15.1 Week 15 Overview: The Final Stretch

15.1 Week 15 Overview: The Final Stretch

This week we will screen a film and contribute to a discussion of that film and concepts learned in this class. This discussion will also act as an opportunity to ask questions and review for the final. Finally, after examining the peer review of your critique you will have a chance to resubmit it.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

By the end of this week, you will be able to:

1.Clarify questions you may have  in regards to the class material.

2.Clarify and define the basic vocabulary of film production and film theory.

3.Apply your knowledge to a film screened  to analyze the aesthetics of filmmaking.


4.Recognize and classify different film genres.

5.Apply your knowledge to a film screened  to evaluate and explore the creation and effects of various types of film experience.

TO-DO LIST

To meet the objectives of this week's module, you will complete the following activities and assessments: 

1.View this week's film.

2.Review chapter 11.

3.Revise and submit a copy your critique if you see fit.

4.Participate in the Review Discussion and Responses.

TIPS

It is best to move through the module sequentially by clicking the NEXT button in the lower right corner. 

15.5 Summary: Week 15

15.5 Summary: Week 15

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

By the end of week 15 you should be able to:

•   to evaluate and explore the creation and effects of various types of film experience.

• Clarify questions you may have  in regards to the class material.
• Clarify and define the basic vocabulary of film production and film theory.
• Apply your knowledge to a film screened  to analyze the aesthetics of filmmaking.

• Recognize and classify different film genres.
• Apply your knowledge to a film screened

TO-DO LIST

To meet the objectives of this week's module, you completed the following activities and assessments: 

1. Viewed this week's film.
2. Reviewed Chapter 11.
3. Submitted a revision of your critique if you saw fit.
4. Participated in the Review Discussion and Responses.

Next up:  The Final Exam

In further preparation for the final exam please look at your film notebooks including the skeletal outlines, review the presentations, discussions, quizzes and the end of each chapter where our author analyzes a film in regards to the material presented.  Look back at the films screened in class. The final is divided into three sections and similar to the midterm includes a number of essay questions. Each section is timed separately and you will have one attempt at each. Do not use materials or the internet in completing your work.

15.4 WATER - Final Review Discussion

 15.4 Final Review Discussion

Directions:

Take a minute to reflect on the reading material thus far the presentation(s), and the study guide. Then,

1.Discuss a concept of your choice.

2.or, ask a question on a concept or term you would like greater clarification on.

3.or formulate a question which you feel could be included on a quiz or the final exam,  Your question may be multiple choice, or short answer. Provide your answer as well.

Finally answer a fellow student's question - other than the question from the previous bullet point.

or feel free to ask multiple questions if that is the path best for you.

Please be thorough.
Use quotes from the text to make your point, but please also cite the page.
Give examples from films screened in class. 

You may specifically concentrate on Water, this weeks film, or you may include films we have previously screened.
For instance you may discuss Water in respect to Hollywood Cinema (classicism).
1.What characteristics does it share,
2.how is it dissimilar?
3.And/or if you have gained knowledge of narrative structure,
4.styles of acting,
5.aesthetic form and analysis and you want to apply that knowledge to Water please do so.

And once again feel free to include Water in your quiz question.

My post: 

• or formulate a question which you feel could be included on a quiz or the final exam,  Your question may be multiple choice, or short answer. Provide your answer as well.

Preface to question. When I read this in the text, It fascinated me. I thought it was one of the best explanations of what made a film revolutionary and a masterpiece. Also how it contributed a change in American film history. 

In the discussion of the golden age of Hollywood which was 1927-1948, the text says that in 1941 with the release of Citizen Kane, Orson Welles’s film revolutionized the medium in American cinema. The text gave sixteen reasons that it was revolutionary; please name four in short sentence answers.

