Bonnie & Clyde

Arthur Penn directed this film that came out in 1967 about a small-time thief, Clyde Barrow, that tries to steal a car and winds up with its owner’s daughter, a dissatisfied small-town girl Bonnie Parker. Their crimes quickly spiral from petty theft to bank robbery, but tensions between the couple and the other members of their gang, driver C.W., Clyde’s older brother Buck and Buck’s ditsy wife, Blanche that could destroy them all.

In the 1960’s, the film industry was going through times of reform and change. The United States was facing racial conflicts, a rise in militarism as well as feminism. There was a shift in audience demographics as well as directors who looked towards European films such as the French New Wave and Italian filmmakers for inspiration. Bonnie and Clyde is one of few films that came out during this New Hollywood era which had started to incorporate violence, promiscuity, disillusionment, and ideas of going against social norms. When Bonnie and Clyde rob their first bank towards the progression of their robberies when C.W. Moss, Buck and Blanche join them the country is relatively broke. Times are hard and banks don’t have much money due to the stock market crash as well as the thousands and millions of Americans who’ve lost their jobs and don’t have money to put away. In essence Bonnie and Clyde’s dream of becoming rich are unrealistic in such a time of depression which leads to their failure. When Bonnie meets Clyde she instantly develops an attraction towards him especially for his bold nature. She soon then decides to follow him in hopes of turning her life around to find adventure and true love. Along their journey the duo hook up with C.W. Moss, Clyde’s older brother Buck, and his wife, Blanche who is the daughter of a preacher. Small crimes that Bonnie and Clyde had once committed in stealing from a grocery store have now escalated with the help of more people. The “Barrow Gang” the group would call themselves, in the process of robbing banks has now started to kill anyone who would stand in their way. The scene in the film where Bonnie reunites with her mother and family is a significant scene in the film because it foreshadows the future for Bonnie as well as the rest of the gang. In this scene the colors of the film becomes misty and dream like as well as the atmosphere among the Barrow Gang and Bonnie’s family. There is this bitter sweet feeling that develops in this scene due to multiple takes of long shots as well as its relatively slow paced nature. Bonnie and Clyde’s initial decision to drive down a dangerous and violent road of crime in a time of depression conveys that there will be no happy ending as well as an ultimate road of doom for them both.

The Piano

This film was released in 1993 and was directed by Jane Campion. Ada McGrath and her daughter (Flora) took a long voyage from Scotland to a New Zealand beach were they were stranded with their belongings, including a piano. Ada has been mute since childhood and was sold into marriage to a man named Alisdair Stewart. However, she doesn’t try to warm up to her new husband, but instead becomes close with her husbands friendly acquaintance, George Baines, that leads to life altering conflicts. Somehow, George Baines ended up owning the piano because he supposedly wanted to learn piano. Baines decides to sell her the piano back one black key at a time in exchange for music lessons. The lessons turned into erotic encounters which leads to jealousy and violence.

This film was directed by a woman and describes a female’s self salvation and told from the female perspective. The setting of the story is mid-Victorian times. During this period, though being treated with special courtesy publicly, women were still regarded as the lower class in the social life. This was also during the Romanticism movement that wasn’t simply concerned with self-expression. The audience can translate her muteness as the silent resistance against the ridiculous and oppressive outside environment. As it is, Ada pursues freedom and equality for all her life.  In the face of her absolute refusal to abandon the piano, her new husband Stewart declares the instrument too heavy for his men to move, and leaves it on the beach. The abandoning of the piano produces an ineradicable rift in the relationship between Ada and Stewart; And Ada resists it by refusing him conjugal rights. But this is a desperate and risky stratagem because in Stewart’s mid-Victorian New Zealand, men are the decision-makers in public issues, and within the confines of family, men also control the sexuality. Stewart, though deeply repressed in his sexuality, expects to be able to exercise his rights over his wife.

