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The American Dream Analysis

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Living the “American Dream” through the perspective of a Czech immigrant Many people around the world travel to the United States wanting to live a utopian life known as the American Dream. With the idea of having an equal opportunity to achieve success, these people get hit with reality and realize that the American Dream is a hoax. The only way to escape this harsh reality, even for a brief moment, is through the sound and ‘human touch’ feeling that music and entertainment brings. There are two worlds within a musical: a ‘real’ world where we experience the difficulty of reality and a ‘utopian’ world which we escape that reality through songs and dances. A utopic world is one that contains no suffering, poverty, racial, sexual, and class …show more content…

One example is the use of color from reality to a musical. In her real world, the scenes look dull and gloomy with lots of contrast while her utopian world is vivid with lots of saturation, warm colors, and vibrancy. This represents how her real world is cold, exhausting, and unhappy while her utopian world is where her happiness lies and she can control it however she wants. Another element is the use of the camera. Von Trier used multiple hand-held cameras, as such used in documentaries, in order to give the audience the feeling of being participants as if we were there in the same setting as the characters. The audience gets to see, feel, and experience the private as well as shocking moments that other moving frames cannot do. The unsteady and tremulous movement of the cameras represent Selma’s life slowly becoming unsteady and out of control. The director also uses lots of close ups so that the audience can specifically focus on the character’s emotions and actions while eliminating the universe around it. However, in her utopian world, he uses lots of high angles, crane, and long shot to show Selma is in the center of the universe. He uses the crane movement with the musical in the factory to show the full location of the work place and all the workers dancing. Selma describes how Hollywood films are, “it goes really big and the camera goes, like, out of the roof…” making a reference to tilt, roll, and track camera movements with lots of sound. In this musical, there is no use of these camera and moving frames when dramatic moments occur which represents how her life cannot be a musical except in her

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The theater tries to replicate the feeling of being in a state of dreaming. (Groen, 2002, Para.7). The state of dreaming makes the movie you are viewing very personal (Groen, 2002, Para. 7). Groen notes that the automobile and motion picture have a shared history.

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Children laughing showing the happiness that is supposed to occur in youth. Even the lack of sound in the movie theatre gives you the impression of contentedness as the crowd watches a film. All these sounds add emotional depth to the scene that cinematography

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The audience is being transported into a film where unseen moments are left to interpretation, as much of its implied

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This scene parallels another moment in the film when Olive's father, Richard, faces rejection from his self-help program, highlighting the characters' shared struggles in finding acceptance and fulfillment. In the real world, viewers are likely to feel inspired and uplifted by Olive's courage and resilience, as well as moved by the familial love and support depicted on screen. Through the masterful use of cinematography, sound effects, dialogue, and editing techniques, this scene effectively conveys Olive's emotional journey and the overarching themes of the film, leaving a lasting impact on audiences and encouraging them to embrace their true selves. 2 - controversy and defiance from audience In the middle part of the scene, as Olive's performance takes an unexpected turn and the audience begins to express their disapproval, the cinematography, sound design, and editing work in perfect harmony to convey the escalating tension and conflict. The cinematography skillfully utilises a combination of wide shots and close-ups to capture both the audience's reaction and Olive's unwavering

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Another example is the scene where the witch dies. After a song performance of “It is the Last Midnight”, the witch fades into the ground among a flurry of spells and dirt. There is color, movement, and chaos everywhere as the witch buries into a portal. In the stage production, after the song, the witch seems to go under through a trap door. The movie scene is a lot more logical and much easier on the eye.

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Jennifer L. Hochschild describes the American dream as “the soul of the nation.” She clearly illustrates the importance of the dream to American culture. So, what is the American dream according to Hochschild? She was referring to John Locke and his fantasy, then said “But the sentence evokes the unsullied newness, infinite possibility, limitless resources that are commonly understood to be the essences of the “American dream.” She also pointed out the flaws in the American dream and how at times the pursuit of it can lead to counterproductive outcomes not just for the individual but society as a whole.

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America is the greatest country to ever exist in the history of all time. Where else in the world are you able to be whatever you want? As long as you work hard and apply yourself, you can achieve anything. In America, anyone can climb the social ladder if they put their mind to it. Success stories are all over the place.

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No matter who you are or where you have come from, you have undoubtedly heard of the American Dream. The idea that no matter who you are or where you have come from, you can do whatever it is you desire in America. What was once one the main driving forces for immigrants to flock to the new world, has slowly changed over the years, but still holds its value in the eyes of those who are looking for a promising new place to live. The American dream might not hold the same awe inspiring sound that it once did, but for many generations before ours it was a beacon of hope that helped build the foundation that the United States was built on. And, still, today the American dream might not be as achievable as it once was, but it is still an important

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Colours and lighting were also used strategically to support and add to the emotions that the characters were undergoing and to affect the emotions of the viewers. Being portrayed as a continuous take, a more intimate relationship and understand was formed between the viewers and the protagonist. The fluidity of the camera movements significantly adds intensity to the viewing experience. Overall, such techniques did not overshadow the experience of the film and the movie looked

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In England, two Americans Spoke about the American dream. It was in 1965 at Cambridge University, Cambridge, England, at the Cambridge Union Society, James Baldwin, and William F. Buckley Jr. Faced off regarding whether "The American Dream has Been Achieved at the Expense of the American Negro?" Before the debate began a man named Norman St. John Stevas M.P. Introduced the two American men who were debating. The debate starts off with two college undergraduate.

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The most apparent themes in this film are loneliness and isolation. Based on the cinematography, it is evident that wide shots of the characters occupy a small space alone or an extremely large space with many people who are completely unaware of their existence. Both of these things work to portray the idea that Murray's character, Bob, and Johansson's character, Charlotte, are lonely, isolated, and missing something. The director also uses the concept of balance to pass the message on the emotional state of the characters.

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The camera was rotating around her, which built the intensity of the scene and symbolized Katherine’s emotions, that everything was spinning out of control. Spielberg finally ended the movie with a powerful and intriguing cliffhanger which leads to the possibility of a sequel. This film also presented the viewers with a variety of themes. There was strong sense of feminism through Katherine Graham.

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Colors are typically murky, and a haze surrounds the town, but it also has bright, saturated spots, often reds drawing attention away, and a very strange, surrealist style of animation, especially with the realistic faces, but crude bodies, that jars with typical animation. This emphasizes the disconnect faced by people in her situation, foreign, unaccommodated, and alone. It creates discomfort in the viewer, just as the character was uncomfortable and intimidated. These films also use other color techniques to affect the viewer. Ryan’s use of leitmotifs also allows it to display emotions

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Almost like staring at smaller bits too hard and not following, but when you take a step back and look at the bigger picture, it makes sense and this is what the director has done for majority of the movie. The disconnected and abrupt story lines make no sense by themselves but when understood as a part of Diane’s dream, it fits. The visual construct of the movie fits too. The shots are too close, almost like a person’s perspective. The scenes with happier tones are well light or in daylight, the rest in dingy rooms or streets.

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The American Dream begins with an affordable living arrangement and a good job, but with remorse, these two pieces are not connecting (Thompson, 2014). A college graduate can expect expensive housing with a job not reflective of the high housing price. In an article published in The Atlantic, “Why it’s So Hard for Millennials to Find a Place to Live and Work” Derek Thompson talks about the inequality between upward mobility and the housing market. For example, Dayton has one of the most affordable housing markets in the United States, however unlike California there is no social mobility (Thompson, 2014). The American dream is different for everyone and changes the course of action an individual may take.

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