Interstellar

            Interstellar is a science fiction drama film that directed by Christopher Nolan which features about humanity travels across the wormhole to find a new home for living being.  Science fiction is a genre that involves the assumptions or theories based on the contemporary or future science or technology. It also can be related to the prediction that made by the scientists in the past or the future. Interstellar is truly a sci-fi genre of film as the producers even used the principle of science from the Einstein’s general theory of relatively to explain the time dilation of our dimension so that the story can be enhanced and more realistic feels. Besides, this film shows mostly in the space or another galaxy where the scientist never really been through or seen before in their research life. It gives audiences exactly likes a space travel tour where we can imagine how it is feel like to be out there in the space. Especially the part Cooper jettisons himself toward the black hole in order to shed weight for Dr. Brand. Then the audiences able to experiences the imaginary experience when passing through the black hole, the audiences able to feel the tension and nervous for the character when falling into black hole. It really not just a science fiction genre film, but a space travel documentary for me. 

            Moreover, another interesting scientific beef shown in the film when the crew arrives in the other galaxy through the worm hole and they started to discuss which planet to visit as they have lack sufficient fuel to visit all of them. They even made an explanation about how a wormhole works so that we audiences can understand, it is just like having a astronomy classes through the film. Back to the point, due to some of the planets are deep within the black hole’s gravitational well (this is what they called in scientifically preposterous), relativity’s time dilation means that visiting those planet would cause them grow slower than the people back on the Earth, as the strong gravitational pull from the black hole will slow down the time travelling in the planet. As Cooper and the team decided to visit this Miller’s planet as they receive a several signal form the planet they would thought it has a positive results responded by the volunteer Miller. When they reach the planet, they only realize the Miler actually just landed on that planet and he has just die not long ago, but due to the time dilated as each hour there equal to seven years pass on the Earth, the Cooper and the team only realize his dead after so many years of Earth’s time and when they went back to the Endurance is already 23 years elapsed on the Earth time. This is the part where audiences can easily get confuse the most but also the part which gives a very interesting fact and imagination for the audiences to think. As what makes a science fiction film is an unlimited imaginary science’s hypothesis that made by the scientist and also the future prediction or possibility. In late 90s film, we do predict about the touch screen phone in the future and now touch screen phone became the common item in the contemporary era right? 

            Besides then the science fiction genre, I would like to talk about the one of the best aspect of this film is the sound design. As what Akira Kurosawa said, the most exciting moment is the moment when the sound is added, he trembled. Sound is often used as a complement to enhance the visual. It can help in shaping audiences understanding toward the visual. For a simple example, when there is a man walk by on the road and suddenly he lying on the floor, at this moment audiences won’t understand what actually happen to him, but with a few shot of gun sound voice over the scene make big different toward the audiences’ understanding. In this film Interstellar, sound is the most important criteria in the movie no matter is sound effect or music background. The music designed by Christopher Nolan is so good until it able to lead audience’s emotion toward the character’s action. For an instances, when the part Cooper uses the lander to dock and stabilize the Endurance when it is spinning out of control in the process and in order to finish the process, Cooper spins his ranger in the same rpm with the Endurance’s rpm, and this is where the music background lead the audiences tension and nervous together with the story. Other than this, the sound effect and design are great. It gives us an extra feel in imagining the sound in the outer space. For example, when Cooper is passing through the worm hole, the creation of sound of the momentum and the friction between the spaceship and the wormhole able to give the audiences the tension and oppressive feeling together with the alarm alert sound in the spaceship create a nervous environment to the audiences.

         

            Interstellar is one of the favorite films all the times because it gives me an unlimited imaginary space for us to think about the world, universe or galaxy.  I also realize to create a science fiction genre film is not easy as we think. It is not just crap something to make it realistic, but doing research, studies or experiment to understand the theory and idea behind the story, as it is a science based content of film.

Zombieland by Ruben Fleischer

A genre is used to categories the film type in such a way that allow the audiences to recognise the kind of the movie that they going to watch. So that audiences able to choose what type of movie they wanted to watch by understand the genre. This is because different kind of genres conveys certain plot elements that can be identify with the genre. For an example, audiences might expect for a future technology that beyond the scope of contemporary science in a science fiction movie. In another perspective, filmmakers use genre to revise the conventions elements that associated with the genre so that audiences will have a pathway into film and allow the movie to communicate with them. Genre was seldom remain it’s oneself in a film in the past. Due to the conventional of the filmmakers, the contemporary films mixes difference genre in a film to create a new possibilities surprisingly results in the film industry, this is also known as cross-genre or hybrid genre.

