The Polar Express – Acting and Acting Styles

With the Polar Express you can’t really classify the actor’s into a particular acting style. For one reason being that the film is animated and done with technology and computers. They were able to use their facial expression to create the characters in the film. The three characters that I recognized were in films prior mostly comedies and were recognized by their voices.

 

Tom Hanks was the main character in the film and played many parts. I would consider him to be a Interpreter/Star actor. He is an actor who does films and characters that puts his own stamp on it even when playing characters that may have been done before.  I felt that in this film he did well in that he was six different characters in the film. The conductor looked and sounded just like himself. When it came to the hero boy you could not tell that it was him at all other then the facial expressions that they picked up from Tom Hanks.

 

Eddie Deezen played the character called the Know-it-All-Kid. I would consider him to be a Typecast actor he has played a lot of nerd type roles in the past and I think that is why they picked him for the part of the Know-it-all-kid. He was into everyone’s business and knew everything about everything. He also played a nerd in other films such as War Games one of my favorite movies too.

 

Michael Jeter who played two characters Smokey and Steamer passed away before the release of the film the Polar Express. He played the two men that worked in the steam engine. I think that he would be considered a Wild card actor because in his life time he played a large and different genre of films or shows. I think that he showed this in the playing to very different character’s side by side and you could not have known.

Based on other films that Michael Jeter had done I came to this conclusion that he is a wild card actor. He has been in films such as The Green Mile, Jurassic Park III, The Polar Express, and even on Sesame Street as Mr. Noodles brother. All very different genre’s and characters, you would not be able to classify him. I had a hard time doing so and was very happy that there was a wild card category.

 

 

Goodykoontz, B., & Jacobs, C. P. (2014). Film: From watching to seeing (2nd ed.). San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint Education, Inc.

https://www.youtube.com/

http://www.imdb.com/

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0005052/

The Polar Express – Categories and Functions of Sound

For this week we are to consider different types of sound in the film and look at how they contribute overall to the sense of meaning in the film. Talking about the types of sound in a film, one the diegetic, and the others are non-diegetic. I will be talking about both for this film.

There are three different basic categories of sound:

• Dialogue – is when the characters are talking to each other in a film.
• Sound Effects – used to enhance the action in a film, or to give you a sense of suspense in a horror film. They used to have what they call a Foley Artists and they would make every day noises for the films.
• Music – is used to Promote the film as in soundtracks, or what they would call a score. A score is used to be a back round noise for an action scene in the film.

In the movie the Polar Express they used these categories of sound. I felt they did very well with both the soundtrack and the score of the movie. The theme song for the movie BELIEVE was also written for the film, and I believe that is why it had such a big impact on the movie. The trailer that they made for the film followed the scenes. The meaning for the words came from the film it self and when you hear the song your mind would refer to the film. Unlike some Theme songs that you have already heard the song before and then they add it to a film. you would already have a placement for the song say in your own life experiences.

The use of sound to inform the mood of a scene, or the over all mood of the film would be a holiday theme of music. There was a big part of the film that surrounded the sound of a Christmas bell. If you believe in the spirit of Christmas then you would be able to hear the bell ringing. Most children could hear the bell and most Adults could not. At first the boy can’t hear the bell and the little girl can. He is very upset by that and keeps saying that he does believe. Santa Clause hears him and then gives him the first gift of the year and its a large bell. At that point he hears the bell, puts it in his pocket.

The one sound that would come to mind for me and this film would be the bells. You hear them all through the movie at different points and then at the end of the film you know why. If you believe in the spirit of Christmas then you hear the bell.

I would have to say that these effects went with the movie theme and also gave it the feel of Christmas. I think that is was very realistic and expected sound for the holiday film. They also played a lot of instrumental music in the film giving it a holiday feel.

If we removed the sound of the bells in the film I don’t think that the effects or the feeling of the movie would have been the same. That was the whole point of the film, I think that it would have left the audience wondering why the bell? What was the message or the plot of the film.

Goodykoontz, B., & Jacobs, C. P. (2014). Film: From watching to seeing (2nd ed.). San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint Education, Inc.

YouTube. (2014). Movieclips [Video channel]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3gNmTGu-TTbFPpfSs5kNkg

 

The Polar Express – Mise en Scene – Lighting

This weeks blog we are to look at the impact of lighting choices on the creation of meaning in a film. I am going to look at the film The Polar Express.

Identify the type of lighting used in the film (traditional three-point, high-key, or low-key) and assess the impact of the lighting used to establish the theme.

 

• What are the benefits of the style of lighting used?  This movie was a little different in that is was one of the first movies that used combine performance and technology, and what they called “performance capture”. In this movie they used a lot of low-key lighting at that it was mostly portraying night time and the North Pole. Using a lot of the lighting from the trees and Christmas lights. The scenes from the North Pole did a lot of this for the effect of Christmas town. They did use some high-key lighting as well during the train ride with the children. Being that its done on the computer they can add any lighting of effects that they was to do. Working in a 3 dimensional world they can have the camera’s where ever they want or need them to be. Using the virtual camera’s and lighting is much like the real thing but for computers. I think that this all did work together to make the film life like.
• How did this technique contribute to the theme?  I think that this technique did contribute to the film and making it magical like Christmas is for us as children. We all wait up for Santa hoping to catch just a gimps of the this mystical person that we hear stories about. As for adults we all watched this movies wondering how did they do that and is that Tom Hanks? How many times is he in this movie? Being that this movies theme is about believing, it did bring back the magic of Christmas and the lighting did a lot for that. Even though they were working from a computer and maybe a warehouse they still pulled off this magical place at the North Pole. The train ride and all the character’s were all very life like and draw you into the story.

