Wonder Boys (1999)

Genre
Being an adaptation of a best-selling novel with the same title makes it easier for me to figure out the movie’s genre placements. However, as I intended to watch it again so I went to the video store and I just couldn’t find it in the drama section, about which I was quite sure to find it in. It ended up sorted under the comedy genre. Because of the earlier confusion caused by genre understanding of Wonder Boys, I had a visit to IMDB to check out which it belongs to. Drama/ Comedy were the answer. I had never heard of this genre and that, was the reason I wanted to watch it again. It was such a special film that involved great deal of deeper thoughts and well-placed humor. Grady Tripp, played by Michael Douglas, was a university literature professor, who had a very talented student named James Leer, portrait by Tobey Maguire. As the story line advanced, Grady found him self less worthy to others and himself; on the other hand, James had his talents discovered, his life style changed. Although they both went through a couple of hardships, they eventually found their dreams and their realities.

Dualism
There were a few dualism performed in the film. Between Q and Tripp was a rivalry that was easy for audience to catch up with. There were others that expressed significant characterizations by the story creator. Crabtree and Tripp, the editor and the writer, although their jobs link them together but the ways they deal with life were on the opposite sides. The dualism, or the binary opposition, can be seen when Professor Tripp sent James back to his home and immediately Crabtree had the idea of rescuing James from his parents. Crabtree did play the opposite side of Grady but also he was positioned also as an editor in Grady Tripp’s life. He made him make the right choices a lot of time as shown in the scene where Grady lost his lengthy novel, which made Grady pick up his new life. Sara, the chancellor, was not “faithful” to her husband but Walter though she was. Sara, who didn’t seem to care too much about her husband’s dog’s death and the loss of the jacket which was put on Marilyn Monroe before showed a strong contrast as Walter called the police to try to find out who was behind all that. James Leer was a mutual character between all. He was unique and sort of the mixed of all other character in my point of view.


Feminism
Sara, played by Frances McDormand represented Feminism in this movie. She was first very humble and seemed to be obeying all her husband’s commands. You can see this through many scenes’ detailed portraits. She came to answer the door at the party, she sit quietly during the Word Fest. She tried not to offend her husband by her affairs. But towards the end, when Grady called Walter and told him about the affairs, she also began more in-control on her situation with Walter. She became stronger and told her men that she would make her decisions herself. She no longer bowed to men and respected everything they did. And in fact, she made her choice of having the baby and divorce Walter to stay with her true love, Grady.

Auteurism
Curtis Hanson, the director of Wonder Boys, used a lot of musical expression in it. From every now and then, we heard a background song playing either on TV, or on radio. These songs give us a clearer image of the situation in which the characters were. Doubting if this is the director’s style, I went to check out some clips from one of his well-known movies-8 Mile. The story was the biography of how Eminem came to his success. Curtis was proven very gifted in adding musical elements into his films when I watched parts of 8 Mile again. One example from Wonder Boys would be the scene at Tripp’s house in Kinship where James turned on the TV and heard a “lecture.” It was very compatible to Tripp’s situation and that is why the movie makers left the subtitles on during that part on DVD. Also, another specialty of Hanson’s films is that there were many good sayings. “What does it matter what I think?” “I mean, what does it matter what anybody thinks?” “Most people don’t think, James.” This had become my favorite movie quote. My second favorite would be-“Books, they don’t mean anything. Not to anybody.”

Cognitive Psychology
One thing I particularly noticed was the usage of muted environmental sound during important conversations. In a scene, professor Tripp had a conversation with James on the road to Johnson’s where James’ parent came to pick him up. In that scene, there was no obvious sound effect coming from a fast-driven car and road sounds, just the conversation. The director successfully gave the scene a soft-touched sense by eliminating other unnecessary sounds, making us feel how precise, deep-hearted, important that conversation was without letting us easily know that he was doing so. Also in the last scene in the Word Fest gathering, Curtis showed the student who were criticizing James’ novel in class standing next to professor Tripp, implying that the professor was surrounded by the things he didn’t favor to encounter. But later, as James got honored by the audience, Tripp wasn’t afraid to shout out for him, showing that he overcame those negative events and walked out from them on a way of his. They are both wonder boys!

This is Hannah Green.

