14.5 DISCUSSION - History etc.

14.5 DISCUSSION - History etc.

Purpose

This discussion gives you the chance to apply the knowledge you attained through the reading to your choice of the work screened for this module.

Directions

Use the vocabulary of filmmaking in respect to film history the 4 basic historical approaches and/or specific movements as described in chapter 10. 

This week describe and analyze Land and Shade. Discussion topics may include, but are not limited to:

What similarities does the film share with a historical film movement/style as described in chapter 10?

How is it similar or different from that of the Hollywood Studio system - the star system?

Are there elements that make the film unique?

Or as in our 4th learning outcome, how do the filmic techniques utilized inform cultural development and social awareness?

Feel free to discuss the acting and chapter 9 as well. For instance,

How does the style of acting contribute to the tone?

Are there moments in which the interplay between the camera and the actor(s) affects your understanding of the story.

Give multiple examples.

My Post: 
12-3-2021

La Tierra y La Sombra (César Augusto Acevedo, 2015)
had most of the characteristics of a Neorealist film. Thematically, there was a line in the text that seemed like they were talking about La Tierra y La Sombra. It said that Neorealist filmmakers “placed the highest value on the lives of ordinary working people; …decried widespread unemployment, poverty…government corruption and inadequate housing” (Monahan 380).

La Tierra y La Sombra depicts a small Columbian county where the people are barely making enough money to survive. The way that they make money is by working in the hazardous cane fields. The daughter-in-law mentions that she prefers the continuous burning and falling of black ash all day as the cane fields are worse and cut like razor blades. In a later scene the grandfather is cutting cane around the house and gets a huge slash across his palm. 

The corrupt Sugar Cane processor is not protecting the workers with any kind of mouth or eye shields. They daily ash burning is probably like chain smoking all day for the workers' lungs. It is killing the workers but, they are expendable and there are always more that need work. By the end of the day the daughter-in-law comes home with a blackened face and clothes from working in these conditions.

Similar to Neorealism this is a story of ordinary poor people (although these are actors). The people are poor because of combination of corporate and government corruption. In a government for the people there are rules to protect the working people from this kind of corporate abuse and poisoning of the people and environment. In third world countries corporations have a louder voice than the people. Especially the poor people. The government doesn’t have an incentive to put restrictions on them. 

The filming style is also Neorealist in that it is filmed on location around the family home and in the cane fields. There are a few scenes where the grandfather goes into town to buy something or take his son to the hospital, but those look like real locations. The dark interior shots seem to be on location as well as all the window shots exactly match the exterior. There are a lot of long shots used outside even when there are just two characters together. For example, the times that the grandfather was outside with his son and grandson, instead of a close up to see their faces, Acevedo uses a long shots to also capture the cane and the surrounding area. This was done in Neorealism to “maintain the look of the actual spaces where shooting occurred” (Monahan 381).

Neorealist films also can have “a documentary visual style that included shooting in the streets with natural light and lightweight cameras” (Monahan 380). An example of this is when the family comes home from work. There is a handheld camera following them and walking behind them unevenly as if it is a coworker. In the end the handheld camera walks into the burning cane fields that are right outside the family home. 

The ending of the film is “true to the neorealist credo, is ambiguous” (Monahan 381). The group that goes with the grandfather perhaps has a better chance although we do not know for sure. The stubborn grandmother chooses to be left behind on her land. It’s inconceivable how she will survive without a job or money, but that is her choice. 

Anna's Response to my post -- private response: 

Thank you for your thorough discussion and your very informative response. I lived in Mexico for a bit and am aware of the bond, but I never really thought about why the son stayed and that the stubbornness of the mother created the situation depicted. I truly appreciate your insight.

Anna Geyer, Dec 4 at

R's Post

1. Wow, what a bleak (and boring...sorry to be blunt) film.  Shot in the style of Italian Neorealism with seemingly nonprofessional actors giving naturalistic performances, this film tells a story of impoverished everyday working class people.  A strict family dynamic with a man returning after 17 years to help care for his sick son as the basis, is a slice of real life as it would probably look.  The authentic setting lends to the despair of nowhere to go, nothing to do, especially for the young son.

