Choose ONE of the following films to watch and analyze:
Beasts of the Southern Wild (2012) / dir. Behn Zeitlin
In Fabric (2018) / dir. Peter Strickland
Hitchcock (2012) / dir. Sacha Gervasi
Lost in Translation (2003) / dir. Sofia Coppola
We Need to Talk about Kevin (2011) / dir. Lynne Ramsay
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000) / dir. Ang Lee
Roma (2018) / dir. Alfonso Cuarón
Boyhood (2014) / dir. Richard Linklater
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) / dir. Michel Gondry
The Master (2012) / dir. Paul Thomas Anderson
Memento (2001) / dir. Christopher Nolan
Her (2013) / dir. Spike Jonze
Spotlight (2015) / dir. Tom McCarthy
The Royal Tenenbaums (2001) / dir. Wes Anderson
The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014) / dir. Wes Anderson
Inherent Vice (2014) / dir. Paul Thomas Anderson
Carol (2015) / dir. Todd Haynes
Slumdog Millionaire (2008) / dir. Danny Boyle
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008) / dir. David Fincher
Milk (2008) / dir. Gus Van Sant
No Country for Old Men (2007) / dir. The Coen Brothers
Juno (2007) / dir. Jason Reitman
There Will Be Blood (2007) / dir. Paul Thomas Anderson
Brokeback Mountain (2005) / dir. Ang Lee
Million Dollar Baby (2004) / dir. Clint Eastwood
Ray (2004) / dir. Taylor Hackford
The Hurt Locker (2008) / dir. Kathryn Bigelow
District 9 (2009) / dir. Neill Blomkamp
The King’s Speech (2010) / dir. Tom Hooper
Black Swan (2010) / dir. Darren Aronofsky
The Kids Are All Right (2010) / dir. Lisa Cholodenko
BlacKkKlansman (2018) / dir. Spike Lee
Vice (2018) / dir. Adam McKay
The Favourite (2018) / dir. Yorgos Lanthimos
The Big Short (2015) / dir. Adam McKay
The Martian (2015) / dir. Ridley Scott
Room (2015) / dir. Lenny Abrahamson
The Revenant (2015) / dir. Alejandro Iñárritu
Fences (2016) / dir. Denzel Washington
La La Land (2016) / dir. Damien Chazelle
Lion (2016) / dir. Garth Davis
The Shape of Water (2017) / dir. Guillermo Del Toro
Get Out (2017) / dir. Jordan Peele
Us (2019) / dir. Jordan Peele
Little Women (2019) / dir. Greta Gerwig
Lady Bird (2017) / dir. Greta Gerwig
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017) / dir. Martin McDonagh
Little Miss Sunshine (2006) / dir. Valerie Faris & Jonathan Dayton
A Star is Born (2018) / dir. Bradley Cooper
Booksmart (2019) / dir. Olivia Wilde
Synecdoche, New York (2008) / dir. Charlie Kaufman
Mulholland Drive (2001) / dir. David Lynch
The Florida Project (2017) / dir. Sean Baker
Eighth Grade (2018) / dir. Bo Burnham
Mid90s (2018) / dir. Jonah Hill
The Last Black Man in San Francisco (2019) / dir. Joe Talbot
Uncut Gems (2019) / dir. Josh Safdie & Benny Safdie
The Lighthouse (2019) / dir. Robert Eggers
Bend It Like Beckham (2002) / dir. Gurinda Chadha
Logan (2017) / dir. James Mangold
Birdman (or The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) (2014) / dir. Alejandro Iñárritu
Can You Ever Forgive Me? (2018) / dir. Marielle Heller
Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom (2020) / dir. George C. Wolfe
Kubo and the Two Strings (2016) / dir. Travis Knight
American Animals (2018) / dir. Bart Layton
Boy Erased (2018) / dir. Joel Edgerton
Tully (2018) / dir. Jason Reitman
Emma. (2020) / dir. Autumn de Wilde
The Triplets of Belleville (2003) / dir. Sylvain Chomet
ParaNorman (2012) / dir. Chris Butler & Sam Fell
Rango (2011) / dir. Gore Verbinski
Spirited Away (2001) / dir. Hayao Miyazaki
Howl’s Moving Castle (2004) / dir. Hayao Miyazaki
The Farewell (2019) / dir. Lulu Wang
Crazy Rich Asians (2018) / dir. Jon M. Chu
Real Women Have Curves (2002) / dir. Patricia Cardoso
The Babadook (2014) / dir. Jennifer Kent
Da 5 Bloods (2020) / dir. Spike Lee
Hereditary (2018) / dir. Ari Aster
Midsommar (2019) / dir. Ari Aster
The Duke of Burgundy (2014) / dir. Peter Strickland
Volver (2006) / dir. Pedro Almodóvar
Snowpiercer (2013) / dir. Bong Joon-Ho
The Host (2006) / dir. Bong Joon-Ho
Okja (2017) / dir. Bong Joon-Ho
The Fall (2006) / dir. Tarsem Singh
Dunkirk (2017) / dir. Christopher Nolan
Persepolis (2007) / dir. Marjane Satrapi & Winshluss
Selma (2014) / dir. Ava DuVernay
