Shot of the week, cinematography wise.

Hey guys, I know your mind howls at you regarding my title above, how can he say its the best its just the first day! Pipe down and listen, chaches, the point is so far I think this shot is going to be the best there is this week and trust me my seer work is definitely not rusty. This scene suddenly gifted with fame is from the hit AMC show, Mad men. The men of Madison avenue!...and so forth and ahem, on to the scene!

Context update! We are at the third episode of the current season 4 and we have just found out that Ana Draper, the one who ball and chained her self to the real Don Draper, has been inflicted with Cancer. we are about 22 minutes into the scene(well when you watch it on DVR from com-cast) and Don sits down and lights up one. it is about a thirty second shot and a single one as well but the color and graphics used in that thirty second shot is phenomenal! we have a few different shades migrate with each other. depending on your favorite genre of movie or whether you might be a comic fan, whatever tickles your fancy optically could be seen in this shot. i personally saw a pastel painting, comic page scene, flintstonesy house look , you get my point. We can see this is the main feature of the shot as John Hamm( portrays pimp Don Draper) stays still looking down. once again, hats bowed to the Director who created that monster of a shot.

Well till then friends, keep watching TV, smile and watch a Guy Ritchie movie once a while, aye?

tata then,

Diezel

Back in business, Nigerian and not so experienced Egbert!

Hey people! I want to apologise for the sudden halt of my film review blog, I was too busy with graduation preparation and preparation for my quarterlife crisis I completely forgot about some of my passions including my blogging. I am going to continue my blog so lets have fun with it! Upcoming reviews in the near future on movies new and old will be posted so just hold on a lil bit longer! soon to be written reviews will be on movies such as The Departed, Howls moving Castle, Fantastic Mr Fox, Avatar and much more.

Stay tuned my peeps,

Remi

Review of Blade Runner

Featuring Harrison Ford, the movie takes place in rainy Los Angeles in 2019. The story features a retired “blade runner”, a policeman who specializes in tracking down and killing illegal replicants on earth. A replicant is an artificial humanoid who can’t be distinguished from humans except for the fact that they have no memories and they can only live for four years. Decker (ford) is called out of retirement to take care of five illegal replicants who have taken over a spacecraft and come to earth.

There are elements of film noir that are present in this movie. It might seem uncharacteristic because the movie is comfortable in the science fiction zone. That is another reason why this movie can be seen as legendary and that’s because of the marriage of Noir and sci-fi. The elements of film noir in this movie were the fact that an alienated hero of questionable morality had to face some sort of evil, a femme fatale trying to stop the hero, rain and dark streets, large usage of shadow and dark setting, and a voice-over narration. The main hero is a detective as well trying to find out and stop evil.

The cinematography was amazing for the year it was it was made in. not only does it show the futuristic technology, but the movie also shows how things will still be the same, for example people reading newspapers, street vendors selling food, that sort of thing. One thing that I noticed were the large billboards depicting young Asian ladies sipping on Coca Cola and I can’t help but chuckle at the fact that maybe in 2020 the Chinese will be the new superpower as it is looking as if we will be treading that path soon.

Just like so many movies that are viewed successful today, the movie originally was not a big hit but then it changed later on in life. It seems the moral or theme of the movie is based on the question of the nature of humanity and its relationship with technology. One question that I wasn’t sure of was whether Decker was a replicant or not. There were signs of evidence suggesting he was a replicant himself but there were also signs of evidence pointing out his nature of humanity.

Overall I liked the movie. I liked the cinematography and the plot but I didn’t really like the pacing of the movie. The movie seemed really slow paced at first and then later it sped up and that’s when I started getting more and more interested. Another thing is like the way the main characters were depicted. The strength and brutal nature of the main replicant leader even thought there was a shadow of pity I had to cast over him because if I were in his situation I would probably go through the same path he did.

