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Woody Allen Film Techniques

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His complex cinematic body of work cannot be summarized with only a few terms. His films are an “eclectic mélange of subjects and styles” (Lax 274), as they do not follow a common thread. His writings range from silly, slapstick comedies such as Bananas, Zelig, or Sleeper, over romantic comedies such as Annie Hall, and Manhattan to family and relationship dramas such as Interiors or Hannah And Her Sisters. Since all his films deal with universal and personal themes like hope, sexual desire, love, morals, and the meaning of life, his films are thought provoking to everyone. Each period, which I will define in the next chapter, seems to have a different focus, and a different effect on the writing of Woody Allen without being directly addressed …show more content…

Therefore, everything that happens to and around him, everything he wonders about, and that interests him will eventually have some influence on his writing. As mentioned before, the filmmaker does not like to address political, economic or social issues in his films directly. He rather plays around with philosophical questions such as mortality, spirituality, and the mostly unbalanced emotional lives of his protagonists on a humorous, yet not shallow, level. Relationship problems, the unpredictability of love or unfaithfulness are themes that recur in his films and can be related to Woody Allen’s private life. Mia Farrow once said that “everyone in Woody’s life plays roles” (Lax 179). Mia Farrow was a prominent figure in Allen’s life, as she was his longest and most profound relationship of eleven years. Allen and Farrow did not have a traditional and conservative relationship. They never got married, lived separately in their own apartments across the Central Park, had one biological and two adopted children, and did not share the same interests (Farrow loves to go to the countryside, whereas Allen is not an outdoorsman). She was also one of his muses and leading ladies in thirteen films until 1992 when she

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Falon Ortega Robert Reynolds Cinema 101 22 November 2015 North by Northwest Essay In North by Northwest, the main character Roger Thornhill is mistaken to be a spy named George Kaplan by the villainous Phillip Vandamm and his henchmen. When no one believes him about his own kidnapping, not even his mother, Thornhill flees persecution from his pursuers as he seeks the real Kaplan. Along the way, he unknowingly meets the spy the false Kaplan identity was a cover for, the secondary protagonist and his love interest, Eve Kendall. North by Northwest is a visually stunning and thrilling action film of the classic Hollywood film narrative, with romance and injustice.

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To summarize this essay, there are several points that highlight differences between the two films, yet the overall context of the film remains the same. One common theme that tends to drive the force between the reasoning in why the two films have varying aspects is because they were made for slightly different audiences at different times in society. Though both versions of the movie have small portions that vary from one another, the main emphasis is the same and both versions are loved by the

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Dirty Dancing was released in 1987. The film clip I chose was from the end of the season talent show. Johnny Castle (Patrick Swayze) approaches Baby’s (Jennifer Grey) table and tells her father “Nobody puts baby in a corner.”

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I don’t believe that this film expresses any political view. I believe that image, speech, sound, music, and writing interact to produce meaning. They are all in sync with one another, but I believe writing dominates because the film is based off of a novel. The facial expressions and speech of the younger actors add to the film, evoking emotion and sympathy from the viewer. The novel emphasizes the spectator more so than in the film.

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“The screen is a magic medium. It has such power that it can convey emotions and moods that no other art form can hope to tackle.” The written word and the moving image have always had their entwining roots deeply entrenched in similar narrative codes, both functioning at the level of implication, connotation and referentiality. But ever since the advent of cinema, they have been pitted against each other over formal and cultural peculiarities – hence engaging in a relationship deemed “overtly compatible, secretly hostile” (Bluestone 2).

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Tim Burton is well known film director. The movies that he has created are often described as mysterious, odd, and intriguing. Burton's movies use certain film techniques to create a certain feeling for the audience to experience. The three main techniques that Tim Burton usually uses is the lighting, camera angles, and sound techniques.

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INTRODUCTION QUOTE OR FACT. The Breakfast Club was a film produced in 1985 by John Hughes in Shermer, Illinois, that involved 5 different stereotypical teenagers in detention who were assigned an essay to tell his or her story. When the day ends, they all queried if they were all somehow the same. The experiences they had throughout the film made them question the stereotypes given to them. The purpose of The Breakfast Club is to inform teenagers and adults of the negative effects that stereotyping and parental pressure has on young adults.