The piano is the most important prop in the film. The piano is the focus of her life. Because of the existence of the musical language, Ada does not feel it much inconvenient losing the power of speech. She says, ―I don’t think myself silent, that is, because of my piano. Her muteness is symbolically the female’s losing of the discourse power in the social life. It is a silent resistance to the oppressive patriarchy. At this phase, the piano is the spiritual haven for Ada. She uses the piano to express the romanticism in her soul.

Goodfellas

This gangster film directed by Martin Scorsese in 1990, is about a young man that grows up in the mob and works to advance himself through the ranks. He lives his life of money and luxury, but doesn’t realize the horror he causes. Drug addiction and other mistakes (cheating on his wife) unravel his climb to the top. Gangster films are normally male films. In Goodfellas, all the characters within the opening sequence are male, and there are not many females throughout the whole film. The females that are in the film are portrayed to be inferior to men. The expectations of a gangster film can be seen through the costumes. The characters wear expensive clothes that are silk shirts and suits.

The audience can tell something against the law is occurring because it is filmed at night. Traveling at night suggests hiding from the police. They then drive to the woods were it is common to bury someone that was murdered. The dark road and woods show the characters committed a crime and did something they do not want others to know about. The opening shot is a tracking shot, which then pans left and comes along side the car. This displays the car that we are going to go inside of and it gives the audience the impression that we are following the car. This enables us to know that the people inside the car are going to be the main people we follow throughout the film. A shot inside the car is a medium close up shot of the driver, but we can also see the other characters in the car. The director uses the rule of thirds to show that all the people within the car are important, but we get the impression that the driver is the main character as the camera is concentrating on him, and the other two characters are slightly out of focus. We then go to a long shot when the characters walk around to the trunk, the director uses this shot to show the background, and to show the characters bathed in the red light.

Bicycle Thieves

The film, Bicycle Thieves directed by Vittorio De Sica, is about a young man, Antonio Ricci that suffered from unemployment, but then got offered a job as a bill poster which requires a bicycle (but he doesn’t have a bicycle). Luckily, is proud wife sold their bed sheets to obtain the money to buy a bike, but then the bike got stolen on the first day. Desperate to keep his new job, Antonio searches across Rome with his son, Bruno, to find his bike. Because this film was created in 1948 during the neorealism era, it demonstrated that life is a continuous struggle.

In Bicycle Thieves, the characters are ordinary people and uses children to display innocence and adult authority. The use of real locations and nonprofessional performers also helped with the reality sense of the film because its more believable and relatable. Ultimately, the film was in black and white photography and had a full aperture that gave it the classical look. It was shot with a minimal crew and technical support that had a team of professionals with a generous budget for large scale scenes, hundreds of extras, and fake rainstorms.

Vittorio De Sica (Bicycle Thieves) used massive amounts of people arranged in each shot to show the working conditions in Italy. When Antonio and his son are looking at the second bike market and it begins to rain, we see them in the mid-ground of the frame. In the foreground and background we see carts of various bicycle parts and hundreds of other people running around. Antonio and his son (placed in the middle of the frame) seem lost in the crowd, just like losing the bike thief to the crowd. Their placement in the frame resembles how many people there are and how strenuous it would be to find the bike. When Antonio and his son are chasing the old man that helped the bike thief into the church, the camera loses them with an angle that has depth to it in a room full of people. In the next consecutive shots, Antonio and his son are in flat shots with absence of people, but Antonio is still looking for the man. As the audience we can see the man is gone, but Antonio doesn’t give up looking for him.

400 Blows

The film, 400 Blows directed by Francois Truffaut, is about a young, French boy that goes through a series of difficult situations as he is surrounded by neglectful parents, inconsiderate adults, and his best friend. He tries to plan for a better life, but one mistake got him in trouble with the law with more unsympathetic authority figures. In 400 Blows it focuses more on the aspirations of youth and disappointments. The cinematographer, Henri Decaë, draws attention to the movements of the camera. This makes the viewer complicit in its reality.