Oh yeah, by the way, she's Tom Cruise's wife in case you don't know that!

The Conversation (1974)

I saw this classic last two days ago...It was only ok for me...

But here are the studies I did on them.

Genre:

I would say that The Conversation, directed by Francis Ford Coppola, was a mystery thriller, despite many other genres listed on IMDB. I felt this way because from what I saw the first time (I plan on watching it once more), those two were what I knew more about and was more familiar with their story formulas, scene convention, and iconic shots. The story consisted of one main character that was secretive from the inner point of view in the world which the story took place but clearly known from audience’s eyes, and many other characters you didn’t know too much about until the last few minutes of the movie. The way Coppola created the scenes was quite identical to other films in these genres. One good example of the scene convention in The Conversation would be the murder that took place in a hotel room next to the main character’s own. The iconic shots were almost everywhere in the film. The surveillance tools were the symbol of secrets, deception, and the encounter to a violation of the secrets.

Binary Oppositions (Dualism):

The dualism in The Conversation was displayed by two very different groups of people-the secret keepers and the secret seekers. Harry Caul (Gene Hackman) was the top secret seeker in his world and his work had once directly led to the murder of three people. Cindy Williams, the secret keeper was the employee of a company whose leader was planned to be murdered by her character, Ann. Harry was once a killer in the past as he considered himself in the story but later played a life saver in the story. Oppositely, Ann was portrayed as a nice-looking, nice girl in the beginning of the film but later on she was the murder of her boss. There were some very strong and clear contrasts between characters.

Mimicry and Catharsis:

In the movie The Conversation, there were also several social controversies but the one that was the most emphasized was the surveillance industry. Back when the movie was made in 1974, the industry began to sprout. Director then showed us how far the technology might go in the future, what moralities that came with it were, and the most important of all: the possible criminal use of it. He also made it seem so mysterious by using many unusual artificial sound effects when the tools were operated that made me think he was trying to convey a negative image of surveillance. Francis Coppola indeed had become a pioneer to show these to his audience and made them think about it when they headed home from theaters.

Auteurism:

Not having seen many of the Coppola collection, I have seen the possibly most important one- Apocalypse Now (1979). Although now I am going backwards, meaning that The Conversation (1974) was made before Apocalypse Now, I might be wrong but I now think that Francis Coppola displayed his favor of a mixture of sound and images in his films, especially the well-reviewed ones. In the famous opening scene of Apocalypse Now, he mixed the sound of helicopter and the fan on the ceiling and in The Conversation, he mixed the flushing toilet with the sound of Harry’s surveillance advices. He used our ability to understand multiple meanings of a mixture of image and sound very well.

Marxism:

The script of The Conversation also discussed about Marxism. The story told us about two employees rebelled against their boss of the same company. It implied the central philosophy of Marxism that encouraged the weaker, or the less-powered to rise against the stronger and the powered. Being made in the 70s, an era in which American public was still taught to fight communism in many ways, the film set an image of “the bad guys” on those who planned to murder their employer instead of setting Harry as the sneaker, or even an ID thief. However, if this film was made nowadays, it would be totally different as we think differently. But yes, Marxism was implemented in the script and well countered.

The Fountain (2006)

Trailers:
http://www.apple.com/trailers/wb/thefountain/

"It's a Psalm: It sounds great, it looks beautiful, and it means a lot! "

Those are the words I would use if a press asked me about how I thought about the highly anticipated movie "The Fountain." Director, described as the greatest living American director by Warren iterates, who was the host of this screening event, took a long period of time to complete this work after the previously welcomed Requiem for a Dream (2000). He said he had gone to many Central American countries for research on an ancient Mayan myth and I could see that clearly. Every single part of the film was so well-prepared like how he mixed up his various ideas about death as rebirth. There were some areas that were just outstanding such as music, sound, lighting, framing, and a powerful message to tell.

The multi-dimensional story line began with a Spanish conquistador Thomas (Hugh Jackman) who was set onto his quest to search for the great mystery of the fountain of youth by the Queen of Spain (Rachel Weisz), a hard working scientist (Jackman) who worked so hard on developing a cure to save his lover (Weisz) 's life, and a future astronaut (Jackman) traveled far beyond galaxy to a place he and his loved one (Weisz) believed where death and life were one.

