Journal 3

The film I chose to watch is the Bridge On the River Kwai directed by David Lean. I chose this film because it won numerous Academy Awards including best picture (1957). It is based on the novel by Pierre Boulle. The film is about British POWs and Allied soldiers. When the British POWs build a railway bridge in enemy occupied Burma, allied commandoes are assigned to destroy the bridge. It is still praised for its excellence as a film but also behind the scenes.
The two writers of the film, Carl Foreman and Michael Wilson were on the Hollywood Backlist and could only work on the film in secret. The Hollywood Backlist was a group of writers, directors and actors who were not allowed to work on films because of their political beliefs. The idea for the script came from a novel by Pierre Boulle called, Le Pont de la Rivière Kwaï. It is a fiction novel but it borrows the construction of the Burma Railway as a main part of the plot. From my research it seems that the film and the novel are very similar. It used the same plot and characters and matched the novel very well. Foreman and Wilson did not collaborate on the script which led to Foreman walking out on the project and Wilson taking over. Previously Carl Foreman wrote the script for High Noon, a popular western film. Michael Wilson also wrote the script for The Planet of the Apes. The credit for the screenplay was given to Pierre Boulle because the two were on the Backlist and Boulle was awarded an Oscar for writing even though he did not speak a word of English. In 1984 Foreman and Wilson were finally awarded an Oscar for the writing of the film.
Many directors were considered for the project, among them John Ford, William Wyler, Howard Hawks, Fred Zinnemann, and Orson Welles. They finally decided on David Lean, a British Director who was virtually unheard of outside of Britain. But that didn’t mean he was a nobody, he directed films such as Lawrence of Arabia and Doctor Zhivago. Lean was a person who wanted a lot to do with the actors and wanted them to be the type of character he wanted. Often times he would get into fights with the actors, most importantly Alec Guinness, the star of the film. Lean had a totally different view of how to play Nicholson (Guinness) as Guinness did. It seemed like Lean stayed away from the Cinematography aspect and focused more on the acting. He was awarded Best Director in the 1957 Academy Awards for his work in the film.
The Bridge on the River Kwai is a fantastic film that was one of the first of its kind. It was praised for its direction and writing and is still a popular film today. It incorporated very new ideas and was a very entertaining and in depth film.

Journal 2

From what I know about the typical western film there is the hero, who is most often a lawman of some kind, there is a bad guy, and the hero is called upon to save someone or something from danger. The film Unforgiven directed by Clint Eastwood is not the typical western. Eastwood and the writer, David Webb Peoples, found a way to turn the whole western genre around and revise the genre to a story which is completely backwards than the traditional western film. The cast includes Clint Eastwood, Gene Hackman and Morgan Freeman. The film provides a new twist to westerns that is completely original.
The story begins with a cowboy with the aid of another cowboy slashes a prostitutes face. The venomous local sheriff and former gunfighter, Little Bill Daggett (Gene Hackman) only fines the two cowboys seven ponies. The other prostitutes who are furious about the easy punishment decide to pool their money together and pay a $1000 dollar reward for anyone who kills the two. A long ways away the Schofield Kid approaches a ranch owned my William Munny (Eastwood) looking for a partner to do the hit. In previous years Munny was an infamous gunslinger, murderer, and bandit has since retired, having forsworn his criminal ways through the influence of his late wife. After initially declining the Kid's offer to join up and split the reward money, Munny reconsiders amidst his financial troubles and recruits a former associate and neighbor, Ned Logan (Morgan Freeman), as his partner before catching up with the Schofield Kid. The three men ride until they find one of the cowboys and they shoot him. After the killing Ned Logan (Freeman) decides he can no longer kill anymore. He rides off to go back home with his wife. Meanwhile William Munny and the Schofield Kid find the other cowboy and kill him. After the killing of the second cowboy Munny catches word that Little Bill (Hackman) found Ned Logan and had tortured and killed him. Munny leaves the Schofield Kid and goes into town to get vengeance for his friends murder. Munny’s past life is reopened as he kills Little Bill and everyone else who had a part in the killing. After shouting threats of wanton violence through the open door to anyone who might be outside waiting for him, he leaves the saloon and rides away on a white horse.
Although the film may seem like a simple, shoot em’ up western it has an underlining purpose that is somewhat hard to pick up. The reoccurring theme in the film is the violence that characters exhibit. When Ned Logan returns to him home after the killing of the first cowboy he seems to be the more rehabilitated one of the two. Munny is still a very mysterious character in that because the viewer still doesn’t know much about his vicious past. Later in the film it is revealed that he was a true monster, he had killed women and children and “just about anything that walked or crawled”. When this is revealed it is clear that Munny hadn’t changed and is still the evil murderous man he always was. A significant part in the film is when Munny is about to kill Little Bill, “I don’t deserve this,” pleads Little Bill. “Deserves got nothing to do with it,” says Munny. This quote sums up the insanity of western violence and what it is to be truly a bad man.
The Dramatic aspects of the film were very well supported. The film had a great cast including Morgan Freeman and Richard Harris all of which acted very well. The film used a lot of low key lighting to make the characters look mysterious. Also the Cinematographer used a lot of low angle shots to make the characters look powerful and deadly.
Eastwood’s directing and acting in the film made this one of the best westerns I have seen. It had a completely different story than I was used to seeing and he took on the idea of the “revisionist” western very well. I think this film deserved best picture in 1992 because if its theme and overall cinematic excellence.