• How was the lighting techniques suited to the genre of the film? I felt that it worked very well with the genre of Fantasy and Animation. It was a combination of both and I felt that it did very well. I also found it very interesting how they used technology and computers for this movie.
• Compare how the scene would play if different choices had been made?  I don’t think is would work because the way that Tom Hanks was able to do all together different characters through out the movie was great. You couldn’t tell in the way you do in other movies and with animation it was very different they we had seen before.

It’s a Wonderful Life

1. Select a full-length film and identify the title, writer, director, major actors and the year it was released.

Title: It’s a Wonderful Life

Writer: Frances Goodrich, Albert Hackett

Director: Frank Capra, Arthur S. Black

Year: 1947

Actors: James Stewart (George Bailey), Donna Reed (Mary Hatch Bailey), Lionel Barrymore (Mr. Potter), Henry Travers (Clarence Oddbody)

2. Summarize the story and plot of your chosen movie.

Story – Starts on Christmas Eve and a story about George Bailey at Bedford Falls, New York. He is thinking about jumping off the bridge and killing himself. There is an angel named Clarence that is trying to get his wings. He is given the assignment of getting them by helping George Bailey reconsider his life and see that without him it would be a lot different.

Plot – To show George Bailey that life is worth living and not to give up. Showing that a life without him would be so much different for all of the people that he loves. Also, the lives that he didn’t know that would be affected by him being alive.

“Clarence is shown George’s life: As a child, George stops his younger brother Harry from drowning in an icy pond, then catches a bad cold and loses his hearing in one ear. Weeks later, George goes back to work at his after school job in Mr. Gower’s drugstore and prevents Gower, who has gotten drunk after learning that his son has died of influenza, from accidentally dispensing arsenic-filled capsules to a sick child. George promises the remorseful Gower never to tell anyone about the incident and he never does.”

“Revisiting Martini’s and other places in town, George is not recognized by anyone and discovers that everything has changed. Harry drowned and Gower went to jail for poisoning the sick child. The town was renamed Potersville and is full of vice and poverty. When George finally makes Clarence show him Mary, he discovers that she is a lonely unmarried librarian.”

3. Discuss whether your film is presented chronologically or non-linearly. In your discussion, address the following:

a. Was the film presented chronologically or non-linearly? I think that with this film it was done non-linearly starting with George and his brother being young, then jumping to him as a young adult, and then showing what it would be like without him. It does start out as a chronologically done film and I think would have been except for them jumping to him not being there at all to show that effect. I do think that this was done well and helped with the movie and the feelings of the characters.

b. How are elements like character development or foreshadowing impacted by the choice of storytelling methods? This for me would be character development. I think that it helped a lot with this story because it showed a build up of George and who he was, and showing why he made the choice to jump and then his reason to want to live.

4. If the film had followed a different presentation style, how would the general effect on the audience have been different? With this movie it was easy to say because they did change it from black and white to a color film. For me turning to color really changed the film and it lost its feel of the movie. I liked the black and white for the fact that it made it old and a classic for me.

The Acting and Acting Style for the movie Moonstruck

 

The actors that I am going to talk about is Olympia Dukakis, who plays the mother of the family. The bigger stars that the movie surrounded was Cher who plays Loretta and Nicolas Cage who plays Ronnie.

Olympia Dukakis is a name that we may not be familiar with but, would recognize her in some movies. I remember her for her roll in this movie and Steel Magnolias. She plays a lot of the same style movies or the same type of roles. I would have to classify her as a Character Actor. She usually will play the mother type rolls, I don’t recall any movies where she is younger.

Cher is more of a Star actor, where she does play the same type of comedy I think that she would be classified in this category. She is an actor that would attract viewers and bring in money at the box office. She is known for a lot more than acting as she was a singer/actor long before, I remember her on the Sonny and Cher Show.

Nicolas Cage I would classify in two areas on would be Star every one knows him by name and has been in a lot of movies. Also, I would have to classify him as a Wild Card too. He his difficult to classify as one character, and therefore would be hard to type cast. We have seen him in different genres, from Moonstruck to Faceoff. Both good movies but very different characters to play.

 

 

 

 

Categories and Functions of Sound for Moonstruck

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This trailer of the movie was a great set up of the movie and the characters in it. It used a great combination of Dialogue and music just it did in the movie. The movie used and surrounds a opera that they attend and they use the music from it as part of the sound effects when they were looking for each other at the opera, and a she was getting ready for her date with Ronney the brother.

The also used music that went with the theme of the moon, and living in an a Italian family in Brooklyn. They played the “”That’s Amora” song at different points to the movie. I believe that they did this to tie in the romance of the movie with this family. I noticed that they used the music as well as the dialogue to show a feeling or a mood of the movie. They did a very good job with the music that they picked for it. At times you didn’t need the dialogue the music or sound effects were enough to know what was happening in the movie and the characters.

 

The Mise en scenes of the film Moonstruck

 

 Moonstruck

 I felt that this was a great romantic comedy and the lighting and the way that they showed the city was really a great way to show the city and this Italian family. The type of lighting used in the film I think is high-key lighting. It was bright over everything with low shadows of darkness, as was seen in this photo above. This is common for comedies like these.

The lighting I thought was done very well in side their house. It had a lot of the Italian type decorum in the home, some of the shots in the house were done darker I felt to really portray that life style more. Also, that they were able to shoot the film in Brooklyn, NY really helped with getting the feel of the city and lighting. They were able to also shoot and use landmarks in that area.

I think that all of these things contribute to the lighting techniques and the genre of the film, if made all the difference to the film and the way that it was shot.

I have always enjoyed this movie but now am looking at it in a new way.

Sherry

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