Baraka Film blog

The film Baraka was awe inspiring in the shots alone and the symbolic interpretations that I saw in numerous shots taken. With pun intended, the first shot of this film was better than anything I had ever done in film class, either that symbolizes my work ethic or the extremely high level of shot execution and geographic exhibition of nature that this film displayed. I think it is the extremely difficult shots that supposedly took 13 months to take and traveling to 24 countries. The idea of nature being awe inspiring has always had that effect upon me, however the scale of this films awe registered an 11 out of 10. 12 out of 10 is awarded if i actually get to go to any of these places displayed in the film. This concept of Awe inspiring to me is different to relatively every person. The indigenous of these places who are used to such cultural environments would see our civilization and be completely awe struck as i am merely witnessing their own cultures and environments. So, alien their "world's" seem that I have been inspired to travel, to my hearts content until witnessing with my own eyes, these places of beauty. (opinion).

This mountain shot alone is something for the beginning of a mythical movie,...ahem (lord of the rings) perhaps or maybe something in a nature magazine never known to exist to the typical suburban kid. These shots have meaning in their brilliance and shot difficulty, yet the story line of this movie is still unclear. A possible reason is that we did not watch the entire film, thus an interweaved idea in the film from the beginning to the end could not have been percieved. However,

I can see the prevalence of the idea of cultural experience and diversity in differing countries around the world. Thus, I have concluded that the idea of this film was to inform the individual of such differing cultural experiences, so as to shock the individual watching the film as well as opening their minds to the possibilities. From most of these shots a feeling of detachement can be felt as though you are an omniscient being observing the people of these countries and these cultures as though you are supposed to pass judgement upon the orthodox or the ordain objects and methods from our own society.

This is a rock garden in kyoto Japan, intriguing to me in its shape and its paterns as well as its methods of creating such "art" or cultural distinction. This film shows views being shattered through out the world. The shots are often wide mixed with close ups, but there is no shot displaying something insignificant. Shots often have foreground, midground and background giving such depth to shots that it's ability to make your jaw drop unprecedented in society today.
these shots also have music associated with them, though my memory is enriched by the depth of each shots beauty. The sense I felt when listening to the music was that of natural connotations of music in such environments, which enable the feeling of being apart of something much more than yourself. This idea of peace and unorthodox ways of using natural music in my suburban lifestyle suprised me. Though the suprise is associated with the beauty of the shots and the atmosphere surrounding the cultures and natural music that enhances them.

Epic failure Film Critique

A) Rationale: The Film that we made was about a basketball player that took the game a little to far by falling in love with the ball that he played with. Inevitably the Character, sees the ball as his way of defeating anyone who plays against him in the sport, treating the ball with human human qualities trying to seduce the ball into letting him win against the opposing character in the film. We tried to make the film comedic but the execution on one of the versions was not as coherent in the plot and design as another. (And pretty harsh criticism, though it was deserved in a way)

