Content avenues are changing every single day based on technological advances. Streaming services are the most current and successful. For this week I binge watched American Vandal on Netflix, which is also my preferred approach to watching long term television. A mochumentary following the main suspect over a couple weeks after a graffiti vandalism is done to a parking lot. Its hilarious because this vandalism of dick drawing is treated as if it was a horrible murder.
Wes Anderson – auteur
What makes Wes Anderson ,Wes mother fucking Anderson is his attention to detail. As what started as his attention to detail of the story, with his first film Bottle Rocket, It quickly grew into this almost obsession of his for him to thoroughly think out each of his character with specific characters and style and swag. This was also quickly matched by the cinematography being perfect, perfect dolly moves, symmetrical compositions, and to say the least beautiful production design.
For this week I watched the Royal Tenenbaums, Moonrise Kingdom, and the Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. Three similar movies of Wes in that they share heavy production design, detail and precise cinematography, and overall stylistic approach. Wes is iconic for his precision to detail from story to production design. From the campsite in Moonrise Kingdom, to the underwater fish of Life Aquatic, or even the house in Royal Tenenbaums. His heavy use of production design pulls you into the film and the story.
Director of Photography approach: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
To be the Director of Photography on a project that size or just with would be such an honor. Nicola Pecorini already iconically did it, to top that would be a challenge at the very least. He was able to paint this world Hunter S. Thompson originally wrote about with wide camera angles capturing the entire beautiful location they shot at. They also were able to create such an original mood with achieving the feeling of paranoia or being watched through cinematography (& sound design) very effectively, and I love all the weird practical and special effects they did.
As the Director of Photography I would definitely be really focused on combing lighting and camera movement to create dynamism. A lot of very specific camera movements such as use of a Arri trinity head to capture the movement of steadicam with the complexity of gimbal. Also maybe some play with the Spike Lee actor on the dolly with the camera locked off. Very large area lighting, dealing with the intense sun of the desert. Definitely defuse my light sources heavily for sober scenes and go more under exposed and a hirer contrast ratio. All of this with work with art department, creating most of the film practically would make it look the most realistic.
‘Ready Player One’ – Ernest Cline
Ernest Cline creates a world thats a mixture of a scary future and a beloved childhood video games. the novel follows wade, our heroic protagonist that we see go there the wonderfully creative wold Ernest has created. Full of pop culture references mostly video games and cinema.
The book, for coming out somewhat recently (2011), isn’t so far off from out current future. every day we get closer to virtual reality slowly taking over our lives entirely. I see more and more people immersed in the technology every day. Ringling just offered a major in VR, most of the senior game art major final video games were VR. My brother currently works for a VR company in south Florida, at this point its becoming a norm. And will continue until our world is a little bit closer to Ernest Cline’s.
‘Suddenly, a Knock on the Door’ by: Etgar Keret
- What is your reaction to the text you just read?
The short story is almost a play on story and writing itself. The writer clearly has been going through some sort of mental block or process as he states he hasn’t told nor wrote a story in some time; yet the time presents itself right now conveniently. Keret is being forced at gun point to tell a story, the story he throws togethers starts coming to life. As a real story starts, just as an idea and slowly progresses and evolves through character and conflict. The more characters that are added, and the more details as well we start to care for the author and also situation. And the gimmick is so clearly evident when the pizza guys shows up, because the swede is telling him to take out his gun already. yet he doesn’t have a gun he has a big knife.
2. What connections did you make with the story? discuss the elements of the work with which you were able to connect.
The connection I made with the story is the feeling of writers block. When writing scripts is easy to get lost in small details and characters, but you have to keep going back to “something knocking on the door” to keep the story going. There always needs to be conflict in the story. If Keret was allowed to tell the story there would be no stakes, the fact he keeps getting interrupted prolongs him being saved.
3. What changes would you make to adopt this story into another medium? what medium would you use? What changes would you make?
I would change this story to be a strictly ouroboros narrative. I feel all the ending needs is Keret saying “there was a knock at the door” and it to be the swede man from the beginning; To wrap this story right back to the beginning. And the medium I would choose is film, I would make a web based short film that would have the potential of looping on the internet.
Cosmopolis
Cosmopolis follows young billionaire who is living in New York city during serious financial crisis. We follow him through the city as he on his way to get a haircut, distracted by various affairs with women including his wife. Eric Packer is very cold and powerful. And he exempts this by how he talks and treats people. One thing that is very predominant in the novel is the exemption of the middle class. While many are privilege like Eric and his wife the only other example of class we see is lower class of the protesters and ultimately the antagonist at the end who shoots Eric.
True Grit
True grit is great view into the life of western culture during the time. We follow Maddy, a young lady seeking justice for her fathers death. When looking for a companion to help her she looks for a man with true grit. The story being narrated from Maddy’s point of view brings up a lot of good points of if we can trust the narrated always necessarily. In the last novel we rad the narrator was the author however the narrator and the author are two different people. Maddy is very mature for her age. Her actions are always logical and motivated by justice. For someone her age she is very opinionated and has a fixed mindset.
Pride and Prejudice
Pride and Prejudice as about Jane, who is always running around looking for love. She is having problems with her relationships and she is very social conservative. And since the story is from her point of view (her narration) the content comes through a filter leaving the reader for the true interpretation. Although the story seems at first as a very contemporary coming of age novel, the relationships and problems Jane goes through seem to transcend time.
Brandon Richards 