8 ½
Movie: 1963, black and white, 138 min.
Director: Frederico Fellini
Actors: Marcelo Mastroianni, Claudia Cardinale, Anouk Aimee, Sandra Milo.
8 ½ is about Guido Anselmi, a film director overwhelmed by the large-scale production he has undertaken. He finds himself annoyed by producers, his wife, and his mistress while he struggles to find the inspiration to finish his film. The stress plunges Guido into an interior world where fantasy and memory impinge on reality. Fellini jumbles narrative logic by freely cutting from flashbacks to dream sequences to the present until it becomes impossible to pry them apart.
What are some important factors that can be seen throughout this film?
The institutional factors that may be important are the much significant historical evidence that may be seen throughout the film. For example, when the director is walking through town, you can see the old Italian buildings. This is important as a specific producer because it is essential for the producer to recreate towns as they way they should be to add to the continuity. This films historical significance shows us how the film industry revolutionized the 1960s in Italy . We can see how directors do many things similar to what directors would do today in relation to film.
What is the importance of the opening scene in relation to the entire film?
The first scene represents the director’s depression in that he cannot see his life clearly like he used to be able to. We can tell that the director is going through a very tough time and he would like to have his life back the way it was and to think like he did when he had huge success with his other films. In fact the smoke that enters into his car is representative of this suffocation of work, love, and memories.The immense amount of traffic around him represents all the people that surround him in reality, his production crew, his lovers and friends etc… In this the scene holds much meaning as he then escapes that traffic and heads towards the clouds his inner want to flee from the chaos.
Cinema Paradiso
Movie: 1988, color, 155 min
Director: Giuseppe Tornatore
Actors: Philippe Noiret, Enzo Cannavale and Antonella Attili
Cinema Paradiso is about a man who receives news from his aging mother in a little town that someone he once knew has passed away. A beautiful story unfolds about the man's childhood friendship with an old man who was the projectionist at the local theater. Their bond was one that contained many highlights and tragedies, and shaped the way for a young boy to grow and move out of his rundown village to pursue a dream.
What happens to the relationship of Alfredo and Toto throughout the film?
In the opening scene of this film we see that Toto and Alfredo are very close with one another. At first Alfredo was not very fond of Toto although Toto greatly admired him. To Alfredo, Toto was a bit of a pest. He was always bugging him while he was trying to do his job. Then, Toto being a sly dog showed Alfredo that he knew the basics of how to work the projector. We are also shown this in that the only way that Toto’s mom could get him to return home was by informing him of Alfredo’s death. We then see their early relationship. At first Alfredo was not very fond of Toto although Toto greatly admired him. As this film progresses, we can tell that Alfredo are very fond of each other and have always took some liking towards each other and it continues to grow throughout this film.
Where can symbolism be present in this film?
In one scene, Salvatore returns to the village and goes back to his home and to his delight he sees his mother travel down the stairs and she unravels this thread, something that signifies her attachment to her home, her life and he village. She is unable to leave, stuck by a threaded umbilical chord.
Another scene where symbolism is present is the scene in which the townspeople are not allowed in the theater and become an angry riot results in Alfredo moving the projection reflection onto the wall of the court square. Whilst the reflection of the film is moving across the walls in the room, Toto is amazed by this magic. A magic that is film and the beauty of it’s ability to silence a crowd and thee beauty in which Alfredo used this trick to please the people. It’s like the moment Toto fell in love with film, before he was a lover of it but now he is in love.
Breathless
Movie: 1960, black and white, 90 min
Director: Jean-Luc Godard
Actors: Jean-Paul Belmondo, Jean Seberg and Henri-Jacques Huet
Breathless is the story of the love between Michel Poiccard, a small-time hood wanted for killing a cop, and Patricia Franchini, an American who sells the International Herald Tribune along the boulevards of Paris . Their relationship develops as Michel hides out from a dragnet. Breathless uses the famous techniques of the French New Wave: location shooting, improvised dialogue, and a loose narrative form.
How does the musical score affect the theme of this film?
