kjarak-blog

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Here are 5 simple filmmaking tips from FilmRiot. They are very simple but can make a big change and add some cooler shots into your film. I really liked the room one, as a lack of space has been a struggle for us before. 

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While I was looking for the trailer from Baby Driver I found this video. I thought it was really interesting as the speaker looks at the movie from a very critical way and I was surprised how many small “mistakes” appeared in the movie which I didn't realise while watching the movie. I thought this video was really helpful to me because it really emphasised that even the smallest details are so very important. 

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Film Review: BABY DRIVER

On a 11 hrs flight I had the time to watch lots of movies. Among them was Baby Driver, which was the movie I most enjoyed.

 Baby driver is a movie about a talented getaway driver. He records and makes his own tapes, which he listens to all the time to deal with his trauma and to be the best driver in the business. He meets the love of his life and with that wants to make a new start without being criminal. However, it’s not that easy as he is constrained to work for the crime boss and therefore is stuck in the routine of helping out to escape the assaults. Can he ever leave that business? Find out yourself…

 It’s funny because due to the fact that baby is listening to his music the whole time and as an audience we sometimes dive in into his world of hearing it kind of feels like a musical at some points.

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HAIRSPRAY (1988)

I really enjoyed watching this musical. Not only the set and the cast is great but also the story. Hairspray is about a overweight teen, who auditions for a popular teen dance show on TV... CAREFUL SPOILER: and wins. She not only wins the show but also wins over her opponents boyfriend. Meeting some black friends in school she uses her esteem to fight for more racial integration on the dance show and with that and all her success turns into a role model and hero. 

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warning: the movie MEET ME IN ST LOUIS (1944) contains songs that will be stuck in your head forever...

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Love his videos @thatoneblondkid // the drone shots are amazing and also really like the glitch effect he uses. I follow him on Instagram and ALWAYS enjoy his videos 

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This is the theme song of Jaws and the music I was talking about in the film review. 

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Film Review: JAWS

Have you ever been afraid of possible sharks underneath you while swimming in the ocean? I have definitely after watching Jaws.  

Jaws is a American thriller directed by Steven Spielberg in 1975 and based on Peter Benchley’s novel from 1974. The story is about a man-eating great shark, that has turned the holidays of families on Amity Island, a summer resort, into a nightmare. Together with a marine biologist and a professional shark hunter, the local police chief is on the hunt of this killer.

 As in all movies sounds play an incredibly important role. Jaw is the perfect example that without the music the sequences with the shark attacks would not at all be as effective as they are. The music basically already tells you that there will be a shark attack building up tension as you know it going to happen any moment. The fact that we, as the audience, know that there will be an attack, seeing things the people in the water cant see and hearing the music, while the people swimming have no clue is really effective because it gives you the feeling that you are meant to do something to warn or help the swimmers but you cant. This includes the audience really well, making them feel part of the movie.

 I think the movie is outstanding having in mind what time it was filmed in. I had to stop watching it on my holidays at the beach, which was really hard for me as I really felt part of the movie and there was so much tension created, but I just knew that if I would watch more of it, I would not go into the sea at all anymore. Watching the end back at home I was definitely not disappointed and was happy I wouldn’t be back in the sea again for the next 3 months.  

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We have finished our silent film projects; this is an extract of my short film. 

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Film Review: Se7en

Are you sick and bored of the typical way of people getting killed in movie? You won’t be disappointed in this one. And you also want a movie that won’t get off your mind for a while?

Then this is exactly the movie for you.

Exactly the aspect of staying on someone’s mind is the aim of the serial killer in this movie who kills by targeting victims and then torturing them by pitting their own underling sins against them. These are incredible pictures that you won’t forget. Not only the way he kills his victims but also the idea behind it is clever, thoughtful and astonishing. The way the movie is set up is amazing and the tension is already set right from the beginning with the dark and mysterious mood. This is emphasized through the good camera work and lighting or better said the lack of lighting and a lot of rain during the movie. The cast fits perfectly with Morgan Freeman and Brad Pitt being the main characters.

What I think is so interesting in this movie is that the worst parts don’t happen on screen but in your head due to the way the movie uses our imagination to full fill the left out scenes on screen.

The movie is definitely worth watching if you want a really good thriller that is always up for many mysterious, clever, creepy and seriously not predictable surprises.

