Blog #4 - Scene Analysis (Jose C)

For our scene analysis, I decided on a scene from on of my favorite movies, Toshio Matsumoto's Funeral Parade of Roses. It's a largely experimental film, but it follows the story of our troubled protagonist named Eddie in a Oedipus-inspired story involving rival drag queens, drug dealers and the gay Tokyo nightlife. The scene I will be analyzing in particular is a short one in which one of Eddie's friends is singing in a bar, entertaining its patrons.

This shot, like the rest of the movie is shot in black and white and in film, giving it a deep and warm quality common with film. The camera is centered on the queen singing in the foreground, with the rest of the bar (minus its patrons) fading into the shadow background. The camera, seemingly handheld goes for a closeup shot around 18 seconds into the clip as she turns around repeatedly.

The lighting is well-placed, even in this shadowy bar her face almost always seems to be adequately illuminated. And even when it isn't the darker tones add to the light drama of the scene and hint at the darkness to come.

Rebecca wang Blog #4

Naughty Boy- La La La ft. Sam Smith 

This music video is a great example of story telling. The video is about 4 minutes long, it 's on youtube. The story is based on Wizard of Oz, but it's a boy version of it. I like the scene when the boys father was yelling at the boy ( in the beginning of the video). The editing techniques in the music video really enhanced the storytelling and continuity. The ways be used are: Some sequences is in one individual shot, used a lot of zoom in to create the dramatic feelings, used different perspective/ point of views, and the relationship with music is matching (lyric and action), also it had a lot of close up shot following the thirty degrees rule (or 180 degrees rule), these all helps to make the story to better understand and make the image more vivid.  

I really like the used of zoom in and slow motion, it creates a feeling of torture, and the close up shot gave a rich feeling of emotions. Another important thing I learned from this final project and this video is, to make the story smooth, the  different footages of same scene should be cut on actions.  

The composition in this video is nice, there were foreground, background, and the midground (main subject). The color of this video was plain and a little dark, even tough there's a scene in the bright desert, viewers can still feel the loneliness while watching it. Overall it's just a really emotional piece of work, along with the music makes it more emotional, I like it a  lot.

Joanne Mariano - Scene Analysis

 "The Conversation" - Francis Coppola

 The scene moves to a shot of Harry standing on the sink of the bathroom looking and listening through a vent within the wall. As he bends down to see what is located under the sink, Harry pulls out his blue suitcase of spying utensils and places it on top of the toilet. This is very interesting because usually suitcases are brown or black, especially if one is trying to be secretive like Harry should be; however, the suitcase is a bright blue and pops out in the shot which is mainly white and dark shadow colors. This is probably not a coincidence because blue is usually associated with the sky which may symbolize calmness, cleanliness, masculinity, wisdom, and intellect, unlike warmer colors such as red, orange, or yellow which may represent more emotional or interactive tones. The blue suitcase can symbolize wisdom and intellect because it contains the high technology audio equipment used to bug Harry’s victims. The blue can also symbolize calmness and cleanliness because his work is very dangerous and it can be considered “dirty work” so it is important for Harry to remain calm and clean.

Harry finds a spot in the plaster of the wall and drills a hole into it. This shot of the scene is crucial because Harry’s body position is much squished. According to Godfather: The Intimate Francis Ford Coppola by Gene D. Phillips, Coppola “called him Harry Call but the transcriber had typed Caul” and decided to keep it because he knew what a caul was: “a membrane that surrounds a fetus until it is born……Harry wears a translucent plastic raincoat, a visual symbol that he is still insulated inside a caul” (Phillips). This touches back to Harry’s position under the sink because he almost shrinks himself into a smaller area, resembling the image of a fetus. As he creates a hole in the wall, he blocks his loud action by constantly flushing the toilet next to him. This shot foreshadows the murder and is ironic because Harry’s way of keeping his audio surveillance action a secret by flushing the toilet is the same way the murderers in the other room try to keep their murder a secret and is revealed when Harry flushes their toilet and blood floods out.

Harry continues to listen to the conversation in Room 773, as the camera slowly zooms into his face. What the viewers hear is the muffled voices of the same couple from the beginning; however, the way they are speaking gives an idea that they are arguing. When Harry’s face consumes almost the entire space of the shot, a masculine voice says, “I can’t stand it, I can’t stand it.” Then a special effect noise is heard which sounds exactly like a tape being rewinded. The feminine voice from the original conversation repeats in Harry’s mind, “I love you,” and Harry fidgets, taking off his headphones with the impression that he was startled and cannot get the first conversation out of his mind. The camera zoom in this shot adds to the suspenseful effect. This shot shows that Harry’s character has somewhat changed. Usually, bugging people’s conversations are his expertise, and all he does is simply record what he hears, without trying to interpret everything. This time, Harry has made his job personal because of his fear of a planned murder. These few shots of Harry actually doing the job and listening into Room 773 in the bathroom is ironic as well because the bathroom is believed to be the most peaceful and private room in a house, but here, the exact opposite happens.

