23 Aralık 2016 Cuma
Requiem for a dream- Film Analysis
https://youtu.be/MaC2SHmfqkE
Requiem For A Dream
This scene starts with walking of Marion who worked as prostitute as a hidden job. Regret is a dominant feeling in this scene, so that light, costumes, music, shot etc. are based on showing them.
The music at the background, which is a score of the film “Lux Aeterna” starts with the walking of Marion. It creates tension because at the scenes that audience hears this score creates tension and they know that something goes wrong. The shot is close up as a reason of showing the importance of her feelings and creating a regretful environment. She didn’t look the camera directly; she is keeping her eyes away from the camera like a child that did something bad. She is shameful of what did she done. The elevator’s light is flickering. It represent something is broken and goes wrong with her and her situation. Also, the color of the light is blue which is dominant color of the movie. The color blue is a great significance for depression and sadness. After, she goes out from the elevator and the building, flickering light effect continues with lightning. It displays that she can’t leave the regrets and secrets behind. They keep following her and it becomes her nature. Another significance symbol of regret and shame are throwing up part of the scene. She knows that she did a wrong thing and even disgusted from herself, but it is a result of obsession of drugs. It is connected with the upcoming scene, her shameful action related with Sara’s make-up scene. She is too old for doing that kind of a make-up, but is a reason of her obsession of being in the show, TV. She prepared for herself from the call till the end of the movie like this. Her make-up is shameful for her age. Also, she didn’t do her make-up properly. In the next scene, Marion comes to the house while the flickering light continues from the TV’s light. Harry is wearing a white t-shirt which represents that he is innocent in this situation because he is waiting for her girlfriend to come home while she is being prostitute.
The main characters that are Marion and Harry placed as right and left sides to show distance and coldness in their relationship. The bars at the background show that they are stuck in vicious circle of their obsession. The ful-2-shot, the bars and the fragment put the character in a prison environment. Again the lights are cold, blue and flickering because of TV. Also, TV is a requiring and important motif because it represents obsession of Harry’s mother and gives the flickering light affect in the scene.
With a Soviet Montage technique of connection to the mother of Tyron and then Tyrone is showing feeling of regret. The medium long shot and the camera movement, zoom out, inform the reader about Tyrone’s situation and trouble. He is looking at the picture of her mother deeply. As the camera moves farther, the audience gets the feeling better. He is sitting right side of the bed naked. Nakedness is a symbol of being innocent, defenseless and regret. He is feeling not protected because of he didn’t keep his promises. Also, the half of the bed is clean and the other part is untidy, like his thoughts. He feels regret because of the entire thing that he done but in the other hand he is addicted to it. This scene is open frame because of the window, but he is sitting far away from the window. So, the distance between the window and him show that he is far from escaping his addiction. Also, even in the daytime, the lights are open as a reason of chance of escape is so low; he needs some sort of a help and support for it. One of the light’s colors is yellow the other one is white, which represents the challenges and differences in Tyrone. He turns back and looks out side of the window to think about the change as escaping. The right sides of the frame, the bars are still seen in the scene to impose the feeling of being trapped in drug. He doesn’t have any way to go out other than the window; he doesn’t have any solution to solve his trouble other than the healing.
The scene where Sara is doing her make-up is juxtaposed right after the scene where Tyrone is looking at a picture of his mother. The reason for that is the mother-son relationship where Freud explains as ‘a classical psychoanalytic theory, the Oedious complex which occurs during the phallic stage of psychosexual development, where a boy’s decisive psychosexual experience is the Oedips complex-his son-father competition and for possession of mother. So while Tyrone is in his room looking at her picture, he is seeking the love of her mother. In contrast Sara has nothing to do with her son in the next scene, and this is obscene. This is a close up, because the feeling of Sara is important to demonstrate at that moment. She is in the middle of the scene and other prompts in the background are not clearly visible. This states her significance in the film. She has a clown like make up on, and this reveals the fact that her make-up is wrong along with everything else in the film. The use of red on her lips and on her dress symbolizes energy and danger; energy being the thing she has at that moment, and danger is the thing that she consists for herself. Also the use of superimposition gives a drunk like feeling which indicates that Sara is not herself. She is supposed to be a fine mother but she actually is a women with obsessions and disorders. The upcoming scene is a high angle wide shot. Combining this, with the fact that the character takes too little space in the scene, indicates that she is lost. The soft, insufficient lighting implies darkness. The open door of the closet and the messy bed indicates the disorder in Sara’s life. Additionally, the use of superimposition shows that she is delusional.
