Saturday 13 December 2008

My Shocking Scene

P.S I Love You
For my shocking sequence i have chosen P.S I Love You. It is mainly the first 10 minutes of the film. I find this scene very shocking as it was unexpected to me. The scene i chose is about a couple Holly and Gerry who have an argument but make up but their argument is funny for the audience, then the credits come up but after all you see is a room with people in it wearing black. First of all i found it very confusing but as soon as i relised what had happened i was completely shocked that Gerry had died.

Sunday 16 November 2008

Stuff i found out:

Looking into reviews:
I looked on a variety of different film review sites which consisted of:
- http://www.empire.com/

- http://www.rottentomatoes.com/
- http://www.yahoomovies.com/
-http://www.filmcritic.com/

Looking at all of these sites it revealed that American Beauty was the highest rated film followed by Kids and last was High School Musical. #

Setting up a debate:
I have also set up an account on http://www.imdb.com/ which i have started a debate on the message boards about dyfunctional youth so far i have found these things out by what other people have said?

- The only one of those three movies I'm really familiar with is American Beauty, so I don't know how much help I can actually be, but I do think that's a very good choice for the topic at hand. Ricky with his odd combination of hippie-ish ideals and ambitious, entrepreneurial spirit; Angela, the beauty-obsessed, attention-starved sex kitten who's afraid of sex; and Jane, the stereotypical average teenager who just wants to be loved for who she is.

- I saw High School Musical 2 and the thing that struck me the most was how these teenagers started prancing around randomly in the dark on a field or a hill. I mean i can't remember the last time I saw a more explicit allusion to drug-taking in my life. Yeah, there's drugs in American Beauty too. So everybody does drugs...

These are the two main comments i have had back. I personally think the 1st statment is interesting and is very good but the 2nd comment is just what someone thought and shows how different people interpret a film.


My focus group questions and what i found out

My focus group Questions:
1. Can you please draw a representation of an american teenager?
2. Can you list 10 adjectives on your sketch that you would use to describe american youth?
3. Can you give me a definition of what you think the american dream is?
My definition: The american dream is the widespread aspirations of americans to live better
than their parents did and also a phrase that translates to mean hope, prosperity and
happiness.
4. Clips:
Kids:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3A93rgYI--Q
American Beauty:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zU1wSLdshcU&feature=related
High School Musical:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PA32s2coJ2I
What messages and values do you think these three clips communicate to you about American
youth?
5. To what extent do you think these films either confrom or challenge the American dream?

What i found out:
1. In my focus group i asked everyone involved which were 13 people to draw an american youth. I found out that 7 males and 2 females drew a male youth whereas no males and 3 females drew a female youth.

2. I asked my focus group to use 10 words to describe an american youth. I found out that 9/13 either named american youths as either fat of obese. 8/13 people used gangster and 6/13 people said sporty or named some sort of sport.
12/13 people's adjectives they used were very derogatory and not very nice towards american youths.

3. 13/13 people understood the american dream by mentioing success, perfect home, perfect job and the perfect family.

Overall i didnt find my focus group 100% useful as the answers i recieved werent as clear as i hoped for and some went against of what i originally thought. This could of been for my questions being too broad but in some way i did find this healpful with the results i have shown above.

Sunday 12 October 2008

Random sites i found useful:

A site i found useful for film reviews:
www.empireonline.com

Synopsis of films:

Kids:
Is a story about a boy called Telly, who goes around taking young girls virginity as he thinks that this will stop him from getting any STD's but he is unaware that he is givining them HIV. A young i girl called Jenny who slept with Telly a year before searches across the city for Telly deserate to tell him the truth that he has HIV and is giving it to other girls as he is the only boy she has slept with. This film shows a story of just a single day where everything and nothing will change.

American Beauty
is story about a 42 yr old man called Lester Burnham and his wife Carolyn are unhappy with their lives so Lester decides to make a few changes in his life. Lester black mails his boss for $60,000, smokes weed who he gets from Jane's boyfriend Nicky who is their next door neighbor, quits his job, comes obsessed with his daughters (Jane) best friend Angela and gets a job flipping burgers. He tries to live his life on the edge and live it to the full but he sees his wife having an affair and doesn't care. The main people in his life start to turn against him and people start to get the wrong ideas which result in his death that he talks about all the way through.

High School Musical
High School Musical is about the American Dream. A school boy called Troy Bolton meets a girl Gabriella and fall in love meeting a group of freinds on the way. Troy is the popular boy in school and Gabriella is a new student who is bright. Together they change the status quo in their school and bring together unlikely friendships and relationships. Troy has a hard time choosing between Basketball which his dad runs or singing as he tries to hide singing from his friends. Gabriella is competed against by the popular girl in school Sharpay who wants Troy to herself and will do anything to get him even if it means making him unhappy.

My Presentation

Why i chose this topic?
I chose this topic as most recent films shown in cinemas are going with the American dream and showing a happy life with no huge problems. However in Kids and American Beauty it portrays American youth in a completely different way showing the struggles and problems that some people could face.
What i hope to learn?
I hope to find out and show that American films can give the effect of life being perfect and not showing the audience some truth of real life and just showing the ideal American Dream ideology.

Key Scenes:
Kids http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCot-k3FJuI
American Beauty http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amnNp8FpqL8
High Shool Musical http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvkh29RKFRY

What i have learnt so far
1. Kids and American Beauty are films that I would not normally pick up to watch and I didn’t know much about the trashing of the American Dream in films, as most films show how lovely life is such as High School Musical. 2. Kids and American Beauty show the complete opposite side of American Youth than High School Musical and shows the effects and that bad things happens in life. For example in Kids Telly gives youth girls HIV and in American Beauty Jane turns against her Parents who give her no attention of self confidence. 3. I’ve looked into a range of different film reviews from sites such as empire, rotten tomatoes and filmcritic.com and on all the website American Beauty gets the highest star rating followed by Kids and last High School Musical.

My Film Studies Question:


“Trashing the white American dream”
A close study into representation of dysfunctional youth across a body of of films and their social and political significance.
Focus Film: Kids (1995) diretor Larry Clark
Secondary Films:American Beauty and High School Musical