After seeing three Chaplin films at this point in chronological order it is not hard to notice the extreme difference from the film “City Lights” to Chaplin’s earlier films “Mabel’s Predicament” and “The Pawnshop”. In terms of cinematography it is real easy to see the differences in these films. To begin the cinematography is different in that in the first two films most of the shots are wide shots and with very minimal cuts. Also the lengths of the first two films are very short “Mabel’s Predicament” is only 11 minutes long and “The Pawnshop” is 29 minutes long. The lack of cuts and the shorter runtime of the films indicate already it is of a shorter budget because the films were limited in terms of how much they could film. When comparing “City Lights” it actually is shot like a feature film you don’t have a lot of long takes with wide shots. …show more content…
City Lights in this case advances in story in comparison to the other Chaplin films. This is done through a full-length story that also has side characters and side stories woven in seamlessly. Previously in the other films the focus was primarily on the Tramp and only the Tramp. However, in City Lights we focused on the Tramp, The Blind Women, and the Rich Entrepreneur allowing for a more full-length feature film with different cohesive stories. In Ewen’s article “City Lights: Immigrant Women and the Rise of the Movies” she focuses on three early female archetypes in film. These archetypes are entitled the vamp, the gamine, and the virgin. The “Vamp” is defined as someone who is evil and a seductress who uses the male’s sympathy of her against himself. The “Gamine” is defined as having many male physical characteristics specifically short hair and also having personality traits defining them as mischievous. Finally, the “Virgin” is defined as someone who is very innocent, untainted, and pure in the eyes of
One of the ways why cinematography made the film was the lighting. To get the feel, the lighting appeared to be fake shadows that were painted on the set. The fake shadows that were painted on the set gave the lighting appeared to be harsh and sharper to set the mood for the audience. If it weren’t for the painted shadows, the movie wouldn’t have been so successful in the horror genre. Since it was a silent movie, if it weren’t for the shadows, you wouldn’t of seen it as a horror film, but as an original film that was trying to be creative.
Believe it or not but the lighting also impacts the movie. The lighting has to be just right for the scenes can look believable, like if it was dark the lights would be dimmer. The movie did have its fine and lousy quality. The light in at night needed to be a bit darker to understand that they are using lanterns, but the light outside in the day was appropriate. There was a exceptional amount of light to shine through the barn or even outside.
The author, Jackie Stacey is a British feminist film historian. The main goal of her research is to understand the specific pleasure and engagements of British cinema audiences in the 1940s and 1950s. Stacey received 350 letters from women who went to the cinema 2-3 times a week during this period of wartime as cinema going was at an all-time high. Within the book, Stacey discusses Laura Mulvey’s Male Gaze and how Mulvey’s analysis of the pleasures of Hollywood cinema led her to conclude that the spectator position offered is a ‘masculine’ one. She talks about how there are 3 looks within the dominant mode of Hollywood cinema; the camera(man), the editor and the director. She emphasizes on how all of these looks work together to create the effect of seeing the female characters as objects of desire through the eyes of the male characters.
This genre is typically modern, perky and upbeat, but the common narrative in all of them is that it features a woman who is strong and she overcomes adversity to reach her goals. There is also a message of empowerment that also struggles with a romantic predicament and using comedy to poke fun at the male characters. Industries are still producing soppy romantic comedies for the female audience but the divide between the standard chick flick and romantic comedy is slowly disappearing. Similarly to the beginning of this essay it is evident that institutions are moving in the direction of women’s place in culture in relation to this film genre; women are usually shown as the super power since they are made to appeal to the female audience. However
As part of the Education Amendments of 1972, Title lX states that, “No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.” This act has been one the most controversial and most scrutinized amendments to be passed in years and it has never been re-evaluated. It has done a lot during its years by increasing womens sports at all levels and even decreasing mens sports at mainly the collegiate level. In this paper I will discuss the ways that it has a positive and negative effects as well as how it should be re-evaluated and how social levels and demographics effect
2) Many early films, and even films today, use what is called Freytag's Pyramid. Freytag’s Pyramid refers to the way a film is structured narratively, creating a similar pattern among the beginning, middle, and end of most films. I believe that The Immigrant mostly complies with this structure. Typically, a movie’s narrative using Freytag’s Pyramid will be laid out in a way that starts with a exposition, where the characters, scene, and mood is introduced. The Immigrant happens to comply with the pyramid on this point. The film opens with a shot of a ship, then continues on to show a rolling boat, its seasick passengers, and Charlie Chaplin’s comedic character. Most everyone aboard is sick except Charlie, and a few others. However, We don’t quite get much detail on the characters backgrounds, other than they are obviously immigrants from another country. Next, usually an inciting incident would occur that would trigger a conflict. When eating in the ship's dining room, charlie looks up from his table where a girl standing that he shows much interest in, and gives his seat to her. I personally believe this moment is the inciting incident that drives the rest of the story. Charlie’s drive to “get the girl” ends up causing him to give her all of his money after her mother had her money stolen. Later, after everyone is dispersed onto land, Charlie is left with no money. However, he finds a coin on the ground and decides to spend it on a meal in a nearby restaurant. Eventually, he spots the girl that was on the ship with him, and offers her a meal. Eventually, the scene shows a man being beat up and kicked out of the restaurant for being 5 cents short on his bill. Later, the waiter brings Charlie his bill, and as charlie reaches into his pocket for the coin he found and realizes the hole in his pocket. This could be seen as rising action, the next part of the pyramid. This moment escalates the conflict of not having money, since now Charlie is in clear danger. Tension rises as many minutes pass of Charlie stalling by ordering more food, and the waiter growing impatient with him. At one point, he even finds the coin again and the waiter
By 1938 Chaplin was one of the greatest writers, directors and actors in the film industry, well known for his socioeconomic and political satire within The United States. He felt so confident in his ability in mocking the world’s most dangerous man that he was willing to spend $1.5 million of the $2 million budget. The two differences in this later film from his earlier work were the introduction of sound in films and the disappearance of his reoccurring protagonist “The Little Tramp”. Chaplin’s use of sound in this film was a huge factor in history, not
Women’s roles in movies have changed dramatically throughout the years. As a result of the changing societal norms, women have experienced more transition in their roles than any other class. During the period of classical Hollywood cinema, both society and the film industry preached that women should be dependent on men and remain in home in order to guarantee stability in the community and the family. Women did not have predominated roles in movies such as being the heroin. The 1940’s film Gilda wasn’t an exception. In Gilda, the female character mainly had two different stereotypes. The female character was first stereotyped as a sex object and the second stereotyped as a scorned woman who has to be punished.