Zombieland by Ruben Fleischer is seen like an adventure, horror-comedy genres of film. But we notice that there is more aspect of different genre that can be found in the film itself. Besides than the genres above, there is also a romance, action, road-film, science-fiction kind of genres that can be found in the film.

Horror genre is the most obvious and major aspect that can be recognize in the film Zombieland. It is about a mutated strain of mad cow disease that mutated into “mad person disease” that transform human into zombie. A zombie is an aspect of unnatural subgenres that can recognise in a Horror genre. These zombies will chase after human and eat their flesh which creating an emotional effect of disgust and terrify to the audiences. The reason zombies horrifies us in such way because it goes against the laws of nature that we portray in our life, zombie is not part of the nature and it attacks human, this terrifies the audiences’ emotion. Besides than zombie, the setting of the scene can be recognize easily as there is mostly happen in a low key lighting environment such as night time. For an instance, at the final plot of the film where the Wichita active all the ride and lights and begin to enjoy the park at Pacific Playland. This scene was happened in night which makes audiences feel creepy because of the abandon park in the middle of the night. The audiences believe there is something possibly happen at the park soon because of the setting and during the night time as they recognize the elements for a common horror genre film which usually happen in this kind of setting location. Besides, heavy makeup is used for the zombie and the artificial blood and flesh to increase the realistic for the film to make audiences feel more disgust and terrify. These are the common element in the iconography of the horror film. Moreover, the characters in the film will usually divided into feel characteristic which is an idea generator man, a heroism person or maybe a weak character but learned to be strong in that environment and these peoples are trying to stay alive from the zombies things. For an instance, Columbus is the one who live with the rules and stay smart to ensure his survival; Tallahassee is the one who is strong and muscular and he is the one who portrays the heroism characteristic; Wichita will be the one who looks weak in appearance but strong inside and she only trusts on Little Rock in order to keep safe from the others peoples and zombies. There will usually work together in order to stay alive and the trust game will be played among them in order to stay alive from zombies and humans. For an instance, Wichita leave them second times with the Hummer because she believe that the only way to keep them safe is to trust no one except her sister, so she leaves Columbus and Tallahassee even though they feel get along very well. But in the end, Columbus and Tallahassee gain their trust by saving their life.

Next, genre of comedy can be acknowledged in the film as there are some few humor interactions between the character and character itself. One of the elements of comedy that found in the film is slapstick. Slapstick is a type of physical comedy that characterized by silly situation or violent action. For an instance, when Columbus going to find Wichita with Bill’s big bike, he fall from the bike just a second after he rides the bike and he crashes into the underbrush. The falling action highlighted the audiences’ humor sense which makes audiences feel funny toward the part. Besides, dark comedy also recognizable in the movie as it is a sub-genre of comedy. Dark comedy is an event that treated in an ironic manner or negative events that are not usually be treated in real life events. For an example, the moment when Tallahassee finds out his only problem is the lacks of Twinkies create the dark humor in the movie as he still cares about his Twinkies even though the world is doomed.

There is some romance fiction in the film which happens between Columbus and Wichita. A romance genre film is usually centers around the characters falling in love with each other and obstacles faced in making the relationship work. Another element of romance can be explained as an emotionally satisfying and optimistic ending such as how the character willing to risk his/her life to save the lover. For an instance, Columbus in love with Wichita but Wichita decided to leave him as she believes that the only method to keep her sister and Wichita alive is to trust no one but Little Rock. In the end, Columbus proves his love by rescuing Wichita and her sister from the zombies attack even though Wichita had abandoned him.

Action genre of film is a physical action takes place in the storytelling and oftenly have a continuous action and motion such as chases, fight, races, battles and physical stunts. In an action film, the story will usually involve a heroism character in the film to overcome the obstacle. For an instance, the action hero of the film is Tallahassee due to his strong body figures, superb action in killing the Zombies.

Road film genre can be recognized in Zombieland as they have an journey on the open road with a transportation and usually a bonding relationship happen between the characters in the road trip. They can be engage to some kind of goal or quest or any distinct destination in order to discover something. It is also the part where the character establishing occurs in the movie. For an example, Columbus, Tallahassee, Wichita and Little Rock travels together in the H2 Hummer and they started to have some bonding within each other to understand each other better and changing their perception toward each other, from negative to positive.

