Kung Fu Hustle

Sorry for the late post, dead/finals week and Phil Ginley do not go well at all. But regardless, let's talk about Kung Fu Hustle, a film that, to put lightly, truly kicks butt.

This film has plenty of post-modernism in it to boot constantly referencing not just kung fu films but Looney Tunes styled action/violence, religion and spirituality as well. Additionally, aesthetic movie references from The Matrix and Gangs of New York pop throughout the film as well.

What I found truly interesting about this film narratively is how it plays with the idea of a kung-fu master and how the most unorthodox of characters portray them. One never would've expected that an overweight, ill-tempered landlady and her somewhat eccentric and flamboyant husband would wind up being the two highly trained kung fu masters that would save the day. But what is even more surprising is the evolution of the film's protagonist, who starts out as a complete loser, to a wannabe villain. His character eventually progresses into the hero and (oddly enough) becomes "the One". The film does a great job portraying odd characters only to reveal them as heroic and powerful kung-fu warriors. It truly helps fortify how these types of films play with former genres and cinematic cliches in very interesting ways.

If only all parody films were as fantastic as this...

Mulholland Drive

Wow. What a trip. I think it's safe to say that if one thinks too much trying to make sense of the film, their head might explode. That being said, I'm gonna try to explain Mulholland Drive as much as I can before my brain starts to hurt.

One thing that is clear however, is that the film is ripe with surreal, completely out there and sometimes nightmarish images. Now one has to understand that a lot of these images don't really mean anything, going back to the principles of post-modernism but instead establish a certain idea that brings the film together. That idea is that there are two worlds in the film: the real world and the surreal nightmare world. Therefore, a lot of these images aren't metaphors and symbols for something but rather just there to establish this nightmarish alter reality. I mean let's be honest, it's pretty difficult to understand why an old couple is running out of a bag giggling, then crawling under Diane's door and tormenting her until she shoots herself. It is hard to tell which one is real or if either are real, after all the owner of the club Rita and Betty go to explains over and over again that everything is merely an illusion.

Another image that represents an idea are the mob bosses trying to manipulate the casting of Adam's film. They are not meant to be seen as characters but rather as the higher forces in the movie industry preventing the ones from trying to make art (Adam) from having to much power; they are there to keep Hollywood as a business but in the film this idea is exaggerated to the fullest extent. The mob bosses are portrayed as being, quite frankly, socially distraught. The two mob bosses that meet Adam answer with one word or don't even answer at all. Additionally, when they said "she is the one" they don't explain why in any sense and just stare senselessly at Adam. Then to make matters more awkward, when one of the bosses is offered expresso, he spits it out and rejects it in an almost childish fashion. During this whole scene, I was thinking about how these must be the two worst film pitchers ever.

Nochimson states that this film is "a grim angle of perception". That much like the characters in the film, we are forced to descent into darkness and mystery that we don't necessarily understand. And perhaps that the point after all. We don't know what's going on but we go for the ride after all. I mean in Club Silencio, the man said there was no band, that it is all an illusion but Betty and Rita stayed and watched anyway. Much like we did even though we were narratively, lost in this darkness.

Heathers

Sorry for the lateness regarding this post, I lost track of time and with all the events going on this weekend (Jamnesty, Relay for Life etc.) I lost track of time. Anyway...

I must say that Heathers is probably my favorite movie we watched in this class so far. Frankly, if I ever make it in the film industry this is the kind of movie I'd want to make: something that takes a fairly common premise and completely flips it on its head in such a chaotic and post-modern fashion.

For this film, I want to concentrate on its use of "blank parody" as described by Nick Burns and how it jars the expectations of what one would expect from a teen comedy by flipping the genre's cliches upside down. During our talk on thursday, someone discussed how they were almost disappointed in the character J.D., hoping he would be more of a traditional heroic male lead. Such a disappointment is exactly what leads to the idea of this film as a blank parody.