Music in many ways allows the viewers to get a better sense and feeling of what is going on in the film and also it allows the audience to feel the emotions of each character. In this film, the music almost always depends on the main character, Michel. When he is driving in the opening scene he is very happy, thus the music playing is upbeat and charming. When he sees the police officer he gets very worried and the music begins to speed up and gets much more suspenseful. Most of the music throughout the entire film is an uplifted old-fashioned jazzy type of sound that signifies Belmondo’s witty character Michel. When he meets up with Patricia the music gets very calm as if it is a love song for the two of them.
Why are there so many quick cuts in this film and what is the significance of them?
The editor cut out bits and pieces of the film to make it shorter. This later became known as jump cutting. This is now a very popular editing technique. To me it made the film very hard to view. They would be driving in a car and there would just be cut after cut after cut. After viewing another short clip with the same technique I realize what its purpose is. Its purpose is to draw attention to the constructed nature of the film. At first this confused me but then I realized that it was not meant to do this. After viewing the film I looked it up and I found that the cuts were used to cut down the length of the movie.
City of God
Movie: 2002, color, 130 min
Director: Fernando Meirelles, Kátia Lund
Actors: Alexandre Rodrigues, Matheus Nachtergaele
City of God is about a man named Buscape, a poor young fisherman's son who dreams of becoming a photographer one day. His story narrates the violence and corruption surrounding the city and the rise and fall of one of the city's most notorious boss'. Li'l Ze. As war wages on the streets Buscape's only way out of this violent life is to expose its brutality the world through his pictures. Along the way the lives of other are put into perspective as their stories intersect with the events that take place.
How do the directors use lighting to shape this film?
Throughout the movie there is a very dark shadow over all of the characters. This is to make the mood more serious and to also get viewers on the edge of their seats. When in the film, Rocket is narrating the movie; all added light seemingly goes away. Only natural light is used to show the true slums of the City of God . Since this movie is based on a true story, Meirelles and Lund choose to make it as real as possible. With making all of the lighting natural it really gives the movie the effect of being a true story. At the end of the movie, once things get resolved and Rocket goes off to live the rest of his life, the movie gets a bit brighter. There is a bit of added light and it is not only natural lighting.
What symbols can be seen throughout this film?
One of he most important symbols in the film is the gun. We see the gun in the hands of gangsters but to see a gun in the hands of children makes us realize the role it plays in the society in the City of God . Children are forced to shoot their peers, and adults are left victims to shootings and gang violence. Thus, the gun serves as an obvious symbol for violence. When a younger Lil Ze gets his first gun and kills a handful of innocent people, we see that yes, he is killing for the sake of killing, but he also enjoys killing because it gives him power. As he grows up, Lil Ze uses violence to become one of the most powerful gang leaders in the City of God . We never see him without a gun. Thus, the gun symbolizes how violence, respect, and power are all connected in the film.
M
Movie: 1931, black and white, 117 min
Director: Fritz Lang
Actors: Peter Lorre, Ellen Widmann and Inge Landgut
M is about a psychotic child murderer stalks a city, and despite an exhaustive investigation fueled by public hysteria and outcry, the police have been unable to find him. But the police crackdown does have one side-effect, it makes it nearly impossible for the organized criminal underground to operate. So they decide that the only way to get the police off their backs is to catch the murderer themselves. Besides, he is giving them a bad name.
What significance does the opening scene have to the rest of the film?
In the opening scene of the movie we see a group of young children singing a song about a serial killer. They sing that if one is not careful the killer will take him. Then we see a maid tell the children to stop singing because that is an awful song and it will bring bad things. In the end the main girl that is singing the song gets taken and murdered by the killer that they were singing about. We could have guessed that something bad was going to happen because of what they were singing about. This is how the opening scene foreshadowed the rest of the movie.
What is the importance of music and sound in this film?
In Fritz Lang’s M sound plays a very important role in culminating meaning to the film. The film has both dialogue and silent sequences that are complemented by music of sound effects. Lang treats the sound as if he were editing the visuals. When we are introduced to the murder we speak to Elsie, a young girl who is visible but we only hear the conversation he has with her, we don’t see him. We see his shadow on a poster that is in fact his wanted poster, a brilliant trick on Lang’s part. All of the scenes rely wholly on sound for continuity.