400 Blows takes place in Paris in the early 1950s. There are many shots with Paris scenery. The costumes of Antoine and his family are simple and describe an average working family that struggles to make ends meet. There clothes hardly change throughout the story to demonstrate that society is resistant to change. One major prop is the typewriter Antoine steals from his father’s place and tries to sell. He wants to sell the typewriter for his financial plans and to support himself. So basically he longs for freedom. The film being in black and white shows that children only see the world in narrow perspectives. Natural lighting is used to show that people cannot manipulate certain aspects of their lives.

The most famous one was in 400 Blows at the very end of the film. It was a zoom in to a freeze frame of Antoine’s face. Antoine escaped the reformatory his parents sent him to and he ran down a dirt road. The camera used a long, tracking shot to capture this moment. The camera work gives a sense of freedom. His feet pounded with a rhythm that was steady and mesmerizing. Once he reached the beach he had no fear and only hope. It was foreshadowed before that he always wanted to go the beach. This narrative scene shows the fulfillment and captures it in his face with the freeze frame zoom in shot.

Run Lola Run

Run Lola Run is about a girl, Lola, that is trying to come up with $100,000 mark payment for her boyfriend, Manni, to pay his boss. Lola runs through the streets of the city and tries to obtain the money through her bank manager father, before Manni does something irrational.

Run Lola Run has a simplistic plot and philosophical implications of speed, chance, time, choice, and consequence. The camera enters through the “mouth” of an expressionistic clock that cues the audience that they are entering a place where time is different then from normal experience. In the beginning, the flashbacks are the introduction that is the “establishing scene” for the entire movie because it starts the narrative and gives the audience a sense of the two main characters. The flashback scenes are in medium and long shots to show the progression of the events. And the events of the past are shown in black and white opposed to the present which is shot in color.

In the first scene of Run Lola Run it establishes the mise-en-scene with the camera forming a stationary, satellite shot of Berlin, then cuts to Lola’s window to focus on the phone. The camera then cuts to the phone booth where Manni is. These cuts create a sense of urgency. Lola’s room is messy and dark with the blinds drawn, only allowing a small amount of light into the room. The character’s clothing is messy and dirty, which is realistic for the era and situation. The lighting is natural and the spatial distances are realistic. It set the tone of a typical day in a city in Germany. Lola represents the color red with her hair and the candles, posters, and telephone. While Manni symbolizes yellow with the phone booth and his blonde highlights. The telephone booth has a claustrophobic feeling that is tight and demonstrates the tension of the situation. The cinematographer, Frank Griebe, puts the viewers in the same thought of the characters to add anxiety and deeper connection of the choice and consequence. Each run was about 20 minutes expected for temporal consistency which produced a realistic feeling for the viewers. Lola’s motivation to help Manni in any way possible gave the audience a strong sense of love. The techno music played in the background the whole time was a nondiegetic sound that raised tension and carried the fast pace of the film while establishing the musical genre.

Side by Side

The importance of the film industry today is to find the “reinvention of new medium”. Film makers and cinematographers want to have the most updated cameras to have clarity throughout their films, but the question is to keep using 35mm cameras, or switch to digital-motion picture. There are numerous discussions on this topic to see if the film industry will become more advanced in technology and get rid of film completely.

A film we watched in class called, Side by Side, narrated and produced by Keanu Reeves, illuminates the debate between digital motion-picture cameras to traditional 35mm cameras. He interviewed many American and British cinema directors, editors, and cinematographers to incorporate their opinions on the matter. The documentary stays neutral, and describes where the film industry came from, and where it could go in the future with film and digital. It states that film has better texture and dynamic range to the images, while digitization can bring freedom. Film stock and processing are expensive and most filmmakers will not be able to afford it. Digital is cheaper, and easier to use. Also, consumers are the main target that we want to focus on and the medium for the 21st century is the internet. We need to preserve the digital motion pictures from the past for future generations because it may not be as culturally important as it one was. However, using digital motion-picture generates a whole lot of creativity.