Over break I got a chance to catch up on many things. Homework, sleep, news, family, and my personal favorite movies. I watch a bunch of different films. Some were good and some were mediocre. One of the better films was Seeking a Friend for the End of the World.
When I started watching this film I had no idea what I was in for because I had never even heard of it before but what I found was a beautiful little piece of art. It was by no means anything particularly amazing but it was funny and the story was well developed. It didn't spoon feed you anything and made you figure things out for yourself.
I think the main reason I enjoyed the piece was because of the basic idea of the film. What would you do with the last month of your life if you knew the world was going to end? Would you just be with family and wait it out? Would you do a whole bunch of crazy things before everything came to an end? Would you try and find away to survive past the end? These were all things that I couldn't answer and the film did a beautiful and fun job of depicting all the different ideas.
This summer I was able to watch many films, some of which have been out for awhile and some that are fairly recent. One film that I had a particular interest in was Christopher Nolan's Memento. This is a very strange film that is filmed in a very unique style.
This film has been out since the year 2000 and I still think that it have more character and style than most recent films that I see. The plot is not told in a chronological order and the audience has to wait until the very end of the film in order to figure out what is actually going on.
The main character in the movie has short term memory loss and the way the plot is communicated in equally as hard to follow as the main character. He is always saying the same thing from scene to scene over and over and while this might sound redundant and boring it actually is quite entertaining and interesting to watch.
If you have not seen this film I would recommend you check it out. It is a bit of a chore, however if you can make it all the way to the end them it is worth it.
Before I get into things in-depth, let's just clear the air here: Gone Girl is pretty fucked up. The book, the film, the whole damn premise of the story is some of the darkest, most messed up stuff I've ever heard. I'll do my best not to spoil anything for people who haven't seen/read it yet, but let's be honest, I probably will at some point. Just a heads up.
(Side note for anyone who has seen the film, I just saw that the movie was rated R for - among other things (cough cough Ben Affleck's penis) - a scene of bloody violence. A scene. Just one. I think we can all assume what it was.)
Touching less on the technical aspects of David Fincher - Emily already beat me to that - I'd like to focus more on how he makes, as the Economist called it, a "perfect adaptation." Never one to shy away from adapting books, (3 of his last 4 feature films were based on short stories or novels; The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, and now Gone Girl) Fincher always seems to find a way to circumvent the pre-established audience and market for a certain book and create something that is uniquely his. The question I'm interested in answering is: how does a director give a film his/her own personal flourish while simultaneously staying true to the source material?
Fincher, probably talking about how creepy his films are.
There's been plenty of bad book adaptations. More bad than good, actually. The handful of really good ones - Lord of the Rings, Blade Runner, No Country for Old Men, to name a few - all have the same basic thing in common: they capture the essence of the source material, along with the plot. In one of the more informative articles I think I've ever found on the A.V. club, one of the contributing writers, Scott Tobias, brings up a really interesting point about adaptations. When talking about Gary Ross' film adaptation of the Hunger Games, he says that "Films content with merely illustrating books are more concerned with problem solving and translation than artistic expression." This is something I'd never considered before. A literal, direct-from-the-book adaptation is almost no fun at all: if you're going to just film everything right from the page, there's a sense of "well hey, what was the point?" If the audience already knows everything, it's basically just a rehashing of the book, just with less.
It's pretty safe to say that Fincher gets this. The very first thing he did right was to hire the author of Gone Girl, Gillian Flynn, to also pen the screenplay (her first). This assured not only that the story would be close to that of the novel - pleasing the already established fan base - but that the general tone (cold, dark) would be the same as well. Films are much less intimate than novels by nature. In many books - Gone Girl included - we can literally hear inside the characters heads. One of the many goals for adaptations is to find a believable substitute for these internal voices, and to show character's emotions and thoughts in a much more visual manner. Gone Girl succeeds at this on every level.
