestyle. Another example is in the police station where the father reports his stolen bike. We see the indifferent police officer versus the desperate father. This represents Italy's failure of a justice system, and we sympathize with the father and his decision to go against his morals in the end.

Out of the Past

As we discussed in class, the film Out of the Past fits the film noir category in content and form in several parts, but the lighting concept was not really there. Usually in film noirs there is a high contrast in lighting throughout the film, but Out of the Past has much less contrast. Also, the opening and closing of the film leaves me more empty than satisfied.
Even though the idea of hope lingers at the end, the idea of moving on just to move on leaves me a little frustrated. I want to see the remainding characters move on, but I want to see more resolution with several of the characters. I guess the film succeeded in making me want to see more, but I did not love the film by any means.
Is everyone happy now? I felt that the characters alive only live to continue a predictable country life where stereotypes tell the truth.