The skeleton of the movie is the movie structure. The structure includes the way the story flows and how it reaches its peak. The use of the three act, five act, and classic structure of movie's judge what is going to happen throughout the movie. Classic act structure includes a beginning middle and then end. The climax occurs sometime in the middle and changes the momentum or shade of the movie.
In the movie, Braveheart. The plot is a classic shakespearian structure. The movie is moving along until the English representative of the Scottish town, takes a liking to Mel Gibson's new wife. She refuses and starts a fight with the evil doer. Mel Gibson heroicly shows up out of nowhere and saves the day. However, they are separated and his wife is killed by the English lord. From that moment on Mel Gibson's character channels his inner hero and goes against his previous sentiments of peace. He joins the fight and is forever changed by the murder of his wife.
This classic structure follows Freytag's Pyramid. Where the middle is the climax and it changes in a different way than the beginning of the movie.
Sunday, October 31, 2010
Sunday, October 17, 2010
Assignment 6
One of my all-time favorite movies is The Graduate. In this movie there are many scenes that depict human emotion. In one of the very last scenes of the movie, Ben (Dustin Hoffman) rushes to get back his love, Elaine. The first part of this scene at :52 seconds there is an extreme longshot, showing that he is alone in his pursuit to get her back. As he is sprinting to get to the church, it shows another long shot of the church when is trying to get in. The extreme longshot shows the size of the church. It looks overwhelming compared to the size of Ben.
The medium shot of him running up the stairs at 1:25 shows information of what he is trying to do. Ben is frantically trying to get into the church. You can tell by how fast he is moving and that he will do anything to see Elaine.
The close ups in this scene are just awesome. At 1:37 there is a close up of Ben when he realizes he might be too late. You can truely see the tears starting to emerge from his eyes. At 2:26 there are close ups of the Robinson's. Both of them are cursing Ben for being there, but there is no sound. This is to show the emotion of these people. As you put these three scenes together you get one of the best scenes in movie history due to the raw human emotion radiating itself onto the audience.
The medium shot of him running up the stairs at 1:25 shows information of what he is trying to do. Ben is frantically trying to get into the church. You can tell by how fast he is moving and that he will do anything to see Elaine.
The close ups in this scene are just awesome. At 1:37 there is a close up of Ben when he realizes he might be too late. You can truely see the tears starting to emerge from his eyes. At 2:26 there are close ups of the Robinson's. Both of them are cursing Ben for being there, but there is no sound. This is to show the emotion of these people. As you put these three scenes together you get one of the best scenes in movie history due to the raw human emotion radiating itself onto the audience.
Sunday, October 10, 2010
5th Assignment
The assembly line of making movies that was so popular in classic hollywood cinema was successful in many ways. The movie making machine made atleast 4-5 movies a year using similar actors. The most important part of this aspect was the stable income of movie gems. These gems include movies like Casablanca. These movies were made as the premier movie of the assembly line. The studio would make 3 or 4 other movies that werent supposed to live up to the hype of the gems, but they were entertaining nonetheless.
These big movies were important because they showed that, even though it was quickly assembled, they were THAT good. Its unbelievable to think in an age where it takes around 2 to 3 years to make a movie that these movies were made so quickly.
In the event of Casablanca, the studio heads picked a director who had directed other movies, but not with the magnitude of Casablanca. They inserted him into the formula, wrote a great story, inserted Humphrey Bogart and a lot of international actors and actresses. The end result, is arguably the best movie ever.
These big movies were important because they showed that, even though it was quickly assembled, they were THAT good. Its unbelievable to think in an age where it takes around 2 to 3 years to make a movie that these movies were made so quickly.
In the event of Casablanca, the studio heads picked a director who had directed other movies, but not with the magnitude of Casablanca. They inserted him into the formula, wrote a great story, inserted Humphrey Bogart and a lot of international actors and actresses. The end result, is arguably the best movie ever.
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