Film Texts

1. The Seventh Seal- Ingmar Bergman

The first clip, from 'The Seventh Seal', showed a knight faced with death, though he manages to avoid his fate by challenging death to a game of chess. The first line of the film (read by a narrator) is a reference from the bible: 'And when the Lamb opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven about the space of half an hour... And the seven angels which had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to sound.' (Revelation 8:1 and 8:6). This passage is about the apocalypse. Shortly after this is read, death appears before the knight. Death is depicted in an interesting way in the film. The actor themself does not look particularly frightening and does not wear a mask or anything similar to cover his face. A human figure, death is dressed in a black cloak, giving you the impression that he (or it) is something like a shadow, rather than the horrific figure you might imagine. The lack of music in this portion of the clip (and sound altogether besides the dialogue) adds to the sinister mood. Another technique in the film is the use of black and white, which I think may have been used to create contrast. For example, the idea is good and evil in relation to the colours of the chess pieces (death uses black while the knight uses white). The idea of man cheating death is hardly a new one- is has been a commonly used idea in popular culture probably for centuries, and neither is the idea of death playing chess, but the clip is still an interesting one.



2. All or Nothing- Mike Leigh

This clip (towards the end of the movie 'All or Nothing') involved a couple coming to terms with the unhappiness of their relationship, enabling them to then have some form of reconciliation. Phil and Penny's son has just had a heart attack and after an angry and frustrated outburst from Penny, Phil opens up to his wife about how he doesn't think she loves him anymore. It's a rather confronting scene- lots of dialogue, close-ups and tears. Even before they started talking, the scene was bleak and sad, with a rather grainy, drained of colour look and dull lighting- showing that there is a lack of joy in their household. Phil, who has very poor self esteem and could very easily have depression is shot mostly from a side view, hunched over himself. This gives the impression that he is hiding, protecting himself and that he's insecure, unable to look at Penny until he confronts her with his thoughts. He describes himself as 'an old tree that ain't got no water'. Penny reacts badly to his accusations and I can't decide whether she reacted the way she did because she really does still love him or if what he was saying was true and was forcing her to confront her own feelings. I think for now I'll believe she still does love him, just not what he had become.


3. The Umbrellas of Cherbourg- Jacques Demy

'The Umbrellas of Cherbourg' is about a young man and woman who are in,love, but then the man has to go to war (on National service) for two years. In contrast to the previous two clips, the colours and lighting in this clip were very bright and cheerful, despite the fact that the man was leaving (they were more reflective of the love story as a whole rather than what was happening at that specific time). Despite not being a fan of musicals, the film still looked to be quite interesting, as the whole movie is sung. Because of this, the film seems to be even more dramatic than your average love story. Also, the language suited the sad scenes well as the use of French (as opposed to English which can could very crude in distressing situations) suited the genre well. At then end of the clip, the woman became smaller and smaller as the train drew further and further away from the station, signifying how lonely and sad she was feeling.


4. Don't look Now- Nicholas Roeg

I thought that this clip, the opening of 'Don't look Now', (directed by Nicholas Roeg) was quite well done. Editing was very important for this clip, with the camera jumping forwards and backwards between the characters. Parallels were drawn between what the children (a boy and a girl) are doing outside and what their parents are doing inside, ending with the tragic death of the daughter, having drowned in a large pond. Some examples of this technique include the father throwing the cigarettes and the girl throwing the ball, the girl and the mother both touching their face, and the glass being knocked over and the ball falling in the pond, resulting in the spreading of the red section of the photograph and the death of the girl. Though this scene was rather confusing at first, it proved to be rather effective. The colour red also plays a big role in the film, mainly due to the fact that that is the colour coat that the girl is wearing at the time of her death (her name also happens to be Scarlett). Something else I noticed when watching this clip was a rather creepy sound effect. I know that is used at least once more towards the end of the film, but it likely also plays multiple times throughout. It's a hard effect to describe, but it just gives you that feeling that something bad is going to happen.


5. Walkabout- Nicholas Roeg

The last clip from the film 'Walkabout' showed Adelaide in the early 70's. The majority of the clip showed the children of a small family and their father. The city is shown to be very busy and modern, and was shown in contrast to the barren landscape of central Australia. Many interesting shots are used in the depiction of the city. The director included many shots partly obstructed by buildings, and others showed things such as the sky reflected from the windows of buildings, and the sunlight struggling get beyond the ugly man-made city. Overall, it is shown as bleak and rather unhappy, dominated by man. There are also many shots only showing people from the waist down and others in uniform, suggesting that there is no sense of individuality in the city.
I got the impression that the father in this clip was depressed. He seemed unhappy with the man-made world, which may have been why he took his children into the outback in the first place, although there is no real explanation as to why he did this, or why he then shot at them, destroy his car and then killed himself. Regardless of whether or not he was depressed, he obviously wasn't in his right mind.
The clip clearly showed modern Australia conflicting with Aboriginal Australia, in both the use of the scenes of the city and the outback, and in the use of aboriginal music during the city scene.

