Cries and Whispers Essay; Found Doing a Hard Drive Sweep

I’ve been trying to organize all of my documents, and I found this little tidbit that I wrote in college. Who knows what I got on the paper (probably a B), but why not just share it with you on the blog. Enjoy.

Ingmar Bergman uses color to translate the emotions, thoughts, and personal struggles of the characters in his film, “Cries and Whispers”. The Swedish director is an architect of the frame, meticulously setting up each frame so the audience can receive as much, if not more, information visually as comes out from the actors’ performances. Through examining his use of color within each of those frames, one can decipher the central ideas of the film.

The most prominent color in the film is red. Bergman immediately sets his audience up to recognize that this color is important by running the opening credits over red. The house’s red walls are prominently exposed throughout the film, but rarely, if ever, around Agnes, except when she was a girl, spying on her mother in the red drawing room. Another prominent use of red in the film is the use of fading to red between segments of the film. In traditional film language, a fade to black commonly occurs between scenes. By fading to red, the director has drawn attention to the color itself, making the audience pay more attention to red whenever it appears on screen. Just like the fades, red permeates the world of the film. Red represents love and death, concurrently. It is a very sensual color, reminding us of lips, the heart, and sex. But it is also a very destructive color, reminding us of blood. This dichotomy is what drives the film forward. It is a house of death because Agnes’s condition is what has brought the family together. However, sexuality has permeated this world of death, just as the color red has permeated this world of the film. Thus, sexuality and destruction, both manifested by the color red, are inseparable necessities of the film. Read on...

Big Changes Coming

As part of my plan to be a better blogger in 2009, I wanted to let you all know that things are going to be changing here soon. I’ve been transitioning things to a new site, so hang in there and I’ll be back soon. Thanks!

Leftover Movie Reviews from 2008

In 2008, I had trouble getting my A in G when it came to publishing to this blog. I toiled over a few movie reviews for so long that I never ended up publishing them. I’m having the same issue now, with The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and Slumdog Millionaire reviews still marinating in my “Drafts” folder. Anyhow, I was trying to clean up the hard drive when I stumbled upon some of my unfinished masterpieces. There are too many reviews to write for movies that are fresh in my mind now, so I suppose it would be futile trying to complete these little nuggets. However, it would be just as dumb to keep them to myself. So here you go, my unfinished and unedited thoughts on 6 films from 2008. Read on...

Review: Valkyrie

Valkyrie, dir. Bryan Singer, AMC Loews Lincoln Center 13, NYC

At long last, Bryan Singer’s consistently postponed Valkyrie hit theaters this past Christmas, actually a few months ahead of schedule. The controversy surrounding the film, which provided about two years of delectable biz luncheon gossip, will be forgotten with time, and thankfully so because the resulting film is a slick little addition to Mr. Singer’s short but monumental resume. It is a great little thrill ride that manages to suck you in and convince you of a daring concept, that not all Nazis are bad. In fact, the film is so good at pulling this parlor trick off early on that the audience is even able to sympathize with those most devilish of SS officers.

Based on the real-life attempt to to assassinate Adolph Hitler from within the Third Reich, the film follows the exploits of Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg, played with surprising refrain by Tom Cruise. The megastar has trouble slipping into historical roles, evidenced by his twenty-first century charm on full display in Ed Zwick’s 19th century drama, The Last Samurai. In that ambitious project, Mr. Cruise appeared to be reprising his role as Jerry Maguire only with more hair and a sword. Not so this time around. Thanks mostly to the visceral pace of Christopher McQuarrie and Nathan Alexander’s screeenplay, Mr. Cruise is never afforded the chance to be cute or charming. Instead, we spend the better part of two and a half hours watching the world around him spin out of control while he desperately tries to keep himself grounded in the middle of it all. Read on...

Netflixing: In Bruges

I spent the first reel of this film completely bored, hoping there had to be some reason for this movie to be released coming up around any turn. Well, Once you give yourself over to the basic filmmaking offered up in In Bruges, you start to see where this film is doing a lot of things right. For one, Colin Farrell has a brief glint of humanity, though not as much as he mustered up in Cassandra’s Dream.

If anything has proven consistent over the last decade of “independent” film, it’s that you’ve got to start with the less-clever-than-it-lets-on cold-blooded-killers-who-are-actually-like-regular-people semi-offensive-but-never-subversive black comedy before you move on to bigger and brighter things. And so, not missing a step of his destiny, Martin McDonagh, of Oscar-winning Six Shooter fame, gives us this forgettable speck. Read on...