"Our bodies are prisons for our souls. All flesh decays. Death turns all to ash. And thus death frees every soul. "

In the 1500 story, the Church was outrageous because Spain discovered the secret of the Mayan legend of the fountain of youth, or to say the Christian mystery of the tree of life. Therefore, the Church wished to take control of Spain before the secret-that men can actually live forever, was revealed to the world. The queen then hand picked Thomas because of his loyalty to Spain and its queen and it was in the scene too that the director created the most memorable script line of the movie- "When you come back, I shall be your Eve, together we will live forever." During this small "fellowship of the tree"'s staying in the Mayan jungles, patience of its members was outrun by the father or the priest's being unable to find the temple, where the tree was. But by a mythic map on the dagger (you'll understand what I am talking about after watching the film.), the priest found it finally. Unfortunately, it was too late (this concept, being too late, was often raised throughout the movie.), the impatient soldiers killed him before Thomas could stop them. From that moment on, the conquistador fought alone because of two of his men left were killed because of their cowardliness while facing Mayan warriors. He fought alone with the "king" or the "guardian" of the fountain. If you want to know who won, keep reading.

It is year of 2006, a scientist named Tommy (Jackman) who does experiments on a monkey was very eager to find a cure for his wife, Izzi (Weisz), who had a desease that caused her not feeling anything. Izzi knows she's going to die soon so she started writing a novel called "The Fountain", which was accidentally the same as the title of the movie I am talking about. In addition, it tells what I just told you, too. Don't understand? This is where I think the story's success is-it plays with your mind when you're "experiencing" the movie and it became logical to you when you're out of the theater...hmm... Back onto the track, she finished most of her book and left only the last chapter for Tommy to compose as she finally died right before the cure was developed. Again, this is where the "being too late" came into the story. There were quite a few discussions from this part of the movie that will impact people. One of the most impressive one for me was whether to spend more time with someone you know that is dying soon or searching for the cure. In Tommy's case, he spent more time on developing the drug so he regreted about not spending enough time with Izzi. He had not yet finished the book at the end of this time period but the sotry line jumps from present to future, or when the real side of the movie ends. Again, keep reading or you won't understand.

In the last part of the movie, which was the final journey of Thomas's quest for the eternal life, the Astronaut wore a meditate-like clothing and first appeared to be meditating above the tree you guys see on the poster. The main idea, or the creativity here came from Buddhist beliefs-said the director Darren Aronofsky even someone at the Q&A asked him if the idea of Hugh's eating the tree as a spiritual bread came from the Catholic holy communion. Well, I guess the circle and the meditation, and all the yellowish colors that were found in last scenes were Buddhist. The astronaut (I didn't mention his name because it was either not mentioned in the movie or I forgot...or sometimes the director meant not to mention his name because it couldn't be more obvious that they three were the same person from the beginning to the end.) was trying to reach Xibalba, a place where 2006 Tommy and Izzi promised that death and life shall meet, while traveling in the "bubble rocket" with a tree that symbols the Spanish queen, or Izzi. As he got closer to it, the life indicators of the tree weakened more. Eventually, it was too late again as the tree died right before they reached Xibalba. The three stories then joined together as one as the editor showed the ending of the three stories altogether: the conquistador didn't need to beat the Mayan to pass to the tree of life, because he was a special person who deserved to drink from it. The modern Tommy ran out to the snow-covered field where his wife was buried to place a cone that he got from the tree onto Izzi's grave. The end to the space expedition was his life's being taken away to join Xibalba with the tree's death as one. Now here comes another memorable quote form the movie

" Death is the way to Awe and Life."

Well well, that was the plot...Now we can get into the outstanding lighting and framing.

Introduction

Above is a picture of three intersecting lines meaning the three elements that make me who I am- the Desire to Technology, the Love of Nature, and the Passion to Dream.

This will be the place where I share my thoughts on movies with the world. It's been a long time since I went to the first movie in my life. Now it's about time to get deeper into films while trying to get into the industry. By taking a course at school so called "Introduction to Film", and by regularly attending free premiers, I will push myself to put more efforts into writing reviews of movies.

"amisare" means that everyone visits this blog believes that different people join as one in a movie's presence.