Here are the answers: 

1)Citizen Kane shows Welles’s genius as an artist and his vision of a new kind of cinema. (at age 24)
2)Involves a complex plot consisting of 9 sequences (each using a different tone and style).  -5 are
   flashbacks,
3)Including the omniscient camera, the movie has seven narrators – some of them unreliable – who,
   taken together present a modern psychological portrait of a megalomaniac.
4)Released 7 months before the US declared war in dec 41. it was a radical film for Hollywood.
5)Many interpretations including the Freudian interpretation of young Charlie’s relationship to his
   mother.
6)Citizen Kane carries a strong antifascist message. It warns against the Kane’s arrogant abuse of the
   first amendment right of freedom of speech and press, one of the many evils that Americans, reading
   their own newspapers, associated with Hitler.
7)Radical in its handling of prevailing cinematic language.
8)Astonishing complexity and speed of the narrative. It has influenced the structure and pace of nearly
    every movie after.
9)Movie’s stark design is heavily influenced by German Expressionism (in size, height, and depth of the
    rooms and other spaces at Xanadu).
10)Through deep-space composition, lighting, deep-focus cinematography, and long takes.  Gregg
      Toland (Cinematographer) achieved the highest degree of cinematic realism yet seen.  
11)The film is marked by brilliant innovations that changed cinematic language forever.
      Among these is deep focus cinematography, which permits action on all three planes of depth --
      foreground, middle ground and background.
12)In contrast to the prevailing soft look of the 1930s films, Citizen Kane has a hard finish.
13)The omniscient, probing, and usually moving camera, emphasizing its voyeuristic role, goes directly
      to the heart of each scene.
14)The editing is conventional, most often taking place within long takes/within camera. No soviet
     montage type things…except when he does “News on the March” sequence and pans and swipes that
     create the passing of time during the famous breakfast-table sequence.
15)His sound design for Kane creates and aural realism equivalent to the movie’s visual realism. He
      frequently uses overlapping sound, film also louder that typical. The bravado of its dialogue, sound
      effects, and music puts in your ears as well as in your face. Bernard Herrmann’s score was space,
      modernist ahead of its time.
16)Welles called on his stage and radio experiences to break another Hollywood convention. Actors did
      not normally rehearse their lines except in private or for a few minutes with the director b4 shooting.
      but Welles rehearsed his cast for a month before shooting began, so his ensemble of actors could
      handle long passage of dialogue in the movie’s distinctive long takes. And the performances,
      including Welles as Kane, are unforgettable.

15.3 View Water (2005, 119 min.) Deepa Mehta

15.3 View Water (2005, 119 min.) Deepa Mehta

View Water (Links to an external site.)  (Links to an external site.)(2005, 119 min.) Deepa Mehta 

Water is one of three films that comprise a trilogy -  Fire (1996) and  Earth (1998) are the others.

As we studied cultural invisibility we explored the concept that a film reflects the culture from which it comes. 

Film in Indian developed historically not through a link with literature and the novel, but through theater.  Thus, Indian film tends to reflect culturally specific theatrical elements. Early silent Indian cinema audiences were often non-reading.  Further, multiple languages are spoken. 

For a reading audience the question of what language to print subtitles in automatically excluded some audience members. Historical stories based on legends, stories of the pantheon of the gods/heroes were often prevalent. Indian film audiences were familiar with these stories/legends/myths and the manner in which they were told through theater and therefore language or subtitles were not a must.

A star, six songs and three dances is a dismissive definition coined by Western critics of Indian, and specifically Bollywood, cinema. Water is considered a hybrid production; it includes elements of both Indian/South Asian cinema and Western/Hollywood productions.

This skeletal outline to be used to aid in note taking in regards to the film viewed. Feel free to download it and either use it as a reference, or as a page in your film notebook.

How is this a hybrid film?

How is the film focalized? (from last week's presentation)

Auteur theory?

Other interesting moments/techniques.

Examples of meaning or invisibility.

Questions?

 

15.2 READ Chapter 11 How Movies are Made

 15.2 READ Chapter 11 How Movies are Made

 Please Review Chapter 11 – How Movies are Made

14.6 Summary: Week 14 - History

14.6 Summary: Week 14 - History

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

By the end of this week you should be able to:

1.Distinguish multiple manners utilized to examine film history.

2.Discuss vocabulary and terminology.

3.Describe various historically important film movements.

TO-DO LIST

To meet the objectives of this week's module, you completed the following activities and assessments: 

1.Completed the reading assignment - Chapter 10. 