Review for "Touch of Evil"

The movie starts in a seedy Mexican border town and the story is about a Mexican drug investigator, Vargas, who is at the crime of a scene with his wife and accuses a police captain, Quinlan, of planting evidence and there is a rivalry between these two men. Quinlan is prejudiced against Mexicans and so he vows to destroy Vargas. While this is happening, Vargas’ wife played by Janet Leigh is terrorized by a gang and Quinlan tries to use her to destroy Vargas.

During the end during the part where we find out it was Quinlan who plants the dynamite I can go back to the beginning of the movie and say “ohhh.” Obviously his intuition is right because he strives to make sure it is right, and if planting dynamite is what he has to do then by all means it has to be done. That is why the movie is named what it is, Touch of Evil, because every good thing probably has a touch of evil in it. Quinlan is a police officer who strives for the good of the people but he has a touch of evil in him. That thin line is so easy to cross sometimes I feel.

At first the plot was losing me and my eyes were growing heavy due to so much school work but after a while I started to get the drift of the film and the intensity of the movie pulled me in the more I watched it. The first talk about the Grandi business was confusing because they never show this guy and it seemed like two different stories but later it meshed to one for me. Orson Welles looked so huge and I was wondering at such vast obesity till I was told that he was padded and that is probably why he was filmed looking up at him to show his largeness. Another thing I liked is how Edward G Robinson was incorporated in this movie when Vargas’ wife yells at Grandi’s brother

Note that the hotel scene was just like Psycho. Same actress, sexual themes, and skittish hotel owners.

From the quality I feel like this was a lower budget movie but it still managed to be a successful movie. Apparently, after Welles left to film another movie, they re-cut the movie and added different parts which were not part of Welles’ original plans and a furious Welles sent in a 58 page memo giving detailed faults with the movie and how to change it he was ignored.

The movie so far has one of the longest cuts I’ve seen so far with my new knowledge of editing, the beginning scene. It was a bit over three minutes. The movie used these kinds of techniques for the whole movie which probably is why it was noted for being a great movie, editing-wise. It did still have the characteristics of film noir. There was use of low camera angles and sharp shadows. There were detective work and big themes especially that of murder. Of course the use of low lighting was incorporated also.

It’s funny because there was a scene at the end of the movie where director Orson Welles asked Marlene Dietrich to predict his future and she said he had no future and that his future was all used up. The funny thing is that after this movie, Welles didn’t direct anymore movies in Hollywood and he didn’t even know it but he was predicting his own future as he directed that scene. In fact, Quinlan and Welles aren’t much different because they both are celebrated but ultimately fall down to their demise due to their own work. Irony strikes once again.

Overall it was a good movie though.

this is a review for Double Indemnity, Seee!

The story is about Walter Neff, an insurance salesman who comes into the office at night bleeding. Though the use of a flashback, he tells the story of how he got caught up with a black widow of a woman, Phyllis Deitrichson, who not only convinces Neff to take out an insurance policy on her husband, but to help murder him as well for double indemnity, twice the money that she would have originally received for a normal death. Dodging annoyances like Keyes, the claims adjuster, they finally pull it off but it also pulls them apart. They end up squaring against each other in a dramatic finish.

I didn’t think I was a big fan of the older movies but I keep getting surprised at how much I like these movies. I am starting to really appreciate these aged movies. Double Indemnity definitely has characteristics of film noir; from the hardboiled dialogue, the narration, the detective work, the shadowy lighting though out the movie, and a preposterously evil femme fatale. The last element there, I am not fond of. There is nothing more annoying and sad about a women who plays with the heart of a man for money. I thought it was pretty extreme the way he killed her, but in the very end of the matter, she did deserve it

Edward G Robinson. What a genius. Growing up, I had always heard of the “back-in-the-day” gangster with his machine gun, suit and slicked back hair. One thing I would constantly associate with these fellows was the nasally phrase “nyahh see” and I just found out it was Edward Robinson from Little Caesar which just made my month. No lie, for a day and I half I just thought of that phrase and would often say it. Anyways, Edward G’s character, Keyes, was my favorite character in the movie especially when he berates the president for not knowing what he is saying. Another reason is that Edward G was in another movie, the Ten Commandments and I didn’t know that. He is definitely one of my favorite actors now. He breaks the good-looking-actor stereotype and that’s another reason I like him.