 This scene is one of the most important scenes within the film because it directly includes the Watergate Scandal which has everything to do with privacy and surveillance by the government. This entire scene also delves into the true characteristics Harry Caul has. By the way this murder scene was shot and edited emphasizes the reality of what guilt and fear can do to a person.

Blog 4 - Kill Bill

I chose to analyze a scene from Kill Bill. I chose the "Bride vs Crazy 88" scene, for the camera is constantly following every detail of the battle. The camera revolves around the main character. This is done to give a visual of all of the opponents surrounding her. A close up of her face is provided after each devastating blow in order to emphasize the concentration and effort being put into the battle. The camera is constantly switching angles and moving with the character to show the intensity and agility in which the film maker wants the viewer to realize. The shots change rapidly, but the shot increases in length when showing the lethal blow. a variety of short shots are placed together to emphasize the velocity of her moves. The contact being made is typically last longer in order to glorify the the action. The cuts are obvious, for the filmmaker wants Theres no music in the start of the fighting scene. The only sounds used are sound effects of swords connecting, blood splattering, and men screaming in agony. Heroic and Adventurous music are used to drive the story. Music begins when the main character views her main target. The velocity of the cuts increases with the music. This is done to emphasize the action. The ending part of the scene in the blue room sets the tone for the scene, for it shows the characters as mere shadows fighting in the dark. It symbolized the entire scene in this small portion, for all of her opponents are similar. The absence of color diversity forces the viewer to foes on the battle aspect. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbAzWvTbrbA

Audio Portrait of Mr.Quentin Jackson

https://soundcloud.com/xxomelissaoxx323/melissaa

Experience at the Museum of Moving Image

Going to the Museum of Moving Image was not only fun and informative, but it didn’t even feel like I was on assignment at ALL! I felt like I was a kid again, and was truly engaged with most if not all of the exhibits. The one which I enjoyed in particular was the Foley artist exhibit. I was aware that some of the sounds we hear in movies or other media aren’t actually made by what is seen, but I had no idea most of what is heard is recreated by Foley artists, using the most unexpected objects/materials. During this exhibit, our tour guide showed us a scene from the movie “Titanic”, when Rose falls onto the deck and a large pillar collapses into the ocean. The guide broke the scene’s audio into different levels, and had us guess what objects were used to recreate the sound of Rose falling onto the deck after tripping, and what was used in order to recreate the sound of the large pillar collapsing into the ocean. We were all surprised to find out a slowed down audio clip of an elephant trumpeting was used for the pillar, and also learned celery is the object used to make the sound of limbs breaking. It’s not exactly the sound these actions we are watching on the screen make, but the sounds our brains associate with the action. Another exhibit that I loved was the Feral Fount exhibit by Gregory Barsamian, which was a huge spinning stroboscopic zoetrope, which was absolutely amazing, beautiful, and confusing when trying to figure out how the heck it works… but basically teaches the importance of intervals to make an illusion of moving image happen. So much fun!

Blog Assignment 2: "What I Hear"

Working in the West Village off of 14th street and Washington, I, like most native to the area, do my best to zigzag through the hustle and bustle, at the beat of my iPod playlist of choice and get to my destination as fast as possible, with as little interaction with crowds and tourists. It's amazing how much we truly miss visually on a day to day basis, but especially sad/scary how much we miss auditorily. Most of us are guilty of doing everything possible to either relieve, numb, or enhance "reality" around us, especially while on our way to school, work, running errands, etc. I am glad that we had an opportunity to sit still and actually listen to our environment for this assignment in order to increase our sonic awareness and realize how much is actually going on around us. I walked into Coffee Bean for a cup of joe, made sure my scarf was securely wrapped around my neck (the area on 14th and 9th is known for its strong breeze), and proceeded to walk around around. It was about 6:45 pm, the sun was setting, and there was a lot of traffic as well as crowds of people walking around. At first it felt uncomfortable... almost PAINFUL not feeling those earbuds tightly packed into my ear canal, however, my anxiety quickly turned into curiosity. I was hearing sounds my iPod and conditioned brain helped me tune out. I heard snippets of multiple conversations as people rushed by me on their phones, with their friends and significant others, cars and Citi bikes beep their horns at slow moving traffic or people jaywalking... I could hear dogs barking about a block and a half away, laughter, a crying toddler, a girl wearing high heels walking by me, and as I got closer to 14th and 8th avenue, I could hear train announcements by the station. It was a lovely, awakening experience.