2.Viewed the presentation.

3.Viewed this week's film.

4.Participated in the Discussion and Responses.

5.Submitted the Ikiru critique Due Dec 3 and completed the peer review by Dec 6th.

6.Examined the final exam review in order to prepare for next week's review discussion.

Next up:  Module 15

We examined approaches in an analysis of film history and some important historical trends. Next up we will spend much of our time participating  an online review in preparation for the final exam.

14.5 part 2 - WRITE AKIRA KUROSAWA - IKIRU - CRITIQUE

14.5 part 2 - WRITE AKIRA KUROSAWA - IKIRU - CRITIQUE 

This critique is worth 10% of your overall grade.

1. Remember your work must be two to three pages in length, typed at either single, or one and one half spaced (900 - 1350 words)  on a topic of your choice as applied to Ikiru. In regards to form, a critique includes an introductory paragraph with a topic sentence, the body which discusses at least three pertinent points, and a conclusion.

2. The second part of this assignment is a peer review. Consider this a group project. Here you will automatically be assigned a student to review. Use the rubric as a guideline for your input. Like the discussion responses you will be expected to give feedback on the critique, what worked and what could be improved upon and, why? Is there a topic sentence, a conclusion, are sources properly cited, etc.? Remember, peer feedback is an excellent educational tool. The rubric should be beneficial.

3.Complete the peer review for the Ikiru critique by Dec 5th.  Make sure you leave comments for your fellow students. After you have received feedback on your work you will have an opportunity to submit a revised critique by Dec 8th.  Once the peer reviews are completed I will grade your work. Please inform me if you resubmitted your work so it is not considered late.

My Critique:

Ida Z. 
Anna Geyer 
Introduction to Film Studies 70427-931 
29 November 2021 

 

                                                                  Critique Assignment  

 

There are many moving films by auteur director/screenwriters that I respect telling the story of an elder facing their mortality and doing so with horrible children. One comparison is Ingmar Bergman’s Wild Strawberries (1957) with the elder Professor Isak Borg and his distant ambivalent son. The closer comparison is Ozu’s Tokyo Story (1953) where the elder husband and his terminal wife from the country visit their callous city children in Tokyo. Akira Kurosawa is able to take this simple storyline and with famously unique screenwriting style and use of Brechtian technique; create the screenplay of Ikiru (1952) into a film that was novel for his time and today.  

 

Kurosawa developed the protagonist Mr. Watanabe. A man of values, principles and ethics. A man that was not sick from work for twenty-nine years and worked within the bureaucratic civil service system without ruffling feathers. “He’s presented with Brechtian objectivity via a quiet voice-over which tells us he’s got on for twenty-nine years by doing nothing at all” (Cochran). 

 

We are introduced in an emotionally restricted way to the background story of Mr. Watanabe’s family life and relationship with his son using a Hollywood montage way of storytelling. We see him caring for Matsuo above his own needs from his wife’s funeral to the present day. He is so selfless that he has declined advice to remarry for his own needs to take care of his son’s.  

 

Mr. Watanabe saved all his money and provided for his son and daughter-in-law. We see a solid man that has done everything that has been expected of him as a Japanese salaryman and a father. At the same time of building up this honorable character, Kurosawa is letting us know that this honest, simple soul is going to die. It’s an interesting Kurosawa strategy of building up a character for us to love and killing him at the same time. He is doubling our emotional concern over the character, yet also distancing us. 

Kurosawa uses Brechtian technique in Ikiru. “The formal experimentation of Ikiru has one central purpose: to sharpen the film’s focus by controlling and limiting the audience’s emotional response. A film about the last months of a man who knows he is dying is inherently threatened by a descent into bathos…yet the form of the film prevents this from happening and aids in its didactic task” (Prince 101). Bathos meaning over sentimentality.

 

So, what is the Brechtian film purpose that requires a controlled and limited response?  

“Kurosawa too, is committed in Ikiru, as in much of his other work, to the “uniformed” characters, to those just starting out in life whose moral transformation the films study and place in relation to a detailed social context. Heroes like Watanabe – are intended as explicit role models for the audience, but the values incarnated by their behavior are communicated through a “complex seeing” in which these lessons in responsible living are filtered through, altered, and sometimes deformed by the social order, whose competing values generate other voices in the texts that contest the example provided by the hero” (Prince 101). 