The film was good in all aspects. The cinematography made magnificent use of such noir characteristics such as heavy sculpted shadows, light slatted by venetian blinds and sharp camera angles. The main aspect that made this compelling crime story into a classic are the three main actors. Stanwyck did well in her striking portrayal of an icy woman whose boredom and desire fuel a plot of murder and intrigue. MacMurray, in a great change of pace, does well to act as the shifty loner excited by a challenge and a deadly dame's anklet. Robinson, meanwhile, brilliantly gives the film its passion. Again his speech of death statistics was very well done and his cigar smoking was trademark in the movie.

Two other things I liked were the matches that Neff used. I really want to see if those are sold anywhere, I don’t smoke but I would just want to keep it on me to look sophisticated as I held a match out for a beautiful dame at a restaurant someday. Another thing I liked was the fact that Walter Neff said “babey” in the fast manner of dialogue. It was very amusing.

What makes a movie not just a movie but a good movie?

I’m sure people are wondering what I base my reviews on, what criteria I used to idolize or criticize my film review so I decided to write a blog to give my opinion of what a movie must have to be categorized as a good movie. Ok here goes

To be truly great, a movie must:-

• Have a great plot. Not that by plot I don’t mean story because a movie can have a really silly story but have an amazing plot and vice versa. Does the plot attract or repel people? A movie with a bad plot will just bore people. Is t here any conflict that pulls the viewers in? A movie like Casablanca is perfect in terms of plot because it just pulled the readers in. we can see the twist of plot once Ilsa walks into that bar and we find out they had a history. Things like that make the movie as good as it is now. I am going to add dialogue under this because dialogue is part of the plot and stupid dialogue makes a stupid movie.

• It must have an effect that touches the audience in some way. Again I will use Casablanca. The concept of sacrifice in the movie touched a lot of the viewers and the emotion of the strength of love was another strong factor that caused the movie to be what it was.

• Good actors/characters- a good movie must obviously have good actors in order to make the characters good, thus doing a good job with the movie. The actors are a big part of the movie and a successful movie usually has good actors. There are some cases in which the characters of a good movie are hardly known so then other aspects same them from this, such as cinematography or plot but usually if the actors bring the characters to life and we can identify with that character, along with other aspects I talked about earlier and later, the movie will probably be good. Good examples of movies with good actors and characters are Casablanca and Apocalypse now and a good example of a movie with good characters is Do the right thing

• It must have some sense of realism. Do the right thing by Spike Lee was a good movie because its sense of everyday realism and Casablanca was good as well because though it was Hollywood realism, it still appealed to the realistic emotional strength that love has.

• Have continuity

o Be fresh enough to become a classic in years to come
o Be good enough that you wouldn’t mind watching it again and again
o Sequels of the movie that are viewed as crappy compared to the original show a good movie but this not the case for all movies because the Godfather series were all good.




• It must have good cinematography. I will use Ran as a good example for this. The Cinematography and mise en scene in this movie was amazing. The graphics, the color representation and other symbols such as the clouds made the movie the very expression of art. For example during the war, the transformation of the lord’s face was very good. Special effects can go into this category as well. There are a lot of good movies that owe it to the special effects used.

• The pace- the pacing of the movie can make the movie good or bad compared to what genre and the components I’ve mentioned above.


Few points to know

Remember that these traits have to be good because there are also negative forms of these core traits that may spoil a movie. For example, in daughters of the dust, the cinematography was amazing but for others the plot may have been to slow and deliberate and they might not have known the actors so the movie might have been a never-see-again movie.