An Education (2009) / dir. Lone Scherfig
A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood (2019) / dir. Marielle Heller
Moonlight (2016) / dir. Barry Jenkins
If Beale Street Could Talk (2018) / dir. Barry Jenkins
Mandy (2018) / dir. Panos Cosmatos
The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004) / dir. Wes Anderson
***There are almost 100 films on this list so it is quite possibly you’ve seen some (or many) of them. Though it is not required for you to choose a film you have not seen, I would suggest choosing a film you have not seen so you may experience something new.***
Question A:
- First, watch your chosen film. I would highly recommend taking detailed notes as you watch to help you in your writings.
- Look for STORYTELLING – Who is the protagonist? What is their objective? What are their obstacles? If you had to break this film down into three sections: Beginning, Middle, and End – what would be the three sentences you would use to tell me what is going on?
- How does the film effectively use the rule of “Show, don’t tell”? What was particularly brilliant about the storytelling and the film’s use of visual cues? Remember, this is NOT about the acting; “Show, don’t tell” is when the camera moves to show YOU, the audience, something that clues you into something significant. [For example, the very end of Citizen Kane has a brilliant moment of “show, don’t tell” by the last image of the film, which is a close up of the sled burning in the fire…and we finally see “Rosebud”. There is no acting involved here…it’s ALL camera work.]
- What 2 brilliant moments of ACTING did you see in this film? How so? What do you think made it brilliant? (Think about emotional availability, movements, gestures, vocal inflection…) How did the actor bring the character to life? What made them believable? [If you have chosen one of the animated films from the list, please talk about the voice acting AND the way the animation of the characters helps to enhance the actors’ vocal performances]
- How did they use CINEMATOGRAPHY to tell this story? Choose 3 different shots from the shot list that you learned last week and choose moments in the movie where you can name the shot, composition, etc. used and why they chose that one. How was the story better because of that choice?
- What about DESIGN? There are five aspects of design:
- Costume: Choose a character – what does the costume design tell you about this character? Think about choice of color, texture of the material, extra bling. Choose 2 outfits and talk about why that choice of costume was perfect for the character.
- Props: Choose one thing an actor picked up and handled that told you something about their character? How did they treat it?
- Set: Where was this film set? Do you think it was “on location” or they had a Green screen? What makes you think so? What did the set tell you about the world the characters live in? Choose a setting that was perfect – notice a particular detail about the set that you never saw before. How did noticing that add to the story?
- Sound: What sort of music was in this film? Think about the instrumentation that you hear. How did it make you feel when the movie started? Was there ever utter silence? How did the music help tell the story? Talk about a moment where you heard music. What about the choice of songs throughout the film? Why did they choose that song? Music, lyrics…both? What about the sound effects?
- Lights: Think about the section on lighting, and how it is so important to film. When were there moments of backlight, low light, deep color saturation, washed out colors…how did that make you feel while watching it? Choose 2 moments from the film where you are now really aware of why they made the choice of lighting that they did.
- Overall Opinion: What have you learned from doing this analysis? Did you enjoy this film? Would you watch this film again? Why or why not? Why should other people watch this film?
Question B:
- Why you chose this film, what about the film interested you, why this film is important, etc.
- Why you’re excited to watch this film
0 comments