Blades of glory

For one of the lectures we missed in the beginning of the semester we were asked to write a blog about a movie of our own selection, and include the five essential elements of a movie.
I chose the movie “Blades of Glory” from 2007, directed by Josh Gordon and Will Speck, as it is one of my favourite movies from the last year, and is a movie I like to watch over and over again.

The five essential elements:
1. A believable lead character.

The two lead characters Chazz Michael Micheals and Jimmy MacElroy are two professional ice skaters, even though none of them seems very smart and are both easily distracted by emotions that more than once destroy for their career. We find them believable and likable because they are funny and both kind and harmless of nature, even though it may not seem like that in the beginning.

2. Their urgent and difficult problem: They both get shut out from all future skating, which has been both of their lives until now, and they find themselves in a depressing and disgracing situation with no job or friends.
3. Their attempt to resolve the problem, which fails and make their situation more desperate: They find a way to get back into skating again by competing in couple’s skating and starts training together. They become better friends and everything seems to go well, until their competitors, Stranz and Fairchild Van Waldernberg, previous champions in the sport, tries to destroy their friendship by setting them up with, Jimmy’s girlfriend, Katie, and makes him think she’s been cheating him with Chazz. Jimmy runs away and refuses to let Chazz contact him, and it is the day before the Olympics.

4. The crisis, their last chance to win, the anticlimax: Both Jimmy and Chazz is captured by the Van Waldernbergs so they can’t make it to the competition.
5. The successful resolution: Chazz manages to escape from Stranz Van Waldernberg, by using ice skates to get loose and races him to the competition. Jimmy also manages to find his way out, but first has to overcome his fear of bad hygiene by getting the key to his handcuffs from dirty toiletpaper from the bin. They both manage to come to the competition in time and wins.
They become friends again when Jimmy finds out that Chazz didn’t betray him with his girlfriend. Chazz who has been a lonesome wolf as he puts it himself, now admits that he has found a “brother” in Jimmy and won’t be lonely again.

Audio lecture: "Elephant"(2003)

The topic of this week’s lecture was audio, and the movie we watched in this lecture was “Elephant” from 2003, directed by Gus Van Sant and the second movie in his Death Trilogy, of movies based on actual incidents. This movie is based on the school massacre at Columbine High School in 1999. In the movie we follow several ordinary students at a high school, each living out their ordinary school life, totally unconcerned of the shooting massacre that is about to happen. Our task for this week’s topic was to take a look at the soundtrack used in the movie.






The movie is very slow in style and action, with very long shots with little action where we mostly follow students for a long time, not doing very much.ole movie almost seems neutral and banal sometimes, with very little action in it, and a long build up before the climax. One of the scenes is over five minutes for example, and this makes the movie a long and slow process to watch as the tension builds up and the school massacre starts. The quietness and calm of the movie also emphasises and increases how we see the two students planning and the great relaxation and how normal they think and act their horrible plan out, how incredible little feelings and consideration of how bad they are about to destroy their fellow students and their families life.

There are four elements of the soundtrack in a movie: narration, music, sound effects and the dialog. These elements are used in various degrees in this movie, but even though these elements may not be as clearly used in this movie as in many others, they still serve an important role for the mood of the movie.
There are few if not any elements of narration in this movie. This element of the soundtrack is mostly used in educational movies and documentaries, and even though this kind of tool to add information to the movie could be used in “Elephant”, since it is based on school massacres from realities, the director has chosen to let the characters and the story itself tell what is happening, through shots of students in their normal school life, letting us know or feel that something is about to happen which will change these students life drastically. We also know that one or two of these students are the actual gunmen, but all of the students we meet seem like normal people, including the two boys we later find out are the boys who is planning the school massacre. This increases the feeling that behind the apparently normal surface of these high school teenagers, there is so much inside everyone that no one knows about that can both be good or bad. There is more to a person than its surface.

The music used in “Elephant” suits the mood and the slow action of the movie. The main purpose of the music element is to add emotion to the moving pictures and to guide the audience to know what to feel in different sequences of the scenes. The music used in “Elephant” is most classical piano music, especially Beethoven, but also Hildegard Westerkamp, and probably has connection to one of the gunmen, Alex who we early in the movie meets playing Beethoven’s “Für Elise” to himself on the piano. In the final scene with Alex this song is also played in the background, maybe to remind us or illustrate that this is the same boy who we earlier met so innocently playing the piano to himself seemingly harmless.
The use of music in the movie has little purpose to build up tension in the scenes. The music doesn’t tell us clearly when the scenes are getting scarier, happier or more exciting, as a thriller or action movie would in a much stronger degree. In the scene where we follow the bulimic girls through the cafeteria, the music used is an exception, because then the music is very hectic and fast, using a lot of rhythmic instruments, maybe to illustrate the chaos and the hectic tension that can be experienced in a high school cafeteria during lunch break.