B) Commentary

1. Some of my areas of responsibility involved me being the cinematographer of the piece. Also I did a lot of the work on the setting up of the beginning scenes where Zafir and Vince are playing each other on the basketball court. The rest of the shots I am not proud of because the locations that were chosen were based on whims and on the issue of time which plagued our 2 man team since the beginning. However, I enjoyed some of the background that I was able to capture in my piece especially with foreground, midground, background in the basketball court shot, setting the scene as being urban, instead of rural. Also I was responsible for the initial story and script design though we changed the approved script and story line throughout shooting, due to the issue of timing.
2. Some factors that arose while being the cinematographer involved the lighting at specific scenes. This was due to scheduling difficulties on all members who had matters to attend to on days where scheduling was originally set. This led to dim shots that were off balance in color and lighting difficulties due to the time on different days. Also the locations of certain shots were used in the spontaneous developement of ideas that could (improve) the plot and that would make our film better, but obviously that backfired and sent us and our film crashing down like a world war 2 fighter. Anyways, being the cinematographer I tried to use lots of establishing shots and zoom shots in the piece as well as having long shots that establish the character and then the scene as in Amelie. Some other problems that I encountered being a writer of the script was the idea of not having a set plan of dialogue yet because we were unsure on whether we wanted the ball to have a voice for itself and Zafir speaking to the ball as a person.
3.Since we did not get shots that were perfect in color temperature or in setting as well, I tried to place filters over some of the parts. However, looking back at the significant differences in color, we were pressed for time due to our poor planning, from excessive fooling around since my partners were my friends and the organization of shots was not the best. Therefore, fixing this problem in the future, I will not use Zafir or Vince bolla as any of my casting or partners because I really enjoy this class and I dislike having such a terrible grade when I know I can make better films than this and be proud of my work instead of hiding under my jacket when viewing the film. Another problem of the film that I had to address in my role as the cinemetogropher was the issue of lighting in the piece, obviously most of the lighting shots were not perfect, but they could have been much worse, given the time our group had in developing and shooting the scenes. Also, I acted as a mediator in the group when things started to get out of hand or when individuals were getting bored and wanted to do something else. Basically, I had to force some people at times to continue on with the film so we could get it done as the light gradually faded, my desire to be apart of the group faded as well.
4.Some problems that arose from the film as a whole was the acting choice. We thought that having (vince) as our actor would make our film Funny yet he stole the show and our film died a horrible uncomedic death. Also looking back at the day of showing our film, there was a lot of tension being that the Western Baptist church came to our school to protest the Laramie project and since Zafir's edit had some, "outtakes" which I am not proud of, we deserved a lot of the criticism that we got. Also the audio was off for all of our shots making editing strenuous which, I remebered was probably the inconsistent use of the same cameras in the shooting of individual scenes as well as the mics that we used. Also when we were shooting at Allen there was apparently an afterschool daycare that was playing on the courts the same time that we were shooting our scenes which made us, have to void a lot of shots and audio. Also, on a major day of shooting the camera died on us and we were forced to resume the following day which resulted in a different color temperature and thus, a film which looks a lot worse than it could have been. However, it was our fault, so we can't really say anything.
5.We were not able to fix our problems because we were pressed for time. One being our acting choice which was terrible beyond belief, yet available whenever we needed him. yet he did not take any of our shots seriously and the performance as seen in the edit was all that I could muster from him (vince). Some problems that I tried to address in our piece was the lighting because a lot of our shots were taken at different times making the effect of viewing a clean cut or action less realistic. So I tried to use color correction to make some of the scenes seem as flawless as they were going to get for the amount of time that we had and the quality of the shots that we had taken. When dealing with the children on the playground as stated earlier we had to void a lot of our audio and some shots where kids got in the way of our footage. However, we tried to wait for the children to go inside to resume shooting, yet the color temperature was a little off, thus, filters. Also we had Viince bolla as an actor and I tried to get realistic shots from him however, when he was able to give me a shot that seemed like it deserved to be in the film Zafir couldn't stop laughing because it seemed so unusual, for VINCE to be trying.
6. I am not going to lie, but this film was absolutely terrible in every aspect and individual that I worked with. I am not going to work with the same individuals again because my grade has fallen and when making such films it is wise to not do it with your friends because everything seems to take longer and becomes more of a joke. We found ourselves in disarray at multiple points during the shooting which made my work and our project a lot harder to receive a grade worthy of our original desired outlook. Some aspects of the film that I enjoyed were, some of the shots that I did with the zooming in and out on the individuals face to give background to the scene and to me added another element to the film playing with the zoom. Some things that I thought were quite fun to play around with was the magical appearance of the ball in the places, which was funny to us in the initial ideas behind the film. Some shots could have been edit and cut better to preserve continuity and make our film seem much more fluid. Also some of our acting was just terrible and we need to have better actors because we were not cutting it when it came to some of our expression. Also there was rarely a scene where we were not joking around and we had to put a lot of those scenes in our film, because there were no other scenes that could encapuslate specific ideas that we wanted to portray.

Words: 1615

Film Treatment

Jermaine is always seen on the basketball court shooting hoops from dawn to dusk.(1) At school he is always drawing pictures of playing basketball or of him holding the championships.(2) During practices Jermaine runs down the court and players just fall out of his way as he crosses over. (3) However, Jermaine has a weird habit of taking the basketball everywhere he goes. EX. school (4), gym (5), shower (6). Jermaine looks at his basketball, Ex. Jermaine talks to the basketball. Shots of Guys and girls 2 shots and then close up of Jermaine and then the gradual zoom out of him with with his basketball smiling at it. (7) The ball begins to talk to Jermaine over time and tells him not to talk to girls or look at them. Much of his time is spent with the ball now. ex. carrying, talking, eating. (8) In the end the ball takes over so much of his life. The ball basically becomes his girlfriend. pic of stuff on the ball. (9) The boy is about to get a tattoo of the basketball on his back. When he is on the way in the car and he realizes the basketball is taking over his life. (10) Realizes he has to basically break up with his basketball. He goes home and starts pacing back and forth about how he is going to break up. His Friend and him are talking about it. He enters the house (dramatic) and sees the basketball. He sits down with the basketball and says its over. (11) Ending of the ball leaving rolling out the door. (turn up the dance music when the ball leaves). (12)

Amelie Textual analysis

When Amelie goes into the tunnels, music can be heard from a blind man who is holding a record player playing a song about love. The use of sound by the director allows the following action of Amelie running into a man underneath a photo booth, (future lover) be seen. I also think the blind man was used to symbolize the obscure nature of their love by not knowing/ (seeing) the other. I also think it is pretty ironic that the song is about living with love, which is a dilema of Amelie in the end. Also color correction with a tint of green creates an eerie/mysterious feeling making the audience lonely in a way.

