- Film Structure - The structure of a film refers to how the film is made, and what processes a director goes through to produce the film. From pre-production to post production, to the camera position and movement, the structure of film is the broad scope of what is required to make a film. In Citizen Kane, film structure is important because the film starts at the end, and then flashes back to things that were before the end chronologically.
- Cinematography - Cinematography is the way a film is presented to its audience. Cinematographers can put filters over their film, as well as direct how the cameras are to be used. From film structure, the cinematographer already knows what has to be filmed, but most of the extra camera placement and lighting adjustments are done by the cinematographer. In Citizen Kane, cinematography is essential, because all of the camera angles, high and low lighting situations, and the scenes with camera placement all are key parts of the movie.
- Production Design - Production design focuses on making the background of the film a living, breathing world. Without these people, films would have story, but utterly bland backgrounds. The design of the production allows for viewers to be interested in the movie. In Citizen Kane, the production designers had to create a whole mansion for Kane to walk around in, as well as make a populated New York City for the newspaper and other events to happen in.
- Acting - Acting is the emotion and feeling that actors put into their movie roles. Acting makes the movie much better, considering the characters would be so dull if the actors didn't act. In Citizen Kane, all the actors are stellar actors, and all play their roles perfectly. They play an integral part in the movie.
- Editing - Editing is the reason people like watching films. Editing brings the film together, cuts out all of the bad parts, makes the film exciting or sad, and makes the film mean something. The different ways of cutting films and piecing them back together are what make movies good. The editing in Citizen Kane is very important. The film has montages (a first in the film industry), and other important editing moments that set it apart from other films.
- Sound Design - Sound is said to be most of the movie. Movies need great sound effects and soundtracks. Foley artists spend their whole lives making sound effects for movies, so our movies can sound weird and wacky, or strikingly realistic. Sound really enforces mood and makes a movie 110% better than what it would be like without added sound. The soundtrack for Citizen Kane is definitely very striking and moving, and the sound effects (for example the screaming bird) are very strange, but fitting.
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The sound design of this scene makes the scene so much better. During this epic scene, the audience can hear footsteps, soldiers' armor clinking, and horse hooves. More than that, they can hear the gory clashes and stabs of battle. The battle is brutal and violent, but the listeners can still hear the music over the battle. The music is surprisingly a waltz, that sounds like the Pirates of the Caribbean soundtrack. The victorious sounding waltz assures you that the battle will be won, but it won't be an easy fight. Lastly, the dialogue in the scene is an inspirational speech, along with jeers from the opposing army. The dialogue gives the audience a view into the past, and how battles were fought. The sound of this opening scene in Gladiator enhances the scene so much. My favorite song is Moonlight Sonata by Beethoven. This song has three different movements, each with a different feeling to them. The mood of the song is mourning in general, but all throughout the song, chord modulation a help the feeling of the song change dramatically. It makes me feel self reflective and calm, since it seems to talk of death and suffering, due to its minor key signature. One example is that near the middle of the first movement, there is a minor scale, but it is lifting up into high ranges. This sounds uplifting but somehow sad at the same time. Moonlight Sonata gives me a somber mood, and it makes me feel calm.
My favorite movie ever is Gone in Sixty Seconds. The movie really isn't that good, but I love the cars, action, and humor. The characters are eccentric to say the least, and they all have their own quirks and complications. They interact with each other so strangely, and they don't seem like they would be compatible. The cars in the movie are also pretty nice. They have to boost a hundred cars in 24 hours, ranging from classic cars to new humvees. The variety gives you a taste of what cars have been around for the past century, and what kind of people own those cars. Lastly, the action is great. From the tense moment that a police officer is inspecting a garage with a car full of cocaine to the bombastic action of he car chase at the end, the movie is filled with action. Most people would say that this movie isn't really that spectacular of a movie, but I hold it dear to my heart.
Define the following terms and give examples:
Strasberg created an acting school, and this page describes method acting's history.
This definition was taken from Break of Dawn Theater's blog. Their page elaborates on Technical Acting. Many movies have been able to bring me to a different time and place, but one movie that stands out is Avatar. Even though I didn't care for the plot, James Cameron was able to jam a whole world into a movie. He made it so the world around the characters was living and breathing. The animals and other parts of the environment were used in the plot, but were also flying around when they were not needed. James Cameron was able to insert emotion into the world, which translates into me being able to be sucked into the environment.
Black and white films are no different from color films, despite how society thinks of them. Many of my friends think that black and white movies are somehow inferior, just because old movies aren't as good as new movies. But, some of the best movies are black and white, like Psycho and Back in the days when filmmakers filmed in back and white, they didn't have the technology available to film in color. So, the color palette are indicative of the time period. Each time period has great movies and bad movies, and the films are not graded based on color, they are graded based on depth and plot. Thus, I appreciate black and white films, just like I appreciate color, but I don't feel like they're a genre of movies or that people should think of them any differently than other films.
Books are sometimes considered better than movies, and they simply provide some things that movies cannot provide. For example, books have less stimulus than movies do, allowing more imagination and cognition. The reader has to imagine what the characters look like, and also have to imagine how the environment looks. Books can also be much more detailed than movies. All of the book to movie adaptions always cut out some of the story, which shows that books can contain more. However, this is because most people don't read a book all at one time, where for movies, they would watch one all at once. Books provide more detail, and leave things to the reader's imagination, which movies just cannot do.
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