 

The screenwriting form of Ikiru is “a two-act structure: The first act being Watanabe coming to terms with his illness, and the second a posthumous re-counting at his wake of his building the park/ruminations on the man himself” (tvtropes). 

 

The narrative in Ikiru is nonlinear. This is used intentionally by Kurosawa as an unusual structure so that he can go to “good parts of a storyline that would’ve been too complicated and difficult to tell in a linear fashion” (Man). I believe he was writing the screenplay with a director’s mind editing the story and jumping to choice pieces, not feeling obliged to fill in all the blanks as traditional linear screenwriter would build a story from A to Z. Yet, somehow, Kurosawa seems to cover everything we need to know.  

 

The nonlinear narrative structure and “its form is marked by jumps, curves, and montages.”  It goes back to what Brecht spoke of in using film experimentation “to sharpen the film’s focus by controlling and limiting” the emotional response of the audience. A nonlinear structure also makes an emphasis on “human life as a process open to change” (Prince 101). 
 
“Kurosawa is known for is a diptych form of narrative” (Eggert). Diptych meaning a literary work consisting of two contrasting parts (as a narrative telling the same story from two opposing points of view) (Yourdictionary). 

 

“With Ikiru, Kurosawa studies a life as it changes from wholly empty to filled with intention, and then he considers how that life was viewed by others. The posthumous portion reveals itself to be tragically ironic, as the attendees at Watanabe’s wake talk of his life and grossly reduce it through their skewed perception of his final days. In each case with his diptych films, Kurosawa considers the relationship between the real and the ideal” (Eggert). 

 

Kurosawa uses this type of narrative in other films. Criterion in a review described the film structure as unconventional, even radical in design. Probably most famously used in Kurosawa’s Rashomon (1950). 

 

In the film Rashomon, there is a similar scene as the retelling Mr. Watanabe’s life at his funeral memorial.  The Rashomon effect “gives us four versions of the same series of events…. each retelling markedly different from the others” through the eyes of various witness at a trial (Prince/Criterion). 

 

Criterion says Kurosawa introduced the use of this new type of film storytelling. “When Rashomon (1950) played in Venice and then went into international distribution, it stunned audiences. No one had ever seen a film quite like this one. For one thing, its daring, nonlinear approach to narrative shows the details of the crime as they are related, through the flashbacks of those involved” (Prince/Criterion). 

 

“Kurosawa’s visionary approach would have enormous cinematic and cultural influence. He bequeathed to world cinema and television a striking narrative device—countless movies and television shows have remade Rashomon by incorporating the contradictory flashbacks of unreliable narrators” (Prince/Criterion). 

 

The uniqueness of Kurosawa’s screenwriting with a two-act diptych and nonlinear structure and the use of Brechtian technique is what makes Ikiru such an interesting and unique work. Also as stated he uses the hero Watanabe’s moral transformation in its social context as an intended role model for the audience. This social statement takes it to another level of influence as well. Filmmakers are influenced by Kurosawa as Criterion credits him with the first us of diptych style in film. These create a novel film in Ikiru that It is still admired as one of Akira Kurosawa’s great films and studied today.   

 

 

                                                            Works Cited 

 

 

Cochran, Peter. “Umberto D. (Vittorio de Sica) and Ikiru (Akira Kurosawa) both 1952.”  
        Petercochran.wordpress.com. Feb. 2009 
        https://petercochran.files.wordpress.com/2009/02/umbert_d_and_ikiru.pdf 

Eggert, Brian. “The Definitives: Ikiru.” Deep Focus Review, 5 Jan. 2009.  
        https://deepfocusreview.com/definitives/ikiru/  

Man, Mystery. “THE CRAFT: To Hell With Story Structure.” Script Magazine. 18 Jul. 2017.  
         https://scriptmag.com/features/the-craft-to-hell-with-story-structure 

Prince, Stephen. “The Rashomon Effect.” Criterion. 6 Nov. 2012.  
         https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/195-the-rashomon-effect 