Zombieland is considers as a Science-Fiction genre of film because it has some relationship with the principles of science within the story. A Sci-Fi film is often talking about science and technology the go beyond the contemporary science. It can be a hypothesis for the future or involve in partially fictitious laws or theories of science. For an instance, the zombies is caused by a mutation virus known as mad cow disease which mutated to mad person disease that turn human to become zombie once they get injured by zombies. Besides than the virus, this movie also talks about the apocalypse of the human being. Most of the places are doomed and human being might face extinction due to the virus diseases. This is also part of the hypothesis that made by the scientist that judge the possibility happened in the future world if the world is continuing polluted and causes virus or living organism mutation (Cracked, 2009).

References

"Black Comedy - TV Tropes". TV Tropes. N.p., 2016. Web. 22 June 2016. Retrieved from: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BlackComedy

Buffam, Noelle. "Genre: Action - The Script Lab". Thescriptlab. N.p., 2016. Web. 22 June 2016. Retrieved from: http://thescriptlab.com/screenplay/genre/action

"Road Films". Filmsite. N.p., 2016. Web. 22 June 2016. Retrieved from: http://www.filmsite.org/roadfilms.html

Sloth, TE and David Wong. "5 Scientific Reasons A Zombie Apocalypse Could Actually Happen".Cracked. N.p., 2007. Web. 22 June 2016. Retrieved from: http://www.cracked.com/article_15643_5-scientific-reasons-zombie-apocalypse-could-actually-happen.html

"Zombieland (2009)". IMDb. N.p., 2016. Web. 22 June 2016. Retrieved from: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1156398/

Requiem for a Dream by Darren Aronofsky

Requiem for a Dream is a psychological drama film that directed by Darren Aronofsky. I do enjoy watching the whole film and the way the director conveys the message in such way do inspire and amaze my experience in watching it. This film shows a lot of different style of cinematography and play around the editing part of the film.

Firstly, I enjoy watching the part where the characters consume the drugs and how the director chooses to present in using montages. For instance, when Harry, Marion or Tyrone is consuming the drugs which the film doesn’t really show the process of their drug taking. Instead, the director choose the another way to show this the process of drug consuming by using the montage technique, where they use a combination of some extremely short shots as an abstract of drug taking process. In this combination, the filmmaker used a few extremely short shots with the sequences of white powder within the plastic bag, cell enlarging shot, lighter shot, money rolling shot, shot of white powder on table, rolled-money paper sucking the white powder, body cell moving shot, eye pupil enlarging shot, etc. These shots do not means anything if places individually, but with the combination of these shots and the form of the film, we can understand that it is a process of the characters consume the drugs. I agree for the director’s decision of making this montage instead of just showing it in linear shots. This is because if the filmmaker does shows the drug consumption in linearly shots flow, it doesn’t really express much emotion or feeling when the audiences watch it. But with this montages series, it’s leaded us to imagine the feeling and reaction happened within them when they take the drugs. I believe this method able to enhance the narrative of the story other rather than common showing how people consume drugs. So that we audiences can experiences more instead of just understanding the content.

Besides that, throughout the whole film, I feel very energetic and follow closely to the story flow because of the pacing of the film. “Requiem for a dream” is a film that created high pacing cutting of the sequence with extremely short shots so that we audiences feel the sense of stressed addiction and loss of control of the character and story. A normal film will usually have average 600-700 cuts in a 100-minute film, but this film gives about 2000 cuts which shows that it is a very high rhythmic editing film (Requiem For A Dream (2000), n.d.). I think it is a positive response for having this kind of pacing or tempo for this film because it does creates an attractive sense that makes me wanted to follow the story flow. Let’s take colour as the metaphor for this film, a monochrome will describe as the story of the film if without any fast cuts or montage technique used within it, but with these techniques, it improve the way the story present and it is like colouring the whole film to a different style of story narration rather than just a simple linear editing technique kind of film.

This film has used a lot of split-screen editing art within the movie, you can even see it in the beginning of the movie where the argument happen between Harry and Sara. Split screen technique is normally used to allow the 2 or more stories happen in a same time to appear in a single scene together. So that audiences able to watch 2 different views in a same single scene to make the whole thing looks real to happen in a same time. It is also used to convey more visual language of the characters as we can’t put 2 characters in a single scene when they are having conversation in different location or far distance. Hence, split-screen enables us to look more closely and understand the detail of the character’s facial expression or gestures. Because character’s staging can be a silent messages behind the script where as a technique to express the emotion, feeling or the visual aspects that related to the story so that the narrative of the story can be enhanced. Some hidden messages are mean to be seen or interpret through visual expression, not just about script and dialogue.

