Bad Day at Black Rock Kathryn Abbott October 29 2015 DRAMA 3030 The unexpected arrival of a stranger to a small, Midwestern town creates a feeling of scepticism and suspicion, and through this the explicit meaning is revealed: Fear of the unknown and the moral and physical deterioration of a town left to its own devices. The film exemplifies these concepts through the use of mise-en-scène, and vivid cinematographic elements. The blood red coloured train stands out against a muted background.
On Tuesday, October 6th, “The William & Stephanie Clohesy Documentary Film Series” brought American film director, Dawn Porter, to discuss her documentary Spies of the Mississippi to UNI students. This paper not only discusses the documentary, but also goes through each step of the critical process to make an informed judgment about it. Description Spies of the Mississippi is based in the mid-1900s during the civil rights era in the southernmost state of Mississippi. It was a time when races were segregated and equality was desired by the black community. Change was not only wanted, but was fought for through various organizations, such as the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People).
Numerous screenwriters and directors have often dealt in their films with the theme of borders, whether literal and officially recognised, like military ranks or state frontiers, or abstract and metaphorical, like those of morality, justice, race, and gender, along with several others. As a consequence, as John Gibbs points out, one could assemble these movies, especially those taking place on the confines between Mexico and United States, under the label of ‘border films’ (2002: 27); thus contextualising them in a very specific tradition, which includes pictures such as Touch of Evil (Orson Welles 1958) or The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada (Tommy Lee Jones 2005). Accordingly, another notable movie belonging to the ‘border film tradition’ is Lone Star: an acclaimed 1996 hybrid of western and mystery film conventions, directed and written by independent filmmaker John Sayles. The picture recounts the story of a murder investigation, which leads the main character, Sheriff Sam
The late 19th century consisted of rigid work hours for children, the growth of strikes, and the use of yellow journalism. It was a challenging time for anyone below the upper class to live in. This is demonstrated throughout Newsies, a Broadway Musical displaying the challenges from this time period. Child labor, a major part of the movie, was the way of life and consisted of young children doing hard work as a vital part of the nation’s economy and income of families of the time. Another part of the movie, strikes, were the people’s way of refusing to work as a result of not getting their desires.
Glory: Directed by Edward Zwick, Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, 1989. 122 Minutes Reviewed by Mike Edward Zwick’s Glory is a movie in which the balance between entertainment and history was perfectly managed. He uses the letters sent by contemporary Col. Robert G. Shaw to his wealthy family back in Massachusetts as the historical foundation of the movie while imagining conversations between characters. Through Col. Shaw’s eye, we are able to uncover the birth, the development, and the end of the 54th Massachusetts Regiment, the first colored regiment fought in Civil War. Just like any other war movie, Glory has several battle scenes that were unpleasantly bloody, yet they managed to stay authentic.
Alexander Hamilton was one of the American founding fathers, he became one of the many faces the United States has. He played an essential part when founding the Constitution and the country, becoming the 1st United States Secretary of the Treasury (September 11, 1789 – January 31, 1795), and Senior Officer of the Army (December 14, 1799 – June 15, 1800). He also was the delegate to the Congress of the Confederation from New York (November 3, 1788 – March 2, 1789, and November 3, 1782 – June 21, 1783). Hamilton accomplished numerous achievements since he was given the chance, he was able to become one of the best immigrants the United States he had. However, he could not have done this without adapting to the culture.
Tootsie, a critically acclaimed comedy has been a gut-splitting, yet touching film for decades. This work simultaneously delves into the critical idea of gender roles within media while maintaining the lighthearted feel of a love story. Viewers and critics around the globe even go as far as stating that such a piece is well on its way to becoming a cultural artifact. Dustin Dustin Hoffman stars in Tootsie as Michael Dorsey, an unapologetic actor in New York who is unemployable in the industry due to his temperamental past. Due to this, Michael makes the transition into a liberated and eccentric woman by the name of Dorothy in order to fill the role in a daytime Soap Opera.
