Christmas Vacation

For this final blog I figured that I would talk about one of the greatest Christmas classics and mention some of the 70's and 80's comedy classics that were a staple for that era. Christmas Vacation starring Chevy Chase takes the witty comedy of the original movie and throws it right into the Christmas genre. Movie stars such as Chevy Chase and Bill Murray were key components to the new comedy scene in the 1970's. There were a lot of classics such as Caddyshack, Stripes, and National Lampoon's vacations series.

What are some of your favorites?

Orlando Takeover

In Chapter 14 the book talks about Disney Studios and Universal Studios and how much they have done since the mid 19070's. Universal and Disney have taken over Orlando, Florida and made it into a fun family environment. The two major Corporations have built their own theme parks within 15 minutes of each other; and Disney World is the number 9 tourist destination in the United States. It is fascinating to see two major Corporations/Studios take over an entire town and transform it into such a huge destination. For every successful movie you can find a just as successful attraction at one of the many theme parks!

So who else loves Disney?

Australian Film Industry

For my third response paper I decided to go with Australian Film Industry and I was really glad that I did. This was the first of the three papers that I actually enjoyed writing. I learned a lot writing this paper and did not feel like I was "forcing" anything. The first two papers were really complex and complicated and at times I had no idea what I was supposed to write about. This was mostly my fault for not keeping up with this class as often as I should, but I enjoyed reading Chapter 12 and put in a lot of effort writing this third paper.

Did anyone else enjoy writing this third paper? What film industry did everyone choose?

Blockbuster Screening

In Chapter 10 of the text book, the end of the chapter discusses the beginning of the "blockbuster" film. The two movies and directors mentioned in this small segment were Stephen Spielberg with Jaws and George Lucas with Star Wars.
I wanted to focus on Jaws because I think that people underestimate the power of this movie. I screened this movie last week and realized how much fear this movie puts into its viewers. I remember watching this movie as a child, and to this day I am absolutely terrified to go out too far in the ocean. I even have a fear that Great White Sharks hide in large waves as a sneaking mechanism. Jaws is well acted and directed doing its job almost perfectly; that job is to terrify people and provide the viewers with a story that has come true in many places around the world.
How about you? Were you terrified watching this movie as a kid? As an adult?

Chapter 9

I read through Chapter 9 of this book over the past week and noticed that one piece of information really stood to me. I read that when the television industry became popular; the movie industry in a failed attempt tried to take over creating a few of its own networks. Once Hollywood realized that the Television networks were too big to compete with, Hollywood decided to sell some of its movies for release on Television. All of this was happening in the early 1950's and it is amazing to see that all of this started over 60 years ago.

Now when you turn on the TV you could probably find 20+ movies being played on a variety of channels. You can even buy movies on your TV! So this creates my question for you bloggers out there; did Hollywood eventually succeed?

I think in a way they may have succeeded a little bit. I view channels such as "HBO", "Showtime", and  "Starz" to be "movie channels. These channels in fact did the opposite of most regular TV networks have done. They started out as channels that strictly just show newer released movies and then gradually integrated TV shows.

Essay 2

I wanted to blog about the latest essay we had to write for this Film History class because I enjoyed writing this one much more than the first one. The first one was really difficult to find information about  current events on my Birthday in 1914. I found the second essay much easier because we were able to use all the information from the book to help write the essay. It was also very interesting to be able to compare Hollywood to another Film Industry such as France.

I was wondering what everybody else thought? Maybe I just enjoy doing a compare and contrast essay?

We are in a class!!

I have noticed that a lot of people have gone off the beaten path with their blogs and it makes it difficult to make comments and learn things. The point of these blogs is to talk about things you have learned and relate them to current events or just talk about what you have learned.

To get myself back on track, because I myself am a culprit of getting off the beaten path, I will talk about the interesting things I have learned so far from this class.

I have learned a lot by perusing through the Chapters and watching some of the screenings posted each week. Before this class I had no idea how film started or how filming worked before sound. Learning about silent films and the 75 man orchestra that played through film was fascinating to me. I think that it must have been really difficult to film and act for a silent film because there is no dialogue it is only actions. I have also learned a lot about the different film industries and it was interesting to find out how Hollywood dominated the film industry. Hollywood films were being exported to countries especially France because France was showing a lot of Hollywood films in their theaters.

Go Outside? Do Homework?

I felt it was necessary to do a post about something that has affected people everywhere and especially college students. The term is "binge watching" and it is when you watch a certain show in a short period of time. For example, a week ago I binge watched the first season of the Blacklist and it was 22 episodes on Netflix and I finished them in a week.