While it stuck surprisingly close to the book (Flynn only cut out a few minor, expendable characters and events to cut down on the already lengthy 2.5 hour runtime) I never found myself knowing what would happen next. Apart from the acting (a pretty great Ben Affleck and a really great Rosamund Pike) and the score (the always amazing dynamic duo of Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross gave the film a super weird, super dark tone throughout) I thought the film did a particularly nice job of depicting the various news shows breaking the story about Amy going missing. The 24 hour news cycle was a big part of Flynn's book, but it was only elevated here; the whole thing worked better on a more visual level.
Apart from a few underdeveloped areas (Amy's "cool girl" monologue - one of the best parts of the book - was more or less glossed over) I thought Fincher did an amazing job of taking a very dark, very complex subject matter and turning it into something that was not only visually stimulating but also really fucking creepy. The atmosphere, tone, and message all matched that of the book, all while giving me a whole new perspective on the story as a whole.
As the digital age progresses many icons of our past are being left behind, including drive-in movie theaters. Since 1933, drive in theaters have been a staple of American Past-time for youth and adults alike. It is no secret that movie theaters, especially drive ins, have not been doing so well due to the economy and the rise in pirated movies. All theaters are being forced to switch to a new kind of digital projector if they want to be able to play current movies at a high quality. This means spending tens of thousands, possibly even hundreds of thousands of dollars on a single projector in order for the theater to still function. With less than 375 drive in theaters in America left, this has become a real concern of many movie fanatics. Honda (yes the car company) decided to do something about it.
I have only ever been to 1 drive in during my lifetime so far. I was on a family vacation to Wisconsin when I was in 8th or 9th grade (don't ask me why my family chose to go to Wisconsin...) and one thing my mom planned for the trip was a stop at a drive-in movie theater. We saw a double feature, first was Journey to the Center of the Earth, and after that was The Dark Knight. Despite how awful Journey to the Center of the Earth was, the drive-in movie theater proved to be one of the least shitty parts of my shitty family vacation. It was honestly an experience I remember to this day, and one I would not wish to forget. There is something about the atmosphere of a drive in that changes the movie-going experience. There is more of a sense of community and family. I hope that I get the opportunity to return to another drive-in during the near future.
So far Honda has donated 5 projectors to drive-in movie theaters across America and helped raise enough money for 4 more. They are urging for you to help however you can, whether it be a monetary donation, visiting a drive-in or even spreading the word. More information can be found at http://projectdrivein.com/.
For anyone interested in attending a drive in movie theater, the closest one to Ithaca is in Elmira, and about an hour away from school.
What's going on everybody? Im excited for tonight to see the showing of some of the student films. I like watching student films, they are pretty fun to watch and analyze. Should be a fun time. On another note, I am highly upset at Netflixs for lying to me! They rated a movie 3 and a half stars out of 5 and I was not impressed. It sort of felt like a fake low budget film. When people got shot, it was so unrealistic! It took away from the film. The plot wasn't too bad, but it definitely could have been drawn out better. Any-who im excited for tonight to watch Rat Bastard and the rest of the student films. See you all tonight, peace.
Hello everyone!
I wanted to share some great information with all the Ithacan's who are searching for props and other free items for films!
Take It Or Leave It, in Clarke Hall in the basement, they have a ton of free stuff! Also if you're looking to get rid of some stuff before moving out of Ithaca soon, drop off your unwanted things instead of throwing them away! It's supported by the Eco Reps on campus! It's a great program and I think we should all support them!
I didn't find a whole lot of props needed for my final projet but, I did find a whole lot of really good set dressing there!
I hope the spread of this information proves useful for TIOLI as well as my fellow art department people in Ithaca!
Game 2:
1: "I'll get you my pretty, and your little dog too."
2: "I'm King of the world!"
3: "Rosebud"
4: "I've always depended on the kindness of strangers."
5: "Go do that Voodoo that you do so well!"
6: "No dice, soldier."