The Psychological Abuse of Gaslighting In the 1944 film adaptation of “Gaslight,” produced by Arthur Hornblow Jr, the human psyche is abused in order to gain control over another individual. Before both Patrick Hamilton’s play, as well as the film Gaslight, the word gaslight had a different meaning. The term gaslight used to be just that, a light lit with gas. This film changed that, especially in the field of psychology.
Topic 1: Film genres Through the 1995 film “Clueless”, written and directed by Amy Heckerling, the idea that film genres are located in industry and texts and audiences is clearly shown. “Clueless” is an American typical romantic comedy. This film can be seen as a hybrid genre as it include different characteristics of two film genres. In this movie, elements of humour and romance are both illustrated by its generic formulas and story content. The film talked about the heroine Cher goes through her perplexed teenage and finally realizes she is interested in Josh, her stepbrother.
The film depicts a first hand account of United flight 93 en route to Washington DC as it is presumed, however it is redirected to Pennsylvania where it ultimately crashes due to a terrorist hijacking aboard the aircraft. United Airlines Flight 93 was a domestic scheduled passenger flight that was hijacked by four Al-Qaeda terrorists on board, as part of the September 11 attacks. It crashed into a field near the Diamond T. Mine in Stonycreek Township, Somerset County, Pennsylvania. There was an attempt by some of the passengers to regain control, killing all 44 people aboard including the four hijackers. The hijackers breached the aircraft's cockpit and overpowered the flight crew approximately 46 minutes after takeoff.
Death of a Salesman has been extremely influential in regards to theatrical performance and it has been performed by multiple different theatre groups. It has also been made into a movie, which has actors such as Dustin Hoffman as Willy Loman, John Malkovich as Biff Loman, and Kate Reid as Linda Loman. All of these actors’ performances were true to the character and were extremely realistic. It was easy for the audience to get caught up in the characters that these actors portrayed. Throughout the movie, Dustin Hoffman, John Malkovich, and Kate Reid all provided an outstanding performance by ensuring that their facial expressions, body language, and emotions always shined through all the while they were creating realistic characters that were easily believable by the audience.
The show Band of Brothers was produced by Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks who, at the time, recently had success with a World War II film entitled Saving Private Ryan. Spielberg and Hanks used their expertise on war films to craft the exceptional television series Band of Brothers which originally aired on HBO in 2001. The show follows “Easy” Company, 2nd Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, of the 101st Airborne Division, from the moment they begin their training to the moment their deployment ends. Throughout the show we see the men of “Easy” Company mature a thousand times over. The men experience love, loss, and death at rate that is inconceivable to someone that has never experienced the theatre of war.
Adversity in “The Intouchables” “My true disability is not having to be in a wheel chair. It’s having to be without her.” (The Intouchables). Lines like that are just a piece of the great undertaking directors Olivier Nakache and Eric Toledano took when they decided to be part of The Intouchables.
Lion, directed by Garth Davis, is a compelling interpretation of a remarkable true story of Saroo Brierley, lost as a child and reunited with his family 25 years later. Throughout Davis explores the unique circumstances under which Saroo is separated and reconnected with his family and his journey along the way. At some points of the film, I was confronted by how Saroo, a five-year-old boy, expertely navigates, with great instinct and genuine innocence, through an extended, yet life threatening ride. To put it in other words, Lion is a journey that grabs you entirely; whether you want it or not, and you are involved in each and every scene. I instantly fell in love with the connection and relationship between Saroo and his older brother
Sicko is an American documentary by Michael Moore which explores the status of health care in America. In my opinion, he has presented a clear-cut viewpoint that American health care is not producing results. Nearly half a hundred million Americans, according to Sicko, are not insured while the rest, who are insured, are often sufferers of insurance company deceit and also red tape. Additionally, Sicko mentions that the United States health care system is placed 37th out of 191 by the W.H.O. with definite health measures, like the neonate death and life probability, equivalent to countries with quite less financial wealth. Interviews are carried out with individuals who supposed they had sufficient coverage but were deprived of care.