I didn’t add mise en scene to this list because a lot of what I wrote above can be under mise en scene so obviously, great mise en scene makes a great movie.
I have added some extra spacing between the two bullet points and the rest for some important reasons. A lot of good movies have all these components but the first group of must-haves are a core concept that a good movie should have. The other two might not be so important and I am talking in context of culture. In Nigeria, cinematography and pacing are not that important as movies can take forever and have the worst cinematography but are still really loved. For these movies, the plot and how we relate to the characters are more important so from this I can deduce that different cultures have different expectations for a good movie

Globalization is playing a large role in movie viewing and I say this because the western culture is spreading and everyone wants to watch American movies now because of the special effects and other sort of things.

I just wanted to point that out that I think this whole topic of what makes a movie good is mostly subjective and not very objective as there is no specific criteria to how good a movie could be. What may be a good movie for me might be a crappy movie for another. Have you ever had an argument with your significant other because they want to watch a good movie and their choice is horrible to you and vice versa? That explains what I mean. This obviously brings up a critical question. Is a good movie one that is liked by the masses or can a movie be really good and hated by so many. I would say the answer is the former of the question because a great movie is one that most people have an agreement on the quality that’s why there are great movies and there are personal favorites and were talking about great movies. The movies I have reviewed are considered great movies because of the positive reviews and influence they have had on our society.

Film review of Ran- a King Lear in a different culture with some Mori Motonari....NANI?!!!

The movie has a large deal of King Lear plot but it was also about the story of a feudal lord Mori Motonari. The story is about a feudal lord, Hidetora, and his chaotic end after he gives power to his three sons and the tale of betrayal, violence and melodrama as all hell breaks loose.

I sat through this movie which seemed to take forever, not because I was getting bored but because I had to do something right after the movie. The movie I felt was pretty good and of course you must be expecting my little spiel on culture so the movie did well on that too. I think it is the beauty of the movie that really got me. No wonder it was a 12 million dollar movie! It must have taken a lot of money for the stunning visual images that I saw.

I think the meaning of ran is Chaos and so that should ease the curiosity of people who were wondering why on earth the movie was named “Ran.” It had nothing to do with Hidetora running away all the time, or at least I don’t think it did. We can see how this chaos is shown with the peaceful existence at the beginning quickly turning into a stage of violence and turmoil. We can see this in the characters as well and the two examples I will give are through Hidetora and lady Kaede.

Hidetora is this complex character and we see chaos throughout his time in the movie. He slips into insanity and back out throughout most of the movie showing his chaotic mind due to his grief of losing his sons. Lady Kaede even when she look calmed on the outside, we can see this chaotic turmoil inside her due to the fact that she had her clan murdered and was forced to marry the son of the murderer and now we can see why her whole vision is to see the downfall of the Ichimonji clan. Her beheading was pretty awesome though

As I said in an paragraph, the use of color was pretty amazing. The visual artistry of the movie was like that of a painting. The use of color as representation was amazing as well. It was easier to tell who was on whose side because each army basically had its own color scheme. Jiro’s army had a red color which might have symbolized bloodshed or evil. The colored banners just made the battle scenes like a moving painting. The choreography was amazing especially in the battle scenes. The use of colors during the battles were just visual ecstasy the music and drums were good too. I think the cinematic beauty of this movie is what makes it one of the top film ever made

One thing I want to talk about that I think a lot of other people had a problem with was the amount of melodrama the movie contained. I am sure the movie was supposed to be a serious and tragic tale of this warlord but a lot of his actions were so melodramatic that it just negated this concept. Instead a lot of the time, his actions just brought up laughter to the audience rather than the other appropriate emotions such as sympathy and joy. The death of Hidetora was very sad but one cuodlnt help laughing at the melodrama of his death.

Well whatever it was a pretty good movie.


picture from

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic-art/325341/76450/Kurosawa-Akira-during-the-filming-of-Ran-1985