An aspiring artist wakes up blind. Through a comedy of errors, no one believes the gravity of the situation or the struggle the young artist is going through. Doctors don’t believe him, his drama teacher thinks it’s a brilliant example of method acting, his artwork is demeaned and shamed to the point he goes of the rails and makes the art world his enemy in hopefully witty, dark comedy.
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I have chosen Fernando Meirelles and Kátia Lund’s 2002 crime/drama film City of God for my textual analysis. The film is set between the beginning of the 1960’s and the beginning of the 1980’s and features the stories of two young boys, Rocket and Lil’ Dice both growing up in the slums of the city of god where one pursues photography and the other becomes a ruthless gang leader. I have chosen the section of the film between 0:00:50 – 0:05:50 which is during the opening sequence of the film. In this scene, an opening montage plays showing a bustling open market area where a chicken escapes and the gang chases after it only to bump into Rocket where the police then show up, trapping Rocket between the gang and the police. To analyse this section, I am focusing on sound, editing, mise-en-scene and critical reception.
I have chosen to analyse the 2006 fantasy film Pans labyrinth by Guillermo del Toro. This film is set in 1944 during the Spanish civil war and follows Ophelia, a little girl who is secretly a princess in a fantasy world whilst chaos and war happens around her with her fascist stepdad at the centre of it all. I have chosen to analyse the resolution of the film between 1.46.45 and 1.51.45. In this section, Ophelia has just been shot by her stepdad and is slowly dying. The fascist captain is consequentially killed as a result of killing his stepdaughter. Ophelia is ‘reborn’ into a fantasy world and is reunited with her parents whilst the guerrillas mourn her death. To analyse this section, I am going to focus on Mise En scene ,visual motifs, editing and Film makers influences.
I have chosen Fernando Meirelles’ 2002 crime/drama film, City of God for my textual analysis. The film is set during the end of the 1960s and the beginning of the 1980s and follows what life is like for residents of a slum in Rio de Janeiro during a bloody gang war focusing on a character called Rocket who is a young aspiring photographer trying to escape the slum. I have chosen the section of the film between 1:53:00 – 1:57:00 which is during the climax of the film. In this scene antagonist Lil Z is captured and robbed by corrupt police and then gunned down by the “runts” of the slum to take over his business. The scene is mainly shot through the perspective of Rocket who is photographing the whole event which ends up landing him an internship at a printing company. To analyse this section, I am focusing on cinematography, editing and critical response.