Amelie tricks her father into believing the dwarf is traveling around the country as a way to make her father travel as well, instead of waiting behind. I also see this act of kindness as a way of comic relief in the story to relieve the tension of Amelie helping so many individuals. The symbolism of the dwarf can also be seen as part of the freeing of Amelie through helping others.

Magical realism is used in the film, which can be seen in this part where the key magically appears in amelies pocket. The use of such a device made me think about Amelie's (hobby) of helping others and the creation of Magical powers almost as a connotation of helping others as being "holy". Symbolic opening the lives of others to provide aid and assistance and also in the punishing of those who have done wrong. This idea emphasizes Amelie taking on, almost a divine figure punishing those who have sinned and rewardings those who are kind or troubled. For example the shop owner who Amelie switches his toothepaste and his foot cream, as well as changing his clock, for revenge against the abusing of his worker.

Irony can be seen in this image by the skeleton being Amelies future lover. Silence is used by the author to emphasize the characters words..."booooo" to focus this silence between the 2 characters, which reaccuring throughout the movie. For example the end when Amelie is kissing, no music is in the background of the film. Thus I think I can conclude the Author is trying to make the audience step out of the world of Magical realism and show a more realistic event, converging fantasy and reality through the sound alone.

Plots that kill

I am going to use the punitive plot, style where the character is punished for his wrong doings (except I will do it in a comedic like perspective). One film where I have seen this type of plot structure is called, "Jumper", where a boy is given powers that he uses to jump from place to place and begins to abuse his power and then the government comes after him, with others who can teleport from place to place as well trying to punish the boy for committing crimes. My story will deal with a Boy named sean who gets hit in the head and then is given the ability to transport within a confined space (5ft) anywhere. Basically, I am controlling the distance from which "sean" can transport, instead of the transporting of characters around the world like in the movie. Then I am making the story more comedic with Sean being annoying and messing with kids around the class unlike the movie where the characters are in "life and death" situations. The character Sean in my short film will be dealing with the idea of abusing his power and then being punished in the end. Sean immediately seperates himself from everyone else when he gets his powers, believing he is better than them. This shows the teaching of a moral as well, showing that "with great power comes responsibility" (spiderman #?) Sean goes about, the class room committing acts of being an "A$$ h#$%" like disrupting students work by transporting around the room. Then, knocking people over and preventing others from getting their work done. Then a student gets angry and throws a book at sean while he is zipping back and forth hitting sean's head, making him lose his power. He then gets outcasted by the students of the classroom. The end (This is just a little summary still pretty rough). Yeah....

Treatment revised

There is a man named Sean who realizes that he can transport anywhere, whenever he is happy (use of his face with a really big smile). Sean attains this power by hitting his head on the floor after falling on spilled water. Sean doesn't realize that he can transport in any direction yet, but he realizes when he goes up to a the door for film and smiles. (Voice over of Sean saying," Film is his favorite class"). Sean then transports through the door and then starts to transport all over the class room. Then Sean goes off and begins testing the limit to his power and then starts transporting through doors and walls and around campus finding that whenever he is happy he transports (though, not controlled). Also, hitting on girls and such using his powers to help this one girl catch her books before they fall. Then he realizes that his ability is much worse than he thought transporting whenever he is happy, creating awkward moments inadvertently with people around him (transporting into a bathroom stall someone is using). Transports in on couples making out (awkard) trying to get out of the weird confrontation. The climax happens when Sean realizes that he needs to remain sad to talk with people, not trying to be happy/laugh. (jokes/ dangerous) starts screaming closing his ears). He then tries ways of him losing his powers and then a student throws a book at the moment when Sean loses hope and then it hits Sean in the head. Sean loses his power and then goes back to being a normal kid and appreciates everything that he has now. Such as the people around him and being able to be happy, whenever without transporting.

dramatic moment

Sean is a boy who randomly hits his head falling on the ground and gets the power to transport (5ft) in any direction. Before, Sean feels alone in the classroom as if no one wants to talk to him. You can see this in the way sean keeps himself in the corner of the class and tries to seclude himself from the rest of the class. On the computer screen there is a game where there are certain characters with super powers and you can see drawings of super heros on the paper in front of Sean's computer. This shows sean desiring to escape from his normal self to be something special and stand as the symbol of good. There is a lesson going on in the background, but sean keeps drawing his superheros. Sean is dressed in a black and white shirt signifying him choosing later on in the short film whether or not to use his powers for good/ show off. Someone spills a drink and then sean slips and falls on his head. Then he realizes he has powers and ponders using them to help those around him or not. He chooses to not help those around him seeing people who didn't talk to him as being inferior to him and begins to disrupt the students using his power. Such as annoying them zipping by asking them obvious questions (what are you doing?) repeatedly. The setting in the classroom (mr. bigue) is appropriate for the situation of sean (tj) to portray a disturbed child who hates life. (just kidding). But, having Sean in the corner of the room will be able to portray the idea quite well of isolation and the actors will be able to play their parts fine. Also the contrast of the noisy room in the background of sean who is really mellow, will show isolation.