3) How far does cinematic style support themes and idea in the films you have studied for this topic? Chungking Express (Wong Kar Wai, 1994) has a stylised cinematic style which explores the themes and ideas within East Asian Cinemas in the 90s. Chungking Express focuses on Asian fantasies of America. For instance, the big female roles are played by the renowned Asian actresses: Faye Wong and Brigitte Lin. With Wong’s character obsessively listening to a CD of California Dreamin' by The Mamas & the Papas, and Lin dressed as a conventional femme fatale or Marilyn Monroe icon in a blonde wig, raincoat and sunglasses.
And in Charlie’s Angels, we will see how it also represents the hybridization and transnationalization of film genres as proposed by Sheldon H. Lu in an essay, where he asserts that the adaptation of Hong Kong martial arts and also the casting of the Asian American Lucy Liu renders the film a multicultural one. These coincide with the concept of ‘Transnational aesthetics’ as mentioned by James Udden. However, I would also argue that the two movies fundamentally differ in the way that, while in Crouching Tiger Ang Lee gives audiences the transnational figure of Jen Yu, in the latter what we see are the figures of three women warriors who are highly sexualized and objectified. I would contend that this idea of the ‘male gaze’ which has been imposed upon the three women undercut their roles as transnational ‘women warriors’, a term Sheldon H. Lu bestows upon them. And in contrast to this, we will see how Jen Yu, despite being a femme fatale figure, is still portrayed as possessing the spirit of the wuxia – a genre Stephen Teo argues plays an important role in the construction of Chinese national cinema identity.
Giroux believes that Disney animated shows feature negative awareness through racially coded diction. For instance, Arabian Nights seems to present the Western stereotype of evil Arab ethnicity through its lyrics in Aladdin. Aladdin is set in an Arabian city of Agrabah explaining the gruesome lyrics in Arabian Nights. The hyenas in The Lion King “speak with jive accents of urban black or Hispanic youth” (110). The Lion King has a story line consisting of scenes taking place in Africa.
Horrors and Heroes Entertainment, in any form, often has a deeper meaning than initially assumed. For instance, one might assume that an action movie would be a typical “guy movie.” Nobody would be surprised to see fights, cars, and explosions in an action movie, in fact, it would be expected. However, if the storyline of such a movie was about love, the viewer would be caught off guard. This twist is what makes any great movie entertaining; it keeps the viewer interested and wanting to see more. Two authors that discuss this method of giving deeper meanings to stories are Stephen King (in his essay “My Creature from the Black Lagoon) and Gloria Steinem (in her essay “Wonder Woman”).
1. The author draws attention, to the blatant use of stereotyping, displayed in current animated movies, by describing these well know and expected stereotypes to the readers; “ Chris Rock’s wise-ass zebra and Jada Pinkett Smith’s big bootied hippo”. Chris Rock and Jada Pinkett Smith are both well-known African American actors. The producers of the above mentioned animations, have type-casted the performers, by making their most discernable characteristics their most noticeable and important characteristics. The hippo’s ‘big booty’ and the ‘jive talking’ zebra, further drive forward this notion of stereotyping.
But among all these, The Last Samurai [Zwick 2003] received the most positive Japanese audience reaction. This film, about an ex-Civil War American soldier who takes up arms to fight with the last of the samurai, played to mixed reviews in the U.S. but enjoyed a wildly popular reception in Japan. Judging from Japanese online discussion posts and media articles, many Japanese audiences read the film differently from the American critics. Why and what do these reviews tell us about Japan in the beginning of the 21st century? By being a foreign film, The Last Samurai allowed Japanese audiences to celebrate the nationalist messages taboo in a domestically produced film.
Our study will explain and interpret the meaning or the significance behind those components, and by then try to connect the shot to the themes of the film. Tony Scott applies several genre specific editing techniques, which accordingly suture the audience to the stories multiple levels. Tony Scott is mixing up the sound effects, which links the audience to the drama and the history of the movie, providing a coherent structure. 00:45-1:00 In the first scene of the movie we are presented with the main character “Domino” (Keira, Knightley). In terms of Mise-en-scene our eyes are firstly attracted to Keira, who is lighting up a cigarette.
ANDY WARHOL: CONSUMER RESEARCHER ABSTRACT - This paper "breaks out of the box" by discussing the work of the artist Andy Warhol as a form of consumer research. The paper asserts that Warhol’s career- successful artist, experimental filmmaker, prolific writer and diarist, celebrity-offers insights into consumer culture that reinforces, expands, and illuminates aspects of traditional consumer research. Through illustrations, criticism, and interpretation, five specific areas of consumer research that Warhol’s work might contribute to are introduced: brand equity; clothing, fashion and beauty; imagery; packaging; and self-concept. This project joins recent efforts by consumer researchers to include humanities based methods such as literary criticism and semiotics into the consumer researcher’s toolbox. I love America and these are some comments on it.
The movie is fully embedded in black culture, as seen in its dialogue, cast, visuals and soundtrack. Given how underrepresented and unsympathetically portrayed black people have been in cinema in general, I applaud the filmmakers for taking this step. The themes of the movie are even concerned with things that most white people don’t have to worry about. By making Killmonger an advocate for militancy and anger, while T’Challa symbolizes love and peace-making efforts, “Black Panther” is about how black people should respond to years of oppression. This adds another layer to their conflict.
Unfortunately, the Sho are not accustomed to having a limited resource. Their experience is that everything that had been given by the gods was given in sufficient supply for everyone to use. The existence of a single bottle, an allegory for globalization, threatens their cultural identity as jealousy, anger, and the concept of personal possessions begins to infiltrate their tribe. Even violence, as yet inexperienced by this tribe, creeps into their hearts as they fight over the single Pepsi bottle. By its very nature, globalization does require some release of cultural identity.