Dr. Strangelove

This movie is about the events that follow the orders to launch a nuclear strike on Russia made by an insane US air force general. The movie follows the President in his war room as he tries to stop the air strike. The movie also focuses the crew of a bomber flying over Russia, and the air force base of the general who ordered the strike. The president calls in the Soviet ambassador and talks to the Soviet leader, telling him about the attack. During this time, at the Air force base, The general who ordered the nuclear strike kills himself after the base is over taken, and the secret codes to recall the bombers is found. The president’s scientific adviser appears in the war room, during discussion of Russia’s nuclear attack. After watching antics in the war room, the nuclear bombs go off, and the world is destroyed.

The movie is a good example of a black comedy, Kubrick takes a very serious issue and turns it into a strangely humorous movie. Kubrick is considered a meticulous director, and that is evident in this movie, as every thing in this movie is very well thought out; character names and objects in the film are all created to be strangely funny. The president and his generals and advisers in the war room are portrayed as being sort of immature, and don’t really grasp the severity of their situation. In the end, it is funny listening to how they like the sound of being trapped underground with a high female to male ratio.

 The characters, dialogue, and sets give the movie it's strength, and every scene is entertaining in some way. The suspense of the story, as you wait to find out whether or not the planes will be recalled, keeps the viewer on the edge of his or her seat. This is definitely a classic American film, one that I believe is important for aspiring film makers to watch.

500 Days of Summer

In the beginning, Tom clearly believes in love, where as Summer dismisses it completely. This doesn't stop Tom from actively pursuing Summer, even though she doesn't want a boy friend. Through the depiction of the many good and bad times the two shared together, this film is primarily about the hardships of sustaining a realistic relationships. No matter how bad one person wants to preserve the relationship, it will hit bumps in the road, and sometimes those bumps can cause you to veer off course.

I enjoyed the fact that the movie showed the lives of Tom and Summer when they were kids, giving us a brief history of where they were coming from. I love the use of the jump cutting; they started with Day 1, the meet, and then it jumped to Day 309, where things go wrong. The director would show them having a good time, laughing all the way to the part where she doesn't' look happy and he's trying to please her. Webb just keeps going back and forth with happy scenes to sad scenes forcing you to realize and try and figure out if these two are going to work things out and stay together or break up and move on. Tom and Summer needed each other at that time in their lives to be able to live happily at the end of the 500 days. The music was extremely moving. It pulled me into their love story at the beginning. Each piece of music he chose fit the scene or section of the movie and complimented the emotion Webb wanted from the audience.

This movie, with an unexpected twist at the end, will have you cheering for either Tom or Summer; but mostly Tom because he's the one with the broken heart, the real struggle. This movie had a very moving portrayal. It made me experience emotions of joy and anger with Tom and Summer's relationship. I highly recommend watching this film, it's definitely a must see if you want to see two people struggle to find that happiness that many are too scared to find.

Rear Window

 This film is about a photographer, Jeff, who is bound to a wheel chair and confined to his apartment while he recovers. He is very bored and spends his time watching his neighbor’s lives though binoculars from the rear window of his apartment. The only interaction he has during the day is from his caretaker Stella and his female friend Lisa. One of the families Jeff watches is always arguing, and he believes he the husband kills his wife. Jeff tries to prove it to the authorities, but they don’t want to just take his word for it. Lisa, who tries to prove that she can be adventurous, and Stella help him gather evidence  to convict the man. Eventually the man finds out that Jeff knows he killed his wife, and confronts Jeff in his apartment. In a scuffle between the men, Jeff is dropped out of his window and breaks his other leg, and the man is apprehended by the police.

I really liked Hitchcock’s camera work in the film. You actually feel like you are sitting in the apartment looking across the street and into the other apartments. The main character is doing what the audience is doing, looking into the lives of strangers. Hichcock uses “The Gaze” in this film very well with the main character. Hitchcock also uses an early form montage in the film as he camera looks through the life of all of the people in the apartments. I thought that the set design was perfect for the story. The courtyard below and the large apartment windows were perfect.

Hitchcock succeded at creating a great movie. One of the elements that really helped the movie was the use of almost exclusive diegetic sound. Hitchcock meticulously created where all the sounds of the apartment complex came from, all the sounds helped to create a very believable environment.  Also, he did a good job at created the families that Jeff was watching, and comparing their lives to Jeff, all the families represented something Jeff either wanted or didn’t want, and they eventually appear to be not as they seem.

Jaws

     This film is about a great white shark that roams around a small community off an island called Amity. A young girl is attacked and killed by a shark one night at an ocean side party. Police Chief, Martin Brody, wants to close the beach until the shark is found and killed, but the mayor doesn’t want to scare people during the tourist season that drives the islands economy. The sheriff, a local fisherman and a shark scientist from the Oceanographic Institute set out to sea to kill the dangerous great white shark. It soon becomes a battle between man and shark.

    The use of elements, camera angles, sound scape, dialogue, blocking and editing was done in an array of suspense; it kept the audience on the edge of their seat. The film uses a brilliant score, the music for jaws has become almost the most identifying part of the movie. Spielberg creates suspense throughout the whole movie by keeping the shark very mysterious until the very end. The camera work is also very well done, and really helps with creating tension, by showing the victims from the point of view of the shark. The way Spielberg used his zoom, for example, in one scene when Brody is sitting on the beach after the first attack happened, looking out for all the citizens, there was this close up on Brody's face where the camera was zooming in but in the background it looked as though it was zooming out. This was a cool effect that showed the 'atmosphere' of the events unfolding.



    I think that Spielberg had a lot of discovery in this film. He realized that each detail matters immensely. He successfully used the tactics to make the audience wanting more. He discovered a lot about the film making process and about himself as a director. The making of this film did not go smoothly, but the end result on purpose or not was great. Spielberg used these elements quite well for his first film. Even though the music gave away when there was a shark present and you automatically know something is about to happen, it never over powered the scene. I think he could have used less of the soundtrack because just seeing a person in the water at night gets you all worked up that something could happen without music letting you know it's about to go down. Gives more of that suspense feel. This is most certainly a classic adventurous/horror film that I recommend that everyone should watch at least once.