17 Kasım 2016 Perşembe
13 Kasım 2016 Pazar
Analysis of Citizen Kane
Citizen
Kane is a film shot in 1941 by Orson Walles; who is also its’ producer,
co-author, director and star. The genre of the film is drama, at the same time
mystery. This is because the film consists drama in the flashbacks of the
characters, while the other characters actually try to solve the mystery of the
main character’s last words: ‘Rosebud’.
This film has been nominated for Academy Awards in nine different
categories. It has actually won one Academy Award for Best Writing (Original
Screenplay) by Herman J. Mankiewcz and Welles.
By being a quasi-biographical (a film that describes real life, behind a
façade of fiction), this film examines the life and legacy of Charles Foster
Kane who is played by Orson Welles.
The film starts with Kane Foster’s childhood, his separation from his
parents and Colorado due to poverty. Through the film, the impacts on Charles; of
being separated from his family and moving to New England to live with Mr. Thatcher is depicted.
Through the use of flashbacks; his story is narrated with the research of a
reporter, who is trying to solve the mystery of Charle’s last words before
he dies.
To
blend the settings, superimposition is used in the beginning of the film. This
technique gives the feeling of continuity and shows that there is a
relation/connection between the settings. This is the last scene, the scene
where the sequence of superimposition ends. The sign that says ‘No Trespassing’
foreshadows the story of the character. It means that he has no way out of the
life, he is designated to live. The ring fence further supports this sensation;
that he is trapped and there isn’t a way out. 
It continues with an establishing shot, This is a wide shot which is used to
show the setting and
showing the big landscape which the characters at the same time.
Even without the existence
shows the place where Charlie lives. of Charlie, his big picture shows his
significance to the movie.
There are many scenes where Charlie Kane is
shot with a low angle; whether a mid shot(first picture), long shot(second and
third picture) is used. The use of long angle indicates his significance. These
kinds of shorts are mostly used when he is speaking to the public. This is
because of the fact that he was a candidate to become a president, and that
makes him more important compared to the other characters in the scene who are
just there to listen. He is also always placed in the center of the frame,
which further supports the fact that he is important.
This is the scene
where her mother gives Charlie away because she doesn’t want him to grow up in
poverty and desires him to live a comfortable, rich life. During this scene,
close-ups are used to demonstrate the feelings of characters. So it’s possible
to see that the mother is sad and Charlie is angry.
We see Kane through a
window pane throwing snowballs, while Mr. Thatcher talks over a deal with the
parents of Charles Kane. Normally the director would make the conversation be
the main point in the frame by blurring the background but in this case, by the
use of deep focus shot, we sympathize with Charles because he is the
subject of conversation visually and literally.
This is the scene which comes right after
the one where Charlie leaves his own family. This is his only scene as a child
in his new home. The high angle which is used to shoot young Charlie and the
low angle which is used to shoot Mr. Thatcher, demonstrate the dominance and
significance relation between them. Although Mr. Thatcher is shot with a lower
angle(this shows that he has the authority); when it comes to placement his position ,which is near the left edge of
the frame, indicates that he is insignificant in the film. Oppositely, while
Charlie is shot with a high angle which shows his lack of authority, him being
positioned in the middle of the frame reveals the fact that he is important in
the film.