My example that I will be using is Modern Times by Charlie Chaplin. Modern times is a film developed after the industrial revolution. It serves the purpose of critiquing capitalism and the social world. Modern Times begin with a factory worker who starts developing anxiety through the lack of breaks and repetitive work. When the Worker is on break, his boss is always keeping an eye on him and demands him to go back to work due to the loss of production. Soon after, the factory worker goes on lunch break, but is again distracted by his boss due to the desire to try out a new lunch contraption. At first, the new technology seems to work since the factory Worker was being fed. But, after a few seconds the contraption goes haywire and starts hurting the worker. The factory Worker goes back to work, but suddenly starts to mess up. He goes around ruining all his co-workers’ work and even get himself in prison. However, he ends up saving all the cops from the inmates’ revolution and is released early from jail. He does not want to leave since he is treated properly in jail and will be homeless in the outside world. He tries to get himself in prison again, but meets a beautiful woman Gamin who is also homeless and workless. They run off together and commit burglaries to feed themselves, but is soon discovered by the police. They manage to escape and run off to live in a small house by themselves. The factory Worker and the Gamin decides to have lunch together, but finds out that a
Throughout the film the lighting was dark with lots of shadows and dim lights around the backgrounds. The only points when light was really displayed is when there has been just a scene/ clip of food being prepared or completed. Another scene, that is very bright in the
In conclusion film techniques that Tim burton used in the movies charlie in the chocolate factory, Edward scissorhand, and Crops dead bride. where there is zooming in and out,low-key-lighting,fade, and natural lighting. With the mood and tone being creepy can
To see Chaplin’s commentary on society, one must first look at how he uses sound to spread his message. Right from the first scene, Chaplin infuses his views on society with sound as he plays the kazoo to represent the high class men speaking when they are unveiling a new statue. During this speech, the view can see the tramp (Charlie Chaplin) behind them sleeping on top of the statue. With this scene, Chaplin is saying
In the story of The Bloody Chamber, Angela Carter attacks the conventional gender roles of women. The conventional Gothic plot revolves around pursuit. A young heroine’s virtuous virginity, purity and innocence is sexually threatened. Thus, what Carter does in “The Bloody Chamber” is redefine female desire and sexuality which are rendered passive and repressed through traditional Gothic texts. Where the mother exemplifies the heroic woman, the “girl” is the traditional damsel in distress. Maria Makinen’s assessment of Carters feminine characters is both truthful and incorrect. Carter uses traditional female stereotypes as well as her unique women to make a contrast between these perceptions of women.
Since the 1940’s, movies have predominately portrayed women as sex symbols. Beginning in the 1940’s and continuing though the 1980’s, women did not have major roles in movies. When they did have a leading role the women was either pretreated as unintelligent and beautiful, or as conniving and beautiful: But she was always beautiful. Before the 1990’s, men alone, wrote and directed all the movies, and the movies were written for men. In comparison, movies of the 90’s are not only written and directed by women, but leading roles are also held by older and unattractive women. In this paper I will show the variations and growth of women’s roles in movies from the 1940’s though the 1990’s.
The presentation of women on screen is another highlighted issue in many of the gathered sources. Because men were ultimately in control of what went on the screen much of what the audience perceived were women from the male imagination or fantasy. Bernard Beck elaborates in his article Where the Boys Are: The Contender and other Movies about Women in a Man’s World that, “…women have been used to dress up a male story or motivate a male character” (Beck 15). Women were often insignificant and trivial characters. Although, Kathe Davis disagrees to a point. In her article, Davis offers a dissonant opinion to the fore-mentioned insignificance of the female character. She instead describes many female characters as “predators,” and analyzes the roles of lead women in three prominent films of the nineteenth century. In each film, she finds parallels and similarities of cases of “female emasculation” and instances where “women are turned into objects of male desire” (Davis 47-48). Davis does not perceive female characters as being insignificant, just stripped of their power and misrepresented. She discusses how females of power are often portrayed as crazy