In “Elephant” the use of sound effects is very important to create the feeling of being on a high school. The most important sound effect elements used is the various sounds from students nearby that we can’t often see when we follow the various students on their way around the school, and we get the feeling of the students being just one of hundreds of other students on a high school. The noise from students, classrooms and other school activity is often used in increasingly and decreasingly degree, as to show that the characters are moving from crowded areas to less crowded areas and so on. Another important sound effect element used in this movie is the sound of the various shotguns and explosives. In the last part of the movie, when we follow Benny for example, there is no music, but the sound of screaming people, explosion sounds and gunshots tells us that something very bad is going on, and increases the feeling of being present the school when this is happening. I would say that this movie relies more on the sound effect part of the soundtrack to create the wanted mood and tension in the movie and with the audience, than the music.

At last it is the dialogue. The dialogue in this movie is special, because a lot of it was improvised during shooting, so a lot of the script was created as the scenes where shot. Most of the characters in the movie used their own first names and many of the actors didn’t have any previous acting experience. I think this was to make the characters seem more like normal students, with normal reactions and conversations. The dialogue is mostly very ordinary, and a lot of the time the characters doesn’t even say that much, if it’s not the students we follow through their random conversations, like Nathan and Carrie, talking about a party they’re going to and the girls talking about going to the mall.



So the contrasts when we first meet Eric and Alex, who also seems to have an ordinary conversation, and then we find out that it is actually about planning to kill their fellow students, makes the shock for us viewers bigger to find out who the gunmen are, and this turns up the tension in the movie slightly and keeps it going towards the end. From this point on, the dialogue in the movie becomes more and more surreal and unconventional.

So even though this movie was a movie without any particular action or excitement, it succeeded in keeping me as the viewer still interested, by building up a tension and an expectation of something very unusual that is going to happen, all of this much thanks to a special use of the soundtrack for it.

Framing and Composition: "Kill Bill, vol.2"

Composition and framing was the topic for this week’s lecture, and the movie we watched was “Kill Bill, volume 2”, directed by Quentin Tarantino. Composition is considered as an art, and if the guidelines for composition are broken, it must be done by someone who understands and recognises how they can be successfully transcended. In this movie, Tarantino uses a wide range of untraditional and original composition- and framing techniques, which differs a lot with the traditional principles. He does it very successfully and makes the movie spectacular, interesting and aesthetically pleasant to watch.
The way he uses the framing and composition techniques also play an important role for how the story is told, making it easier to guide the viewer through the story.




For example, he uses black and white colours in the scenes from the wedding massacre at the Two Pines, illustrating that this is something that happened long ago, in the past. In another part of the movie that shows scenes from the past, Pai Mei’s training of the Bride; it is used cold, gray/blue/green-looking colours, which also contrasts that it is something from the past.

One of the examples of where it is used untraditional composition techniques is in the scene when the Bride is outside the chapel and meets Bill there. When they are talking to each other there is not enough talking room and it is use of big close ups on both persons. When they are talking to each other, the camera is only showing one of the parts at the time, but rather focuses on their feet to show how they are closing up on each other. There is although an object in the background of the characters, the electricity chain pole that connects the two people to each other.

Another scene that uses unconventional composition is the training scenes with Pai Mei. There are a lot of fast changes in the framing sizes of Pai Mei, that illustrates how fast and unpredictable he is, and also suits to the fast clipping Kung Fu movies and Kung Fu scenes are well known for.

In the scene where the Bride finally faces Bill, there is a fast and intense close up as she sees him, which illustrates that the final moment she’s been waiting for is about to happen, and also illustrates her strong emotions about Bill and what he has done to her.
In this movie there were a lot of camera angles that impressed me, and I liked how the big effect of these camera angles had for my viewing of the movie and for the understanding of the plot and also how it illustrated the mood and the action in the different scenes. One of the scenes I liked the most and made the biggest impression on me, was the scene where the Bride is buried. It gave you great understanding and empathy for the panic and fright she must have felt and for the progress of how she finally gets control of her feelings and start the fight to get out. Since it begins with total darkness, you understand the confusion and panic for not knowing where she is, how far beneath the ground she is and you get the feeling of being there. When she finds the torch and starts the battle to get through the lid, and finally starts to dig her way up to the surface, you see how she overcomes an impossible task, so it seems more impressive.
I was also impressed by the fighting scenes between the Bride and Elle Driver, because the camera angles managed to show how both parts are struggling to fight each other off, and how they desperately seeks for new tools and strategies. The camera angles manage to show how good both of the girls are, and how much they have to use all of their skills and knowledge to stay alive. The finale of the scene is a very good ending, with the Bride using a very dirty trick to put Elle out of action, by stabbing her eye out, since Elle herself always have been using the dirtiest tricks.