Superman and Paula Brown's New Snowsuit

 Superman and Paula Brown's New Snowsuit by Sylvia Plath is a story about a young girl who leaves the innocence of childhood and is confronted by the ugly reality that life is unfair and cruel. Initially, the narrator lives a happy carefree life, and although she is aware that there is a war raging, it has little impact on her. Superman largely represents her childhood years- he is like the figure who protects her from the cruelty of the world and teaches her to be carefree in her dreams (and in her mind he also bears a large resemblance to her Uncle Frank). I think that the moment in time in which the narrator becomes more aware of reality is when she is watching the war film at Paula Brown's birthday party. She says herself, 'our war games and the radio programmes were all made up, but this was real, this really happened' (lines 91-92). When the narrator runs from the theatre to vomit up the cake and the ice cream, this could be seen as the moment when she truly lost her previous childhood innocence, the food being representative of this. From this point on in the story, the narrator doesn't see things quite the same, and her imagination is weakened. She is haunted by the film, and 'no crusading blue figure came roaring down in heavenly anger to smash the yellow men who invaded [her] dreams' (lines 103-105). Superman was gone. The exuberant colors which filled her life before we're no longer present, and everything was bleak and dull. The destruction of Paula Brown's snowsuit reinforced the truth of this new reality. I think that the end part of the story when her family questions her about what had caused Paula to fall is significant, particularly as it was not only her mother who did not believe her but also Uncle Frank, who previously had been her Superman figure, protecting her from the harsh reality of the world.

Snowdrops

Snowdrops by Leslie Norris is a short story about a six year-old boy who wants to go and see the snowdrops (flowers). It is essentially a story about grief from the perspective of this boy. Your typical six year-old, he is very observant and curious, but also very naive and his life is very sheltered. At school, he and his peers are unable to grasp the idea of emotional pain and whilst they know that something is the matter with their teacher, Miss Webster, they cannot work out what. The boy knows Miss Webster to be rather tough as thinking pain as only physical, mentions that 'she had trapped [her finger] in the cupboard and hadn't cried'. Because of this inability to understand the depth of Miss Webster's emotional pain from the death of her boyfriend, the children are shocked and frightened at the end of the story when she breaks down crying.
Overall, I quite enjoyed the story. The author did a great job of capturing the boy's innocence and clearly shows the sharp contrast between childhood and the adult world. The snowdrops are probably the most significant of symbols in the story, representing the fragility of humans. The boy's ignorance of grief is particularly evident when he looks at the snowdrops and 'felt a slow, sad disappointment', unable to understand the flowers.

Reading History

Starting School

I’m sure other people’s parents did this kind of thing, but my mum liked to buy books for special occasions. A book about knickers was sent off to a small cousin who was getting too old for a nappy and a book about swimming would materialise for another learning to swim. One book she has given just about every relative is Starting School. It managed to make the idea of starting prep all the more exciting to the five year-old me, and I have read it probaby hundreds of times since.

Dr. Dog

Who wouldn’t love a dog for a doctor? Me, for one. Despite the fact that all throughout my earlier years dogs were my favourite animal and I desperately wanted one, I’m not too sure how I ended up with this book as I’m almost as squeamish as my mum when it comes to health. But Dr. Dog is hardly medical training material, so I was alright. And it quickly became one of my all-time favourite picture story books.

The Man who was Magic

The Man who was Magic was one of the many books I remember being read to me during early primary school. As it was read at bedtime, I probably missed at least half of the story the first time round as my dad had a tendancy to just keep on reading through the night until he also fell asleep.

Inheritance Cycle

The Inheritance Cycle was the series that got me into reading fantasy (particularly anything relating to dragons) when I was around eight or nine. It's books are Eragon, Eldest, Brisingr and Inheritance, and to be honest I think the main reason I started reading the series in the first place is just so that I could say that I had. They're pretty big books for an eight year old. But now I can't get enough of fantasy. They're also the perfect books for people who enjoy guessing the pronunciation of words.

Ranger’s Apprentice

The Ranger's Apprentice were probably my favourites for a good five or so years. Like a lot of my other favourite forms of entertainment, my brother was reading this series and I took one quick brief look at it, and declared that it was boring. As usual I was wrong, and this series quickly became my favourite soon after I began reading. Set in a made up universe with a medieval type setting, this series along with the Inheritance Cycle led me to become fascinated with the medieval world. And although now I don’t find these quite as entertaining as I did seven years ago, I still read all 11 books of the series as they came out (the last being released only last year), as well as the first of a new series the author is writing.

My Side of the Mountain

There is something I have always found rather intriguing about the idea of people living in the wilderness. This of course, is what initially attracted me to Lord of the Flies, which wasn't quite the story I was looking for. My Side of the Mountain was. This book along with another called The Bronze Bow were the books that got me into reading books that had nothing to do with fantasy.

Toby Alone

After becoming well acquainted with the owner of a nearby bookstore when I was eleven, she gave me three books, (one Toby Alone and another The Eyes of a King) to read and report back to see if they were worth stocking. The other I can’t even remember the name of. It was too similar to Lord of the Rings for me to stomach (I never have really been able to get into J.L Tolkien's books despite being a fan of fantasy) . Though the tale of a boy a few millimetres tall living in a tree may sound ridiculous, there was just something I found very attractive about the book. And the sequel was even better. Toby Alone and Toby and the Secrets of the Tree are definetly on my favourite list.

Eyes of a King

Eyes of a King sticks out in my memory as the book that reduced me to little more than a water fountain. It had me bawling for chapters, and sniffing for hours. This was a new experiance for me since toddler years (when of course you'd cry at everything even remotely sad in a story.) You'd think that I wouldn't like a book that made me so sad as much as I do, but of course that isn't how it works. I don't think I'l be forgetting this book any time soon.

The Name of the Wind

The Name of the Wind is one of the books I have read in more recent times, along with the second book in the series, The Wise Man's Fear. Back to the fantasy genre again, I couldn't put them down, and that's always a good sign.