7: "You idiots! These are not them! You've captured their stuntdoubles!"
8: "GOONIES NEVER SAY DIE!"
9: "Shut the F*ck up, Donny!"
10: "Squirrel!"
Don't cheat!! ;-)
Also here's a trailer for the last movie I watched.
Breathless 1983 by Jim McBride
Meh, it was alright. I'm not exactly sure how this wound up in my instant queue. I watched it anyways and it was alright. If you're borred enough you could watch it and it wouldn't be a complete waste of time.
Hey everyone,
I've only watched a couple of good movies so far this thanksgiving break. One of them is called "Ondine"! It was produced in 2009 and directed by Neil Jordan, known for directing Interview with a vampire (favorite #113/124 films). The story is about an irish fisherman who finds a woman in his net and he believes her to be a selke (a water nymph). The story was very engaging and I couldn't stop watching it, it was in a way kind of intimate in the way you get to know the characters and feel for the relationship between them. It didn't place on my fav's list so far but who knows, perhaps years from now I'll come across it again and watch it and decide I really loved it. At this point I did really enjoy it and would recommend it to many.
Anyways, to get to a more interesting point, perhaps. I would like to play a little game! I'm going to post 10 movie quotes and you comment on the blog to reveal what movies they're from!
Here they are:
1: "Toto, I've got a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore"
2: "May the force be with you"
3: "E.T Phone home"
4: "A census take once tried to test me. I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti."
5: "Mama always said life was like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get."
6: "I see dead people"
7: "Stella! Hey Stella!"
8: "Here's Johnny!"
9: "Forget it, Jake, it's Chinatown"
10: Striker: "Surely you can't be serious."
Rumack: "I am serious... and don't call me shirley."
Well those should be easy enough! Guess away friends!
Tata for now!
The last film I added to my favorites list came in at number 55 out of a total of 121 films!! Warning This film is a tear-jerker!! The film I speak of is The Pianist!
I had kept seeing it suggested to me on my Netflix account but never really thought too hard about biting the bate. My most recent method in watching films everyday has been to look up the directors of each of my favorite films on IMDB and look for other films they've directed on Netflix. Obviously, I couldn't find all of them. My other method is to look for films on Netflix that are suggested to me by friends and staff members at Ithaca. Sometimes I'll even eves dorp on other people talking about a film and try to find that one too. Needless to say, the "director method" as I like to call it, took me a very long time considering I have 121 films on my list currently!!
The Pianist was directed by Roman Polanski, who also directed Chinatown (#41/121). The writing was very well done and art direction was incredible, directing was wonderful and Adrian Brody did one heck of an act!
I suggest if you don't mind balling your eyes out a little it's a great story and certainly something everyone should experience because it's good to understand what happened from a certain perspective. It's really great! Sorry this post was a little later than usual but I've been a busy little film making student these days! Hope all is well with everyone out there!
I thought for a while about this assignment and I wanted to bring in something very complex and yet simple. One of my inspirations was a recent funeral I attended. The preacher quoted a scripture that caught my attention and made me cry like a baby. The scripture was John 11:35; Jesus Wept. To understand that a symbol of such great influence among people for hundreds of years and to see him humbled for the grieving sisters of Lazarus, to understand that he knew and felt the pain that they were feeling is very deep and I decided to take it and make it something more modernly understood.
My six word story is:
"The King wept with his people."
This reminded me of the scene in The King's Speech. In the scene I speak of, the queen comforts the king as he weeps. It's a scene where the audience begins to feel a mutual feeling of the weight of the world and a man in complete frustration and nerves. Almost a feeling of release. I wish I could find the particular scene on YouTube, however even if I did it probably wouldn't do it justice. It's a great film and it's a must see, for sure. I have personally made a list of my favorite films from the past three years (that I've seen). The King's Speech came in at number twelve out of my (currently) 119 films.
I found a little clip of the film in this montage of the story line on YouTube.
