Being able to breakdown a film into its repertoire of elements allows us to see if it follows its conventions of the genre. This can be useful when doing textual analysis on a film, the repertoire gives it an identity and with this we can analyse what the film is showing/trying to convey.

The Corpus→ The Repertoire of Elements↓	Film1: John Ford – Stagecoach (1939)	Film 2: Charles Bronson in Once Upon a Time in the West (1968)	Film 3: Rango 2011
Typical Locations	Deserts, old towns, mountains, open land
Characters / Groups	Cowboys, American country folk, townspeople,
Conflicts & Themes	Treasure hunting, cowboys VS Indians, resistance to change, outlaws and banditos.
Filmic Technique	Cowboy shots, sweeping landscapes, birds-eye views, extreme close up reaction shots.
Iconography /  Mise-en-Scene	Pistols, horses, native Americans, saloons,
The shape of the story	Beginning A cowboy rides into town, as a lone wolf	Middle Has a conflict with sn antagonist Possible romance	End Rides out of town, into the sunset.

In class, we researched an important film movement. I researched into New Queer Cinema, a movement in the 80s and 90s that re-explored normative in cinema.

Current New Queer Cinema

Pose is a modern example of New Queer cinema, it explores the social conventions of a New queer cinema film in the same way as Paris Is Burning, and has been heavily influenced by it. Pose is a fiction-documentary series that explores the life of queer new yorkers during the aids pandemic in a camp and hard hitting way.

Slumdog Millionaire 2008, Danny Boyle, is a Romance Drama set in the slums of Mumbai India during the 1990s and also the early 2000s. The film explores the dejected poverty and privation of impoverished people of India and principally the suffering of the Muslim children during the Hindi-Muslim religious violence, where approximately 10,000 people died. We see two protagonists, Salim and Latika, young adults who take different paths who appear in the visionary flashbacks of Jamal on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, these flashbacks cause the narrative to be non-linear.

In this scene, we are shown the brutal violence the Muslim people of Mumbai had to ordeal. This is exemplified by the repetition of their mother being killed. The first time we are shown, it is in normal speed and shot normally, the second time we see it we are shown it as a POV of Salim. This is done to show how that moment is embedded into his memories, that he can see this memory again and again in his head, Boyle uses this repetition to show this.

Boyle uses a wipe transition between Salim’s memory and the present. A wipe transition is typically used to establish a change in the narrative and or storyline. Boyle uses this to bring his memories into the present and to show that it still affects him till the present. The slow wipe acts as an overlay, the shot becomes more intense and visual. Salim’s shell shocked face parallel the horrors that persist in his brain, this gives the audience the feeling of extra space within the film as well as an association between the memories and the person.

Textual Analysis in The Dark Knight

In a pair we chose a scene from “The Dark Knight” 2008 to analyse, my duo chosethe hospital scene as it was our mutual faveourite as well as there being a lot to write about. This scene explores the Joker’s character development with its use of Mise-en-Scene and Cinematography.

Joker TEAS

 

(click to see work)

 

Advanced Cinematography

This shot from gone girl uses symmetry to show the object for best effect, Jeff Cronenweth places her in the middle of the mid shot so she is the audiences main focus, leaving enough lead space to show her direction. The low contrast and dark tones show the morality in this scene.

Pan’s Labyrinth Final Essay Feedback

https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vQT3lvvhTlZcglSm0ReHfaAnIQSkcQsfxOTPoSviGN-iK-xMAZ6KdVae-cxdXDP3CqJpTYCaTJ9Xg-f/pub

(Link to final Pan’s Labyrinth Essay)

Targets:

-Use more technical terms such as “proxemics”

-Develop my use of words, with a variety of words and adjectives. Try to not use the word show but connotes and or symbolises to vary my work as well as develop my description and suggestions to the context of the film. 

-Use more film keywords to describe micro and macro features.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mise-en-scene in The Captain’s Feast

The Captain’s Feast scene establishes the nature of the communist party in rural spain during the spanish civil war, in particular the attitude and values of Captain Vidal, the antagonist in the film. The feast symbolises permissiveness of the ruling class, and at the head of the table the embodiment of a fascist brute, Vidal. He has a reputation that he is proud of, and dominates the scene. This is shown with the mise-en-scene. He sits at the head of the table as he holds the highest rank, shown by his pristine uniform and medals which stands out on the table because he is backlit by the fire, but is lit with dark lighting. This lighting gives him an omniscient, sinister aura. The red from the flames, connotes his anger, this relates to his short fuse and raging temper. 

The guests at the feast are “high class” or at least seem to be until the scene progresses. It is shown that the guests are arrogant, patronising and aloof. This is shown to us by the way their mise-en-scene portrays them, for example the way they are dressed; they are all wearing bland, dark, catholic clothing that shows their lack of personality and that they are formal. We can also tell this by the way they use cutlery, and help themselves to the plentiful amounts of food. With that being said there are some members on the table that use their hands to eat which shows how they are hypocrites and aren’t all posh.

Carmen doesn’t seem to fit in on the dinner table, she is wheeled in by one of the maids which shows her as fragile and in need of help. She is seen wearing light blue which stands out to all the dull coloured uniforms and brown suits the women are wearing, this symbolises her elegance and purity in the scene, this also symbolises how she has gained class, and can keep clean, the vibrant colour is a sign of wealth. Vidal is shown to not care for her, they are sat close together to show that they are in relation but many shots show that there is some emotional distance between them. She seems cut off from the others because she doesn’t feel like she fits in with them, she is not use to having class and she seems quite awkward in the scene.

(As a class we created a slideshow that presnts the Mise-en-scene in each individual category and character.)