I know a lot of you can relate to me about this phenomenon and it does not have to be a recent show either. I know people who binge watch old TV shows like Spongebob and Zoey 101 on Netflix. I myself found myself binge watching Entourage one summer and was able to finish all 8 seasons way too fast. It can take over our lives sometimes and especially on a rainy day there is nothing better than binge watching a great TV show.

So, how does everyone else feel about this? What do you binge watch? Any suggestions?

Movie Critics

Chapter 4 in a Short Guide talks about the different approaches to writing about film, and the different approaches to analyzing a film. This immediately made me think of the job that a movie critic. A movie takes all of their knowledge about the film industry and creates an educated analysis of the movie. They talk about everything from the plot, the directors techniques, and even the individual performances. Then they take all of that data and they form an opinion on the movie, a personal opinion because there is no right answer as to whether or not a movie was "good" or not.

This brings me to my next point and I will use Rotten Tomatoes as my example because it is the top site used in showing the rating of a movie. All of these critics send in their reviews or post them or whatever they do and Rotten Tomatoes generates a general consensus. If more than 60% of critics enjoyed the movie then the movie is considered "fresh"; and then the opposite is "rotten". Stick with me here because this is where I tie it all in. Even if a movie gets terrible ratings from the critics "opinion" the only way to see how successful a movie was is to look at its gross profit.

So these movie critics use their personal opinion to tell you whether or not to see a movie or not. This brings you to my question to you, Why do we listen to them? Seriously why do we listen to movie critics?

I am the biggest offender of this. I literally go on rotten tomatoes and if I see a 25% for a movie I will not go see it. Which makes me realize that maybe I should become my own movie critic and stop listening to all these writers. If I read too much into the reviews it could prevent me from seeing movies that I could possibly really enjoy.

Hans Richter

Reading through the Cubists and Film section of chapter 4 in the film history text I decided to do some digging of my own. I found reading about implementing art into film very interesting and wanted to look up some of the work of a film maker mentioned in this section.

I chose Hans Richter mainly because he was the first name in the section. Can you blame me? Didn't think so. Well I'm glad I picked him because I came across two interesting films that he created. The first one I watched was Rhythm 21 which was mentioned in the book. I watched a short clip that I found on YouTube and what I watched I really cannot explain. It was a movie exploring different shapes and movements of these shapes with no sound or narration. It was pretty much just a video canvas for Hans's artwork but as much as it was weird it was actually really interesting. This was one of the first steps into animation and the next movie I screened of his was another step.

The next movie I screened of his was "Dreams Money Can Buy". Even though I was kind of lost with the plot you can get the gist of the movie out of its title. The part I liked the most about this movie was when three dimensional figurines were shot and meant to look like a "dream". I feel like this could have been a big step towards animation and it was actually really creepy the kind of shapes and figurines used in these scenes. I really enjoyed looking up Hans Richter and some of his work, so encourage you to go off the beaten path on Blackboard and look up a filmmaker that nobody has mentioned.

Oh, and check out Hans and his work on YouTube.

Please explain....

I have thought a lot about something I learned in the first chapter of the guide book we are reading for this film history class. I keep thinking about the point the author makes about how people can say that they understand a movie but when asked to explain it they hit a wall. The author then goes on to explain that people lack the ability to analyze the movie in detail.

This has forced me to really think and analyze the movies that I watch over and over again. Why do I watch them over and over again? Do I just enjoy the jokes? The action scenes? Or do I really get sucked in by plot so much that every time I watch it I notice something different. Ah yes! That's it! I have often found myself thinking "Hmm I did not notice that the first time I watched this". And now that I have noticed that about myself I am realizing that I analyze movies in detail while I watch it and I never even noticed I did that.

Think of yourself as a "viewer" and see if you notice yourself doing the same things. Now sit down and analyze your favorite movie. Every part that you like, the characters, violent scenes, crude jokes, emotional moments and you will realize that it can be really simple to analyze a movie in detail.

And now for something completely different....

Hello people of the blog,

I am new to this blogging thing so I figured I would start with a really easy post; and once I get going in this Film History class I will post more about what I am learning and interesting facts I pick up.

I'll start by giving my reasons to choosing this class and my love for the film world and all it has to offer. I did not expect this to be an easy class when I recently signed up but I was interested in learning about the history of film. And nope, I'm not lying!

I grew up watching movies and following certain actors, and just recently started a Blu Ray movie collection to go along with my love for movies (I know Blu Ray is high maintenance). I recently started to research and follow certain directors in attempt to broaden my horizons. In doing so I came across a really interesting director, Wes Anderson. His films are quirky and out of the ordinary but he really knows what he is doing and has proven to be very successful of late.

So, this is my start to my Film History blog and I hope that I can continue writing a blog after this class has ended. I have a lot of thoughts bouncing around my head each day so stay tuned.