There are two
shots of the character Jed Leland. This shots are before a flashback( before he
starts telling a memory of him which is
seen as a flashback ) and after the flashback. Before the flashback the
character is shot with an eye level angle which shows that he is not
significant, nor trivial. But after the flashback, when the audience learns
that he was fired from the paper do to his nasty comments about Kane’s wife’s
performance, his value directly decreases. That’s why after the flashback, he
is continued to be shot with a high angle.
The use of deep focus is again visible. In
spite of the fact that Charlie is closer to the camera and more significant,
Jed is equally visible due to deep focus.
This shows that Jed is in relation with Charlie. In this scene deep
focus visually details the character’s thoughts and conflict by juxtaposing
them relative to the rest of the scene. 
This shot is a high angle shot which depicts
non-dominance of Kane’s wife. The shadow of Charlie covers half of his wife’s
face, which shows his impact and power over his wife. Also the use of low key
lighting helps the creation of drama in the scene and makes the audience feel
uneasy.
This is an example of an editing technique
which is used a lot in this film, and is called superimposition. The different
newspaper headings about the performance of Charlie’s wife are superimposed to
Charlie’s face expression, and/or to his wife herself, plus to the audience.
The music used in the scene, Kane’s expressions which are superimposed, and the
sequence of the shots create an oppressive/ negative mood.
This scene comes towards the end of the movie,
when Kane has everything that money can buy and when he lives in a castle with
his wife. This scene is very important in several ways. First it’s possible to
say that this is a wide shot which shows the setting. When it’s observed, it’s
easy to say that there is a lot of negative space, which depicts the character
as powerless. The use of low key lighting again creates drama, by the use of
shadows in the setting. The character is almost blended in the shadows, in a
very large room; so it’s possible to say that the character is now lonely,
within his own wealth.
Also, the use of
echoes exist in this scene. While talking to each other Mr. Kane and his wife
sometimes even can’t hear each other. This repeatedly stresses the truth which
is, despite the fact that they are
living in a huge mansion , they are very lonely and isolated.
Lastly, the sound design of the film is
apparent. There are no internal sounds which mean that all sounds in the film are
external. This indicates that there isn’t a major internal (psychological)
conflict in the film. Even though this
is an old production, during the movie sounds are synchronous most of the time.
In some particular scenes there are asynchronous sounds (ex: When the audience
applauses Mr.Kane’s wife after her performance), yet this is only because lack
of technology. Adding to this, ambient sounds can’t be heard, which shows that
the technical aspects of the film is well managed.
Throughout this film, the story of a boy
who is separated from his parents is told. The film starts and ends with the
scene that shows the “No Trespassing” sign, because there is no way that the
character can change his life after being sent to New England. Only if he could
stay in Colorado, he could have the chance to become a good person. With this
shift, Charles fall from childhood innocence into the world of glamour, glitz
and money. His face paced life cause him to hurt a lot of people and loose
friends. And the word ‘rosebud’, which is tried to be understood throughout the
film turns out to be the name of the sled that he used to play with when he was
a little boy. (The same sled that he used to separate himself from Mr.
Thatcher.)
The use of the word ‘rosebud’ as his final
words, reveals that he has lost his childhood innocence and became a bad
person. The bad part of the film is that he realizes this too late, and after
his deat rosebud is tossed into a fire and burned. So with his death, the only
thing remaining from his childhood and representing his innocence is lost.
10 Kasım 2016 Perşembe
16 Ekim 2016 Pazar
GERMAN
EXPRESSIONISM-ART
The expressionism movement appeared during
the mid 1900s in Dresden and Munich paralleling the beginning of expressionism
in France. One of its main influences was Van Gogh’s pioneering expressionist
paintings. Unlike impressionists, who were all about imitating nature, the
expressionist painters ‘typically distorted color, scale and space to convey
their subjective feelings about what they saw’(Wilette). Later on the war( World War 1), sacred most
of the artists for good. So starting from 1915, German expressionism started
becoming a protests movement, as well as it started becoming a style of ‘modern
art’.