2. This film differs from the Hollywood studio system as there are no major stars attached to it, that I know, anyway.  There is no happy ending, or even much of a narrative arc other than the father dying as the conflict that looms over the entire film.  I thought he would die much sooner, but the lingering felt beleaguered.  A Hollywood film would never look or move like this.  There were no major singular protagonists and the plot didn't give us much background as to why the old man left in the first place and what his new life is like. A  Hollywood film doesn't often drop a viewer into a story like this with no backstory or established goal achieved = ART FILM!  The quiet and somber drudgery was unrelenting and Hollywood would never produce a film like this in the Studio system days.  I felt like the director did everything right.  The images were beautifully shot and the acting was perfect, but the lack of compelling story was disappointing for this viewer.

3. The acting contributes to the tone as characters rarely smiled. There wasn't much to smile about. It was obvious that there were wounds that hadn't healed and deep silent resentments.  The many single tears let us know the desperation of their predicament.  The turning away and saying nothing when confronted with prickly questions about the past just spoke to a mood of quiet discontent and resignation to the circumstances, and silence was preferred.

My Response to R.:

We'll never get a false word out of you in this class Robert and that is why I have enjoyed reading your reviews so much. 

First I have to say how much this film made me think of Terrence Malik's Days of Heaven (1978) Latin American version. There were some beautiful shots of the cane fields and the fire at the end. However, it has that Latin American flavor of exploitation. The pace is also very slow, nothing happens fast in most of our Latino countries, so that is very authentic. I agree Robert, it was a painfully long death.

There is a lot of unspoken cultural context that I think would be very difficult for one to pick up on without being from a Latin family or country. Also I was listening to the film in Spanish. 

Being half Mexican myself, I saw it as mainly a family story. In Latin families the mother is usually the strongest voice behind the scenes and the mother and son bond is very tight. In mine I can see it across all the generations of my family.

R's Response:

Thanks for the cultural context Ida....that helps in understanding the complex mother/son relationship.  I must say that the film 'has' stuck with me, even though being in it had me squirming and watching the time once I determined that the film was going to plod in its pace.  It certainly was an unvarnished glimpse into a culture that didn't pose many options, and that was quietly disturbing.  I too caught the explanation of the father leaving due to the sugar cane crop overtaking their once more peaceful existence.  This further explains the old woman digging her heels in and bending those around her against their will.  I had one random thought at the end of the film when the old woman was alone and sat on that bench by the tree after all her loved ones had gone.  I just 'knew' that the shot would pull out to reveal the platform the old man built for the boy,....and a bird would land on it....but she wouldn't see it and only the viewer would....and then the the film ends.  Now 'that' would have been some poetry to ponder on.

One last thought.  I loved Days of Heaven that you mentioned, but unlike Tierra y la Sombra, Malick was backed by Paramount (thus Hollywood) and gave us a young and perfect Richard Gere to fill the screen with, where the other film, like a Neorealist film, gave us regular people.  Hollywood loves its beauty.

My Response to R: 

My analysis is that the husband left because he said he couldn't stay and see what was happening around there with the sugar cane growth. He said that to his son in the beginning and to his ex-wife towards the end of the film.  I believe no one would listen to his correct assessment of the situation, that it was time to leave.  No one would listen and follow him.

I believe the stubborn and selfish mother would not give up on her land, would not see the truth, and her son being loyal of course stayed with her. So her stubbornness essentially killed her own son, as she refused to leave. Even as she saw him get sick and could've granted him his freedom. He wouldn't have  taken it because he would have never left her there alone by herself.  

The daughter-in-law had conversations with him and said - we need to leave, your mother is the problem; knowing that he would never leave her. They were all dying because of his loyalty to her and her insanity to not see this situation as getting worse each year. 

The strongest part of the film for me was when the son was dying and crying to his mother that he was sorry. He was sorry for not making it and being there for her. 

I think there are a lot of stories of what people do to keep their land and feel that it is their home and they will not be forced out. The mother's stubbornness broke up her marriage, killed her son and left her daughter-in-law a widow. 

Very Latino. 

Teacher Anna's Response: 

Interesting that Days of Heaven is mentioned, 

Ida, I think I'll have to see it again, I remember the 1st time I saw it I wasn't that impressed, but I think it was just my mood as an audience member going in. I was non-plussed once the posse appeared. The second time I saw it I appreciated it to a greater degree. Now I want to see it again. It is the only thing I have ever appreciated Richard Gere for, well other than that Kurosawa movie where he plays the distant relative who can't speak Japanese very well, Rhapsody in August. Rhapsody in August is also a film which depicts 3 generations of a family and exhibits many characteristics of Neorealism, but the story revolves around the grandmother.

Anyway, great discussion and Ida thank you for the cultural context.