The first 10 or so minutes of the film are almost exactly like Mean Girls: protagonist befriends the most popular girl at school, said popular girl hurts her, protagonist seeks revenge. The audience probably assumes what will follow will be a series of pranks and gags to get back at the popular girl. The popular girl's popularity will decline, popular girl seeks revenge, emotional chaos will erupt in the school, protagonist feels bad, protagonist seeks redemption, the high school will be at peace once again, the protagonist will fall in love with J.D. and everyone will live happily ever after, more or less. This basic plot line was my assumption of what will happen in Heathers... and then J.D. kills the popular girl.

Then what follows is a satirical tale that slowly unravels its own sanity until Veronica is watching J.D. blow himself up in front of the school. The whole narrative completely throws the audience out of their expectations by ultimately creating an extremely dark and morbid version of a John Hughes coming of age teen comedy; the genre this film is "blank paroding".

However, Burns is wrong about one thing, stating that it is "nothing more than purely formalistic cinematic considerations" and that characters show no real psychological motivation. The lack of motivation is however why the satire is so effective. These characters do have purpose for what they do, as proved with J.D.'s final monologue before attempting to blow up the school, but this lack of motivation Burns talks about only adds to the pure insanity this school is being shoved face first into. Ultimately, Heathers is about a high school literally going mad over the constant "suicides" and how many of the characters, particularly the teachers and parents, are completely incompetent to handle the situation in a mature fashion. It's a metaphor for how adults, for the most part, are unable to connect with their youth.

Shaft

Masculine stereotypes in cinema and television have always intrigued me. Mainly because even though they're almost always out there, not a lot of people shine light on them. Male stereotypes have two sides on them: on one side there is the uber jacked, emotionally repressive action star and on the other side is the dimwitted husband who aside from beer, sports and sex, is completely incompetent. Shaft explores the first of these male stereotypes particularly from the African-American perspective. Throughout the film, it portrays, challenges and ever celebrates these stereotypes.

Shaft shows very little emotion to his female counterparts. When his girlfriend says, "I love you", he merely states akin to Han Solo in the Star Wars saga, "I know". His womanizing persona reminded me a lot of James Bond, how he jumped between women without any real signs of emotional connection. Such a trait always perplexed me, especially as a child, when I watched a Bond movie and wondered what happened to the woman he was with in the previous film and who is the new one she's romanticizing in the current movie.

That being said, Shaft challenges these stereotypes at times, by accepting homosexuality. When a gay man hit on him, he passed it off like it was nothing. Furthermore, he calles men "baby". When you look deeper into his character, you realize that Shaft cares far more about being stylish and cool than being tough and physically aggressive. While he solves his problems with violences, he doesn't necessarily appear buff or overtly masculine as seen in other action films.

Which begs the question, is the idea of a "manly man" in action films really all that relevant anymore? I mean look at modern day blockbusters like Spider-Man or Transformers. The protagonist in each of these films is an average looking, slightly nerdy character who winds up saving the day using mainly his wit and winds up getting the very attractive girl of his dreams. Maybe that's what America wants to see now: an everyman save the world rather than this massively muscular and obnoxiously over-the-top action star. Ultimately, Shaft can be seen as the middle ground between these two character archetypes.

Vanishing Point

This blog is going to be a little interesting since I read the article and listened to the class discussion before I even watched the film. Therefore, I was able to watch Vanishing Point with all of the topics talked about in class in mind.

One statement that caught me off guard during the class discussion was the comparison to the game Grand Theft Auto. Being a huge video game geek (both as a hobby and as an advocate of considering it an art form), I kept this in mind while watching the film and the similarities truly intriguing. Both of these titles deal with a character attempting to escape the police by car while becoming a fatal hazard to everyone else on the road. Both also deal with extremely immoral and scandalous behavior. Even the certain subtle elements, such as the fact that both feature radio stations as the background music for the chases or that the cinematography in Vanishing Point and the "cinematic camera" in Grand Theft Auto have a very similar style, show how alike these two are. There were moments where I thought the designers of GTA created this game with an intent to imitate an interactive experience akin to Vanishing Point.