Although expressionist painting is said to
have originated with the British painterJMW Turner in 1755, it actually
originated in Paris. In Autumn a group held an exhibition which was talked
about across all Europe. Thus was the name Fauvism born.
Simultaneously; a few German architecture
students ,who are at the same time artists,
formed a group called Die Brucke, meaning the bridge. They looked at the
same models for inspiration as Feuves namely: Van Gough, Paul Gaugin and
Georges Seurant. “Die Brucke early embodied the aesthetics of, German
Expressionism, a movement which would reshape abstract as well as representational
art”(Wilette).
As it’s recently stated, Die Brucke
consisted four architecture students: Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Karl
Schmidt-Rottluff , Fritz Bleyl and Erich Heckel. They aimed to attract all the
revolutionary and innovative in order to win the freedom to create, for the
next gerenation.
Their
subjects were taken from their everyday surroundings and their works were
representing their daily life. Their paintings were directly painted with life
and experience itself. Their artistic point of view directly came from the
exhibitions which traveled around Europe and consisted many works of Van Gogh.
“What was at first intuitively transformed into art, was refined into a
powerfully expressive art composed of a simplified tracery of lines, composition
over large surfaces and pure color”(Wilette). Landscape, the nude, the nude in
a landscape were important themes for Die Brucke.
Standing Child- Eric
Heckel:
Naturalness
and exaggeration offered possibilities of overcoming traditional boundaries.
The artists wanted to depict universality and objectivity, that’s why color was
made independent.
In
this drawing, the pose of the girl indicates that she is not ashamed of her
nakedness. Her skinny immature body, provides a visual analog for the artist’s
angularity and simplification form.
Ernst Ludwig Kirchner
(1880):
This is a piece where freedom is stated with the use of color. And again nudity is visible. There is not much contrast in Kirchner’s work yet the use of bold and bright colors, is the main idea of this painting. Her comfortable position again represents lack of shame because of nudity. Plus the existence of the mirror strengthens this meaning by representing that she is comfortable by observing her naked body.
Ernst
Ludwig Kirchner-At The Café Terrace:
This
is most likely drawn close to the year 1915. That’s because, it represents the
darkness and obscurity, which are all about the Great War. The color use (black
and white) illustrates the contrast of the society or maybe even the challenges
of the artist’s inwardness. Additionally, it’s possible to observe the sharp
edges of the women’s clothing, which contributes to the idea of contrast.
Max Pechstein- Killing of the Banquet Roast:
The
human figure with the sharp edges of its body, plus the tree figure with its
unfamiliar illustration demonstrates innovation and modernism. This is another
painting with striking, bold colors. The green, yellow and flesh-color are used
to illustrate naturalism and freedom. While the contrast of colors attract
attention, the use of black in the background but especially in the tree’s
roots depict depression.
The article written by Jeanne Wilette is a
secondary source, which consist all this information about art and German
expressionism. This is obviously written to inform the reader about the German
Expressionism, how it formed and further information of the things that came
with it. Personally I found this article quite beneficial, for the reason that
it provides the necessary information about German Expressionism and arts.
Work Cited
Work Cited
Derain., By French Fauvist Andre. "History
of Expressionist Painting (1880-1930)." History
of Expressionist Painting. Encyclopedia of Arts and History, n.d. Web. 09
Oct. 2016.
<http://www.visual-arts-cork.com/history-of-art/expressionist-painting-origins.htm>.
Christina.tsevis. "The Bridge to
Utopia: Die Brücke's Wild Expressionism." Visual News. Visual News, 03
Mar. 2016. Web. 09 Oct. 2016.
<https://www.visualnews.com/2012/06/04/bridge-utopia-expressionist-group-die-brcke-early-20th-century/>.
"German Expressionism." MoMA. Moma, n.d. Web. 09 Oct.
2016. <https://www.moma.org/explore/collection/ge/themes/index>.
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