Prince, Stephen. The Warrior's Camera: The Cinema of Akira Kurosawa. Revised and Expanded  
         Edition., Princeton University Press, 2020. 
 https://books.google.com/books?id=qG3dDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA101&lpg=PA101&dq=kurosawa+film+ikiru+nonlinear&source=bl&ots=Jn_vzCpkLD&sig=ACfU3U27LnV0nmKTyHSRwbqbbhYfjlF6Ow&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwisop2M4av0AhXDtp4KHX1XCP4Q6AF6BAgmEAM#v=onepage&q=kurosawa%20film%20ikiru%20nonlinear&f=false 

Tvtropes. “Film / Ikiru.” tvtropes.org.  
         https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Film/Ikiru 

Yourdictionary. “Diptych meaning.” yourdictionary.com. 
         https://www.yourdictionary.com/diptych 

 

 R's Brutal tear down critque of my work:

Wow Ida, what a myriad of academic backup in your critique and puzzle to figure out for me. Much of it I can't understand, but I will try and comment. In the second paragraph you state that Watanabe worked for 29 years without ruffling feathers. I assume this to mean bureaucratic feathers, as we saw the disgruntled ladies or 'the public' reaction to his 'doing nothing.' Those were some ruffled feathers. 

 I loved how you brought in comparisons to Bergman and Ozu in your into. I also admire your observation that the children were callous. This leads me to think that parents like this reap what they sow, so to speak, literally.  

 

I would also agree that Brechtian objectivity is appropriate. When I think of Brecht, I think of emotionless, so emotionless freedom from bias. I also agree that the depictions from his past are restricted emotionally. The scene where he watched his son get struck out in baseball was filled with squelched emotion. 

 

Brecht hadn't come to mind for me, so I find this idea fascinating. I just figured that he reacted in a Japanese way. Proper and to himself. When you mention that Kurosawa was building up a character to love and then kill him, I didn't feel much love for him. I just thought he did what was necessary and in keeping with his expected duty as a father.  

I don't know what is meant about 'yet distancing us', but it feels in keeping with your Brechtian idea. 

 

I felt distanced from Watanabe until he marched into the office after his absence, in his rakish white hat. Then the love came for this man with a new mission. I didn't know the word bathos, so I looked it up and it says 'the sudden appearance of the commonplace in otherwise elevated matter of style.'  

 

The paragraph about the Brechtian film purpose is one I had to read several times but I get it now (kind of). I won't stay stuck on that or my head will explode.  

 

Moving on.... I don't think I agree with tvtropes assessment of the film being a two-act structure, although I can see why an analysis would point this way.  

 

The reactions and opinions of Watanabe's associates, friends and family at the funeral were, to me, like the telephone game. As we all have our version of reality and bend our words and thinking to match how we 'really' feel about something, the real truth becomes our version of the truth; especially when reflecting on others, so this to me is what happens in the world, period. People do one thing and are remembered in another way, by those who think they know what the real score is.  

 

The ego-driven boss that wanted to take responsibility for Watanabe's success with the park just spoke to how people envision themselves and make it about himself. Over time, the truth of his success comes to light and one by one, they all come to realize that he maybe wasn't a great man, but he did a great thing (although a few thought he was great) I did not. 

 

I do agree with the diptych idea, that would lend to the two-part structure, but I'm still holding that the film had three distinctive parts, and the most important one was the journey he went through to get to where he got.  

Or maybe i just like any film that includes brothels.  

 

You mention Rashomon, and this device in storytelling is a bit similar for the funeral scene, but in Rashomon it was done amplified and the only style. 

 

I love the idea in your conclusion that the moral transformation has a social context as well as a personal message to the audience as that is the effect the film had on me. Well done! Your in-depth study made me think HARD...and look up words! Dang girl! 

My post to teacher - Anna: 
Hi Anna,

Just FYI, I do respect Robert’s feedback on my critique but think I will stand behind the sources I cited and will not re-do things to be a considerably different paper.

So, It's my final paper now.

Thanks,
Ida

2nd note to Anna: 

Ok, I decided to make some changes on my paper. Will send the final post soon.
ida