Journal #1

After doing a little research on a number of movies I came across a critic that seems to have the same taste in movies as I do. He also seems to judge a movie on its entertaining value instead of analyzing way too far until it becomes to miniscule it doesn’t even matter. This critic is Lawrence Toppman from The Charlotte Observer. The review I chose was by Lawrence Toppman on Batman Begins. The movie is about the roots of batman and how he became the superhero we all know and love.

I like how he talks about all of the elements of the movie which I feel are important. He makes a great point about Gotham City being somewhat more realistic than the past Tim Burton Gothams which seemed almost too over the top. I also think that Nolan cleared up the story of batman. In this movie the viewer will learn where batman learned to fight, where he got all of his gadgets, and how the bat cave was made.

“Nolan has found precisely the right blend of back story, action, sardonic humor, emotion, menace and characterization. He and Goyer don't aim to create a myth; their Gotham looks like a grungy version of New York or Chicago, not the dark fantasyland of Tim Burton's two "Batman" outings.” (Toppman)

Another way Toppman shows his knowledge of a superhero film is by stating the needs of a good superhero film. He goes over the main points that all superhero films have in common. He carefully examines each one and shows how the movie clearly has all of those things.

“Superhero pictures require certain conventions: a romance, a sidekick, cool weapons, a juicy but inconsequential bad guy who answers to the master villains. Nolan and Goyer meet these expectations in unexpected ways.” (Toppman)

I like how Toppman goes in depth but not so far that it’s hard for a normal movie watcher to take the review seriously. Sometimes critics seem to only write good reviews on movies they think will win academy awards. When I see critics analyzing a movie way to far I stop reading the review right away. Toppman analyzes the film critically but he doesn’t go so far that I want to quit reading. He seems to judge a movie on if he enjoyed it or not instead of judging a movie on its award winning excellence.

Overall I liked the review very much. It reinforced my liking of Batman Begins and he wrote about things I hadn’t even thought about after the movie. I think he explained himself very well because sometimes critics write to little and leave the reader still confused. Also I like Toppman because so far he likes and dislikes the same movies as I do. We need a critic that we trust to make the right judgment of a movie. Everyone has different opinions about certain movies and I like Toppman because he pretty much shares mine.

This clip shows many film elements but the ones that stood out to me the most were the lighting and the low angle shot. The lighting in this clip is meant to make everything seem more realistic. There are many shadows especially with the people in the helicopters. The goal of the lighting is to make it look more realistic and battle like. Also it uses low angle shots to make the soldiers seem bigger and more powerful. It makes the viewer feel like the soldiers are very strong and brave.

Joe's homework assignment

My favorite movie is braveheart. It is the story of William Wallace, a Scotish revolutionary, who led the Scots to freedom over the british. The movie follows Walace through his life but most of the movie is focused on when he is an adult. He begins to fight the British to avenge the death of his wife but he turns into the hero who is to help win Scotlands freedom. Walace is played by Mel Gibson.

I really like this movie because it is full of action, it is a great story and it is very well done. There are alot of great fight scenes in this movie and that makes it very entertaining. There are many battle scenes in this movie and they are done well. It is also a great story and iot is very interesting. The story keeps me intertested through the entire movie. Also the movie is very well done. It portrays the life of William Wallace very well and everything is done right. This movie is about 1000 times better than 300 because it is not a modern cartoon and 300 sucks.

This academy award winning movie was liked by almost all of the critics I read. According to James Berardinelli, with its clashing armies, heartstopping action, and grand sense of romance this is the sort of film it's a pleasure to see and review. The only bad thing that critics said about the movie is that it is a little chiche. But overall the critics really enjoyed it and recommend it to viewers.

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