The film constantly refers to themes of rebellion and pursuit of freedom which makes sense due to its reflection on post-60s culture. Right when this film was being made, America was going through the Vietnam War, the Counter-Culture Movement and a whole social revolution that would impact our society for years to come. The recurring ideas of rebellion elicit the signs of the times fairly well. Rebellion is seen through the two main characters, Kowalski and Super Soul.

John Beck states in his essay that, "the highway in the United States has always functioned as a signifier of liberty and possibility. At the same time, road building has from the beginning been bound up with issues of social management and control". The film's camera work makes sure you notice all of the signs across the road, from stop signs to speed limit signs, revealing that even as Kowalski is pursuing freedom from "the man" on the road, there are still limitations to said freedom. That being said, Kowalski ignores and purposely disobeys these signs in an attempt to defy the law and truly pursue complete and total freedom.

Super Soul gives a first impression of a rebellious persona due to his vibrantly eccentric and energetic personality in a setting that seems devoid of any real passion. This attitude propels even further when he cheers Kowalski on in his pursuit from the cops, labeling him as "the last American hero". Celebrating someone the cops are attempting to arrest, a felon, truly is a daring feat of rebellion, even for the 70s.

Of Dr. Strangelove

Dr. Strangelove is saying a lot of interesting things about the Cold War era of America. For starters the color alludes to two aspects during this time in American history. The intro of the film is very similar in style to the war newsreels of World War II which relates to the idea that the soldiers in this film believe they're going to be war heroes, when the cruel irony is that after this conflict there may not be any war survivors let alone war heroes. Additionally, this was a time period, seen through the McCarthy fiasco, that socially and politically had a very "you either for us or against us" attitude: every topic is either black or white.

Additionally, the film utilizes a large number of wide shots eliciting the idea that the characters are emotionally distant from reality and don't exactly understand what is going on regarding the war. Interestingly enough, the shots in the meeting room are very similar to the shots in the meeting room during another Kubrick film, 2001: A Space Odyssey, another film that deals with the negative relationship with humans and technology.

In the article, there is a talk about how this film satirizes the liberal consensus that the American state of time is, for the most part, perfect. Throughout this film, you can feel this assumption that what these characters are going through is heroic in the same sense that World War II was: that they are passionately fighting for their country and the survival of democracy in itself. In reality, this is a foreign conflict that could potentially end in a global nuclear holocaust; almost like their fighting for who's going to end the world first.

Deren and Brakhage

Wow. What a compilation of experimental shorts. I'm still trying to wrap my head around the fact that these films were done in the late 50s. They truly were extremely advanced for their time and I can only imagine what the film-goers thought of them when they first came out.

Deren gave an intriguing point in her essay that films can, at times, be considered "animated paintings"; that there is a similarity between the screen and the canvas. She also states that there is an artistic way how film can exploit the idea of time as well as create illusions through 3 Dimensional compositions. Her works, Ritual in Transfigured Time, fortify this idea very well. In Ritual in Transfigured Time, the basic elements of time and dimension are significantly shifted through Deren's unorthodox use of filmmaking techniques.

Time is altered in several moments throughout the film. In the beginning when Deren is knitting, time is slowed down in a hypnotic state. During the ballroom scene, many of the segments are repeated twice, highlighting their importance while retaining the film's dream-like atmosphere. Additionally, there is a constant use of freeze-frame, jarring the expectations of the audience.

Dimension is also portrayed in an usual way particularly in the end when the character is falling down with a negative color technique placed to have her completely white. This visual stands out profoundly as it artistically displays something that usually wouldn't be shown in that way. This use of basic film elements composed in a very non-traditional way fortifies its odd presentation. More importantly, its artistic use of these aspects shows what Deren meant regarding "animated painting".

Brakhage discusses the camera as an eye; a lens into our world. With this in mind, Window Water Baby Moving, through its brutally realistic depiction of a childbirth can be seen understandable as Brakhage wants us to feel as if we were really there, rather than merely watching a woman giving birth. This ultimately makes sense because when one thinks of a birth scene in a Hollywood scene it is extremely disconnecting on an emotional standpoint.