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MAIN LESSONS:

-       books: story told through words, what we read is most important as how the writer writes the book can change how we feel about the story

SAME --> Film: story told through pictures, the pictures we see and how we see them can change the feel oft he story

-       movement:

1.     Camera is moving like one oft he soldiers - first person perspective à to quickly make the audience feel what is going on

2.     Camera seems still but is shaking – vibration/shaking fits with the movement of the shot à helps audience enter the world to see and feel what the explosion/vibration is causing

3.     Camera movement – slowly/gentle à to make the viewer concentrate on the subject and the surrounding

-       different genres of film use different types of camera work

-->  fast past action film : camera fast moving and the characters are close to the lends

--> comedy : camera further away from the characters to hit more of the body in the frame

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MAIN LESSONS:

-       Movies are windows into worlds and lives that are not our own

-       Cinematography is not only about how we capture the action oft he scene, it is how we show the action tot he audience (communication with the viewer)

-       Cinema = language (cinematography is build on principles of concrete understanding)

-       Our perspective = her perspective à makes us feel the way the girl does as we see everything from her view

I liked the 2 video essays above the most as they included a lot of explanation with giving examples which I thought was on the one hand very interesting as they were things I have never really thought about that much and have seen these as totally usual but actually

Video 3:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBu0c-ib0jg

 MAIN LESSONS:

-       your camera is where the story goes through the lens and accomplishes it on the screen

-       being aware oft he surrounding

-       Composing : deriding where your camera is going to be pointed at, by putting a person in a particular part of the frame – you are saying something with this

-       composing a shot that’s saying what you are trying to say

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Film Review - BREAKFAST CLUB

Detention time on a Saturday doesn’t need to be boring. This is what the comedy Breakfast Club from 1985 directed and written by John Hughes is all about. 

5 teenagers all different stereotypes, a brain, an athlete, a princess, a criminal and a girl nobody wants to talk to, are spending the day together, locked into the library of the school during detention time. All of them have parental issues and after some hours together they start to tell their stories to each other.

I think that this movie gives people an opportunity to rethink the negativity that goes through their heads about an individual that appears different. Especially teens tend to judge on another prior to knowing them personal.  

I personally think the movie was ok, very American and the characters, especially Judd Nelson as Bender was a little to much, of course this made the story more interesting and funny but his acting seemed a little too posed for me personally. The budget of this movie must have been quite low, because it only has 7 actors, no change of clothes and most of the scenes played in one room.

But the good thing I can say is, I really liked the music. If you want to watch something really exciting then this is definitely not the right movie. I enjoyed watching it anyways but you would probably not miss out much if you haven’t watched it.

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Film Review: SILENCE OF THE LAMBS

Silence of the lambs is a crime thriller produced in 1991 by director Jonathan Demme. The thrill of this movie is not the cool action sequence but the psychological aspect.

Silence of the lambs is based on the novel of Thomas Harris and it is about the FBI trainee Clarice (Judy Foster) seeking help from the in jail Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins) a former psychiatrist cannibalistic serial killer. They are trying to catch the transsexual Buffalo Bill, another serial killer who skins his victims.

Clarice who is in the beginning very afraid of Lector, get’s into a strange relationship with the cannibalistic psychiatrist after he agreed to help her to understand the psychotic mind of Buffalo Bill. Lecter is playing a game with her in which he only gives her information if she will grant him the sadistic pleasure of allowing him to see the inside of her mind. Thereafter their relationship becomes a fascinating back-and-forth duel of teasing, anxiety and mutual need.

The movie is creepy and exciting in a simple way, in which sounds are used to help build up suspense and to highlight these. Foster and Hopkins both showed fantastic acting in this movie and both deserve the Oscar they have received.

However Hopkin is the actor I remember best from this movie. His representation of the refined-yet-cannibalistic serial killer-doctor is one I won’t forget.

 I can definitely recommend this movie but also have to say that it was hard for me to fall asleep that night as it was seriously a very creepy and little strange story and I was indeed a little freaked out. So it is surely nothing for people who get scared easily. However if you do like this genre: certainly a thriller worth watching!

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Have a look: you might be surprised, I DEFINITELY was !

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FILM REVIEW - GUESS WHO’S COMING TO DINNER

This is a great film about forbidden love. It´s a film about loving someone, no matter what society they are from. Of course the film is not really up to date anymore because most of the parents wouldn´t mind if the daughter was coming home with the idea to marry a famous doctor graduated from Yale even if he is coloured.

But 1960 was a different time and so did Joanna Drayton’s (Katharine Houghton) unannounced early return home to her parents (Katherine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy) house in San Francisco from a vacation on Hawaii cause a big stir after she had announced that she is going to marry an outstanding black doctor (Sidney Poitier) after knowing him for only 10 days. 

This film was the last film of Spencer Tracy, he was already really sick during the production and died right after the film. Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn had an affair for many years and during the whole movie I had the feeling that the tears that were shining in her eyes were not just good acting.

What I liked about the movie was that it included a bit of everything: comedy, sadness, racism and love. Love of the parents for the daughter, love between the husband and the wife and love of two people who just met recently, nobody knowing if their love is an everlasting one. In all levels this film works and although most of the time it is playing in just one house it never gets boring, because the dialogs are great.

The biggest problem in this movie is the racial difference and I think it is interesting that the big age gap and the fact that they wanted to get married just after 10 days of knowing each other did not seem to bother anybody...