Screen Arts - Week 18



10/06/2019

This week's class was about looking we looking at animation by Don Blynth and Rankin/Bass. We watched trailers for Pete's Dragon, Secret of NIMH, An American Tail.

 Don Bluth
Space Ace (1984) was a low budget production. It would explain why there is poor quality voice acting in this arcade game because people who worked on the game voiced the characters. It was where quick-time events originated from, which is interesting. Video game history is being included in the cinema history components of this course.

 We also looked at  a behind the scenes It was interesting to know that traditional and cell animation techniques were implemented for an arcade game. It was all transferred to Laserdisc for it to be in an arcade video game, which was a complex process at the time.
Rankin / Bass
We watched work by them that they did through a Japanese animation studio. Work to do mostly with television like an animated King Kong, a Christmas special, Rudolph the red-nose reindeer, Mad Monster Party. We watched trailers and clips of the mentioned work.

 We watched The Last Unicorn as a class. It goes off to a slow start, but it gets engaging when the inciting incident happens.

 Bass, J., & Rankin Jr, A. (1982). The last unicorn [Motion picture]. United States: Jensen Farley Pictures.

12/06/2019

 Movies that remind me why I'm into filmmaking

 Star Wars (1977)
Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Titanic (1997)
Lord of the Rings trilogy (2001-2003)

15/06/2019

Ames, R., Cavendish, J., Robertson, J., & Serkis, A. (2017). Breathe [Motion picture]. United Kingdom: BBC Films.

 Despite trying to be like Theory of Everything, it's a good film with a mix of heartwarming and depressing tones. What makes the film better is knowing it was directorial debut of Andy Serkis, who is more widely known for his performance capture.  There is hardly any motion capture in this film, showing thew world he is a man of many talents, including directing a live-action biopic.

 Themes - The will to live, euthanasia, defying the odds.


Feels like a long time since I've watched a film with a 2:39:1. Actually, I'm wrong, the DVD case says the aspect ratio is 2:76:1, but I was close though.

 Title card does suit the film's time period in the beginning - 1950's. It applies a romantic style likely common in melodramatic film and television of the time.

 Good to see Tom Hollander in a film other than Bohemian Rhapsody, even if it is like how they had Armie Hammer in The Social Network.




Been a long time since Jonathan Hyde has been in a good movie.


Aspect ratio does support the cinematography, especially when it comes to scenic wide shots.




Didn't know protagonists were married before going to Africa and is mentioned well after arriving in Africa.



Slow motion and sound used to express the abstract feelings around showing the first sign of the protagonist's disability.


The loud oxygen machine would do my head in because of my sensory issues.. Even more so in a room of full them. Intimate shots are used to express what the protagonist is feeling (especially visually communicated to the audience), which is that he is in a living hell. It's expressed visually before it's expressed in dialogue.





The high contrast lighting / blue hue does seem to express depression and a clinical, institutionalized setting like in the 'Normal Again' episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.





Fast paced inciting incidents where the film gets depressing really fast in a out of the blue fashion.



I believe there is a bit of The Uncanny Valley in this shot of Hollander. Something about it that looks fake, but tries to be real.



Comments

  1. Meek and Wild CreationsJuly 2, 2019 at 5:21 PM

    That last shot DOES look weird... maybe it's because the one towards the back shouldn't be lit the same way as the one in front? Like, the one in back should have more shadow and because they were filmed on green screen they are equally lit.

    ReplyDelete

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