Lastly, I found a different explanation toward the split-screen effect that used in the “Requiem for a dream”. In one of the film’s more romantic moments, Harry and Marion closely lie on a bed and the split screen is used in this scene to show the interaction between the characters. This is the part where it gets my attention to focus on it. The interaction between them with their conversations is shown in split-screen. I feel very satisfy with this scene, it not just showing us the relationship or connection between the characters, but the sense of touch while the character touching each other. The first screen shows the character who praises the another one and the second screen shows how the character appeases the another one by touching his/her face, body, etc. The cinematography shows sense of touch of the character, not just showing the emotion or the ambient around the scene. When I watch this particular scene, I can feel the sense of touch when Harry appeases Marion. In my opinion, I love the way how the camera, the split-screen and the actor’s performances work together to have interaction with audiences. It is the results on how acting works together with other film techniques to create a better narration of the story and watching experience.

Overall, these all techniques or style can be explained as the Darren Aronofsky’s personalities in directing the film. As most of the directors will have their own way of style in making a film and this techniques or style will becomes his masterpiece of artwork creation.

Reference:

"Requiem For A Dream (2000)". IMDb. Web. 14 June 2016. Retrieved from:               http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0180093/trivia?ref_=tt_trv_trv%3F&c=1#_=_

Bordwell, David & Thompson, Kristin (2010) Film Art An Introduction, 9^th ed., USA: McGraw-Hill, pp. 144

Bordwell, David & Thompson, Kristin (2010) Film Art An Introduction, 9^th ed., USA: McGraw-Hill, pp. 230

Sprited Away

Spirited Away is a Japanese anime film written and directed by Hayao Miyazaki in 2001. I love how the story present in such way that allow the audiences to imagine, link and create their own interpretation throughout the film. Overall, this movie does surprise me as I don’t often watch Japanese Anime. 

Firstly, as the sun goes down and the spirits all came out in the abandoned theme park, it is just like another space for spirits to live like a human being where the spirits able to eat, massage, communicate and even pay for their spending. One thing I was curious about this, how do they get money to pay for their spending there? As we all portray the living daily life where we need to get work or job in order to get money and spend for something else. An imaginary question pop-out in my mind as how do they get this money? I have made a hypothesis for the answer of this question. Is it possible to say that when some Buddhism Chinese they often burn those “hell bank note” to their ancestor. Is this the one of the way how spirits get their money and spend on their joyous? So I might able to imagine and persuade myself that our ancestors are having fun in their worlds. 

Secondly, part of the story tells us something cannot be exchange or measure by using the value of money. Some people always think that money is everything as they believe they can solve everything in money. This is a yes for most of the people in present. As when we are outgoing we all do wish to have more cash or credit card around us because our mind set already fix that money can solve everything and it became our talisman to give us a sense of safety in daily life. So do the movie when Chihiro’s parents were eating those foods without knowing the source or thinking any consequences as they believe they can solve it later with cash and credit card where these 2 stuffs give them the sense of safety to make them feel better in eating the foods. But something is not mean to be solve in money as they end up became pig. 

Thirdly, how importance is money to someone? From the story as we can see those spirit workers are desperately want the gold but except Sen. Some of the opinion says that Sen is not greedy and she does not get influence by the money. But I explain that as Sen is still a child, she does not know the capability of money can be done for. Because I believe that people or those spirits do not born to be greedy or in love with money, there is definitely something that provokes their greediness or makes them wanted to have money in order to achieve and satisfy their needs. So in order to say that Sen is not greedy to money, let’s just say she is just too young to know about it or she does not need the money to achieve anything. Greedy is just a sense of desire that they need to have more money to satisfy their needs. Taking up to another point, I can see Sen is a girl of feeling where she cares more about love, family and even friendship. At first I don’t really perceive love between Haku and Sen. I rather persuade myself as the feeling of gratitude friendship of Sen to Haku since he is the one who save Sen and taught her what to do to save her parents. Sen is so hopeless and she desperately wanted to see Haku that makes her feels secure. When comes to the part where Sen gives part of the dumpling to save Haku’s life, it creates a little bit love within the emotion because she rather to use the dumpling that she intent to save her parents life for Haku. I feel the love within the part where Sen willing to sacrifice for Haku. It is also can be explained that some people defined love is the priority when comes to everything. 

These are my own opinion and thought after watching this anime. But overall this anime film is one of the best cartoon films I ever watched. It does contain a lot of hidden or abstract meaning that allow the audience to reflect on the reality world. Indeed, the director Hayao Miyazaki has explained that this movie was actually reflecting the prostitution issues that happen commonly in Japan. But I do able to interpret other aspects throughout the Sprited Away movie.