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La La Land, directed by Damien Chazelle, has won many awards and is about the love story between Sebastian and Mia, who come together because of their common goal of making it big time in Hollywood. The scene that follows is when they are having dinner after some time apart. It portrays the theme of how change can affect relationships. Initially in the scene, the camera is placed over the shoulder of Sebastian, with the view of Mia as they are having a conversation over dinner. This is a two shot scene accompanied by very minimal editing, indicating they are sharing the frame as a couple.

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Like a gothic mastermind, Tim Burton incorporates dark, grotesque, child-like themes in his cinematic style. A director’s cinematic style is how their film is recognized and the techniques in their films to give their work value. Tim Burton is known for his unique cinematic style that has made his films one of a kind. Tim Burton’s style is made so unique through his use of sound tracking, lighting, and costuming for his films such as Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Edward Scissorhands. Tim Burton applies sounds such as background music and sound effects to add reality and emphasis to the film and to create a certain, precise moods.

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What Can “Forrest Gump” (1994) Teach Us About Scriptwriting? Forrest Gump (1994), an American comedy-drama film based on the novel by Winston Groom, with the screenplay adapted by Eric Roth, tells the story of a mentally disabled and very kind-hearted child that comes to lead an extraordinary life. The movie revolves around the irony that the protagonist, Forrest Gump, even though the most simple-minded character in the film, becomes the most successful, as his talents involve him in US history's most prominent historical events between the 50's and 80's. The storyline is very character-driven and resembles a ‘vignette into one's life' as opposed to having a traditional story structure. This is seen through the feather motif and the well-known

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The highly popular and widely discussed 1960’s romantic comedy film “ The Graduate “ displays an inner theme of what is called a generation gap, which is Benjamin Braddock’s alienated and social behavior contrasted from their parents social lives that are expressed by the use of the camera and the plot. From these first frequencies of scenes, in the beginning, the director Mike Nichols displays the camera on how Benjamin feels and acts in this world through the generation gap theme. He is completely silent, alone, and is conforming to society as if he were a zombie. The first twenty seconds of a zoomed out shot of Benjamin on the plane gives all the audience needs to understand the film’s theme: a generation gap leads to isolation through lack of communication. The song composed by Simon and Garfunkel “ Sound of Silence”, is being played as

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V for Vendetta, directed by Alan Moore in 2005 was an eye opening film, with aspects from the past and predictions for the future, the film left many uncertain how to feel. Being placed in the dystopian genre, the film uses many codes and conventions to connect them to the genre. V 's revolutionary speech helps bring hope to the society. The film was born through an illness and plague that had effected the world. The storyline begins to unfold with the rising of High Chancellor Sutler, which was oddly similar to Hitler, who created a government to oppress the people’s liberty.

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2638 Words | 11 Pages

This essay will discuss how the film uses these two techniques, in reference to the film, and to what ideological and political ends are the techniques used in the films with specific references from the film to support the argument. A Man with a Movie Camera is based around one man who travels around the city to capture various moments and everyday

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793 Words | 4 Pages

Tim Burton uses many different cinematic techniques to achieve very specific effects in his movies. The most important cinematic techniques that he uses to create his unique style are Non-Diegetic sound, lighting, eye level, and zoom. These techniques that can be seen in the films Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Edward Scissorhands, and Corpse Bride, create the effects of sadness, dark moments, express the feeling of other without telling. He uses Non-Diegetic sound when he puts a song, he uses sad songs, happy songs, and more to show the feeling of the character, to give us like a hint of something that is going to happen, if it’s going to be bad or sad. He uses lighting to make the moment or scene sad or mysterious.

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I have always viewed movies as mood boosters. Whenever I watch a movie, I judge how good it is according to how well I understand the story. This is why I never truly understand how critics rate movies. However, upon reading John Berger’s “Ev’ry Time We Say Goodbye”, I start to understand how paying attention to the different components of a film helps in understanding the essence of a story. As Berger once said, “There is no film that does not partake of dream.

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