The fighting scene between the Bride and Pai Mei was also very impressive. It makes Pai Mei look supernatural and really shows how superior he his.

Screenplay: West world (1973)

This week’s lecture topic was about screen-play, and in the movie we watched we were specially to pay attention to how the screen-play-formulary was used in the way the story was build upon.
A script-editor called Syd Field read about 1500 scripts during 25 years, and noticed a certain receipt for what made a movie successful or not, and developed the Screenplay-formula. During the movie we watched we were told to look for how the screenplay-formula is used in the script. What is particular with the screenplay-formula is that all sections of the movie is of a particular length, and if you follow the correct direction 1 minute screen page means 1 minute screen time.



We were supposed to watch “3 Kings” but ended up watching an older movie from 1973, called “West world”. This was a science fiction movie that takes place somewhere in the future where it has been created a special high tech amusement park for rich people. They pay to get into RomanWorld, Medieval or Western World, and the people they meet there are human-looking robots how are programmed to respond positive to the guest, and the guests can kill them or involve with them romantically if they want.


ACT 1: approx. 30 min

Who? The main characters of the movie are two cowboys who travel together to this amusement-park where they have chosen to stay in Western World. We meet them first as they are sitting and talking together on the air plane about their expectations for the vacation. They seem like ordinary men who only seek a different and exciting holiday in WestWorld. Both are lawyers of profession, something that indicates that they have no extraordinary powers or skills. When we meet them they are talking about guns and gun belts and are discussing what they are going to do when they arrive in Western World, so we know which world they are going to.

Where? The setting is set somewhere in the future in reality world, where technology has reached as far as creating human robots to please the needs and pleasures of humans. It is created for rich people, as being something expensive and unique for them to experience. It’s a place for them to realise their material desires.

What? The story is about these two cowboys and their vacation in this futuristic amusement park and the problems that occur and it is also about how the robots works, the functions they have and what happens when everything does not works. It is clearly that something will happen between the human visitors in the world and the robots. The resorts slogan “where nothing can possibly go wrong” gives us an idea that something then will go wrong, and what happens when it does.
Plot Points:
The script formula also talks about plot points, points in the movie that turn the story around, makes it more interesting and pushes it forward. They will force the character into take action in some way. Plot point one also turns the movie into act two of the movie, from the set up to the confrontation, and the next plot point will further turn it from the confrontation into the resolution part. The plot points can also be more and rapidly in thriller movies, with a lot of smaller heights of drama, instead of fewer, big ones.
Plot point 1:
In the movie, the first plot point is when one of the honky tonk girl’s eyes suddenly opens wide and stiff, and the engineers later find out there is an increasingly malfunction with the robots. This gives us an idea that something is staring to go wrong.
Plot point 2:
When the remaining of the cowboys sees the bottle of acid and throws it in the face of the cowboy. He has found a weakness in the robots and can use it as a way of rending harmless the gunslinger.
Although I have pointed out these episodes as the plot points, there are also several small pitches (minor plot points) that keep up the tension, and indicate that the movie is of the thriller genre.
The five essential elements of the plot in “WestWorld”:
1. Believable lead character: The two cowboys, who are ordinary people travelling in to a high technological world, where little else seems ordinary.
2. Their urgent and difficult problem: The malfunctions of the robots
3. Their attempt to resolve the problem, which fails and make their situation even more desperate: The cowboy escapes on his horse out in the desert to escape the gunslinger. Takes up the fight with him but fails and escape further into Roman world and down into the underground tunnels.
4. The crisis, their last chance to win, the anticlimax: The face to face fight with the gunslinger down in the robot work shop/lab, when he ends up being faced with the gun pointed to his face.
5. The successful resolution: Fights off gunslinger by throwing acid into his face and finally destroys him as the robots stops working in the end.

Image sources:
http://thisdistractedglobe.com/wp-content/uploads/2006/06/Westworld.jpg

http://www.daniellight.co.uk/uploaded_images/filmpara-776508.jpg