Rear Window

A photographer injures his leg while on the job and is now forced to be stuck in a wheelchair home alone. Jeff spends this time staring at his neighbors with his binoculars and his camera’s telephoto lens. After some time he begins to believe a man, Jeff’s neighbor, murdered his wife. Jeff and two of his friends begin to investigate.  One night, after various interruptions from the authorities, the neighbor comes over to Jeff’s house unannounced but Jeff didn’t realize until he was walking up the stairs. After setting off his flash to blind the man, there is a fight and Jeff is pushed out of the building. Luckily as Jeff falls the police below him break his fall and the neighbor later commits to murdering his wife.

I believe the camera work consisted of some nice pans and shifts but the lighting that was set up in this movie was what was most impressive to me. The extensive shots in the beginning were also very cool to watch.

I believe this is one of the best movies I’ve ever watched. Hitchcock is truly a master and his skills are shown with this film. The story telling combined with the beautiful cinematography and great editing, its one of the best films I’ll ever watch.

The Hunger Games

In the future the world is sectioned off into 12 districts and every year they must put up human offerings to keep the peace. When a young girl is selected her older sister volunteered instead to save her sister.  The boy is selected and it turns out they know each other. They take the trip up to the arena and along the way they are trained and taught survival and fighting skills. When the games begin half are slaughtered within the first ten minutes. The games proceed and various challenges are thrown their way but when one particular player dies, it causes a riot in her district.  Because of this the chairman announces that if two players come from the same district they may win together, so people can cheer for love. The boy and girl from district 12 team up and proceed to win the games. When they are the last two standing the commissioner announces that only one may win. Hearing this they decide to commit suicide by eating poisonous berries. Before they can the commissioner yells stops and crows them both winners.

I liked the idea that the setting was essentially a utopian city where everything was perfect, according to their perfect. Even with this every camera shot was shaky, nothing was smooth, nothing was still, it was always shoulder mounted. I think the idea seeing a perfect world in a not perfect way hints at some underlying imperfections that are on the verge of plaguing their perfect world.

I believe the director had a wonderful vision and went for it. The cool color of the film gives it a futuristic look that even when in daylight, still looks slightly blue. Also the costumes and makeup used in the film are very whimsical and far fetch to say the least but it just gives another reason to further distance ourselves from the idea of being like them.

Cashback

Cashback follows a gentleman, Ben, who is broken with by his girlfriend. The experience is so brutal Ben develops insomnia and is always awake. He is so busy trying to get his paintings noticed during the day he uses the time at night to read. But when money become short, he gets a night job at the grocery store. One nights so many things overwhelm Ben he is able to freeze time. He uses this time to disrobe girls and draw still life portraits of them. Once he is done he puts their clothes back on and begins time again. He quickly falls for his co-worker and she is able to break his cycle; he begins sleeping again.

There are many artistic shots used in this film. There is one shot where he is standing at the telephone then after hearing some unsettling news the camera moves from the side of his face to the front while the background changes from the hallway to what makes it look like Ben is falling down to his bed. There is also some usage of a fisheye lens which is unique. The audio is amazing and every time I watch it people get dead silent to ensure they don’t break the attention and cause time to start again.

The director put together an amazing film and it is now my favorite film. Many trippy scenes are incorporated with a unique use of such a rare superpower that is hard not to acknowledge the creativity of it. Also Ben and I both tend to see very artistic shapes and lighting from things we see, especially females, so it was easy to relate to him.

Jaws

Jaws tells a story about one small town’s summer. Amity’s citizens and tourist are terrorized when a monster in the sea, a gigantic great white shark, begins to attack those in the ocean. A massive hunt is put forth to find the beast that terrorized Amity and many sharks were killed but none were that of the guilty one. After the failure, an unlikely team joins forces. The Mayor hires a fisherman and sends him out to see with the Police Chief and a marine scientist to find and destroy the great white. While out at sea the great white begins to attack the team and their boat, The Orca. The great white leaps onto the boat, which crushes it and begins to sink. The fisherman, Quint, loses his footing and falls into the great white’s mouth. The police chief, Brody, shoves a scuba tank into the shark’s mouth and when the shark comes back to attack them he shoots the tank and blows the great white up.

I thought that there were a lot of cool techniques used is this movie. From a visual stand point I loved how they used the zoomed the camera in while moving it away from Brody. It was a cool technique however I think it was shot too quickly. I also think it was a great way to illustrate the power of the shark by pulling the barrels underwater and towing the boat backwards. I also think the score accurately portrayed what you should be feeling at that moment and made most people feel that way.

Stephen Spielberg masterfully assembled the final product. The camera work, the score, and the acting all created a breakthrough film that became very popular very quickly. Given the time period this was assembled, I believe this film does a great job at implementing emotions into the viewer.