Film Analysis: The Maltese Falcon

The vision Christopher Nolan had for The Prestige (2006) was to add to the outbreak of street magician film, whilst playing a large dramatic subplot equal in grandeur to the magical performances within the film. In the final sequence of the film, I will analyse how the cinematography and sound resolves the plot so that it summarises the themes present in the film, whilst also invoking a response from the audience. Nolan predominantly uses close up shots, non-diegetic sound (music) and dialogue collaboratively to convey the dramatic, personal subplot of the characters and their relationships, whilst appealing to the audience bringing forth an emotional response from the audience. The heavy, slow, dramatic atmosphere of the ending sequence uses various techniques to summarise and uncover the underlying mysteries of the events throughout the film and consolidate themes introduced during the exposition.

If the Syrian refugee articles weren’t the wake up call then 9500 Liberty is. 9500 Liberty drives the point that immigration and accompanying prejudice are not ficticious. These are real people not numbers, or a simply feeling. One of the main ideas that drive this documentary is emotion. Both Hispanic citizens and supporters of the law are guilty of letting emotions be the driving factor in decision making. On the side of supporters, their choice to react ignored a critical factor: empirical data.

By all accounts, this movie reflects and highlights this interplay that exists between film and American Culture. As the world was riddled with battles and darkness, the movies of this time period reflected this sinister reality. Death was a major reality during this time period in America and it was no less a reality in The Maltese Falcon. The audience watches as the main character, Sam Spade, becomes involved in a grand scheme surrounding a priceless statue. Same Spade and his partner Miles Archer, both private investigators, meet a seductive and secretive woman named Ruth Wonderly who claims she is looking for her missing sister who is mixed up with a man named Floyd Thursby. As the movie continues, Spade receives news that Archer was murdered and is later accosted by a man who demands that he locate an irreplaceable statue (the Maltese Falcon). The story unfolds as Spade finds himself entangled in a dark and dangerous web of crime in which his only option is to find the Maltese Falcon, which is one thing they all seem to want. A dark and realistic outlook and mise-en-scene is not the only thing that linked this movie to the respective time period however. Also reflective of the time period is film noir’s dark, sexual, and seductive portrayal of

The Roaring Twenties were a very important time in America’s history. I chose this topic to discuss because I think it brought about many great changes, especially for women. Women were finally able to break away from tradition. They wore shorter dresses, cut their hair short, and expressed themselves more. Some women also enjoyed dancing and became flappers. This is one of the first times women have been able to do things like this, which I think is extremely important. The only downfall of the 1920’s was prohibition, which outlawed alcohol. I’m not really sure why they outlawed it during this time period. This was supposed to be the era of fun and prosperity, and many people drink for fun. However, this did not stop people from drinking,

Film Noir was extremely trendy during the 1940’s. People were captivated by the way it expresses a mood of disillusionment and indistinctness between good and evil. Film Noir have key elements; crime, mystery, an anti-hero, femme fatale, and chiaroscuro lighting and camera angles. The Maltese Falcon is an example of film noir because of the usage of camera angles, lighting and ominous settings, as well as sinister characters as Samuel Spade, the anti-hero on a quest for meaning, who encounters the death of his partner but does not show any signs of remorse but instead for his greed for riches.

The 2016 film Lion, which was first a book called “A Long Way Home”, is a film where a boy named Saroo was separated from his brother in the train station, which leads to Saroo getting on a train taking him thousands of miles away from his family and his home. Saroo, who was only five-years-old when he got lost, had to learn to survive alone in Kolkata, West Bengal. Days after arriving to Kolkata, the city the train left him at, he got admitted into an orphanage, which later turned out to him getting adopted by an Australian couple. But twenty-five years later, he starts to wonder where his first home and family are at the moment. With only his memories, determination, and Google Earth he starts looking and searching where his small

Samuel Spade of The Maltese Falcon novel by Dashiell Hammett is quite different from Samuel Spade of “The Maltese Falcon” motion picture. The book was written a good decade before that version of the movie was produced and in a much more casual time period. The novel focuses on making Sam out to be a more complex character than the movie does. He is not just “the good guy” as he is portrayed more so in the movie. The time period may have had a lot to do with the differences between the 1941 movie and the book, published in 1929. The first thing to consider is that the late 1920’s were a much more relaxed, party era, while the early 1940’s were an era of strict decorum. While

The movie “Gone with the Wind” is about a rich southern girl named Scarlett O’Hara and her life hardships set during the time-period of the Civil War. In the story, Scarlett is forced to watch helplessly as her family’s wealth and lives fade as the confederacy loses the Civil War. Even though, the movie is mainly centered on the dilemmas of Scarlett’s love life, there are many historical accuracies that immerse the viewer in the southern mindset as well as the timeframe. The portrayal of class structures and the confederate attitudes before the Civil War are both accurate and engaging details that the movie successfully implements. In the film, these examples are displayed mainly through the dialogue and setting.

Casablanca, the crowning achievement of director Michael Curtiz, which was released in 1942, is a film that had to work against the pressing concerns associated with World War II to stay relevant in both cinematic and general audiences. The writing, which was done by Julius J. Epstein, Philip G. Epstein, and Howard Koch, had to be inspirational yet uncontroversial. With actors like Humphrey Bogart as Rick Blaine, Ingrid Bergman as Ilsa Lund, Claude Rains as Captain Louis Renault, and Paul Henreid as the French revolutionary Victor Laszlo, Casablanca has a respectable cast. The movie initially appears to fit the film noir genre because of its smoky backdrops with muted colors,

Cinderella Man was an incredibly magnificent and uplifting film that followed the life of the “Bulldog”, later entitled “Cinderella Man”, starring Russell Crowe as James J. Braddock, the American heavyweight boxer. Primarily, Cinderella Man embodies strength and willpower as once-undefeated heavyweight fighter, Braddock’s loses started to rapidly accumulate, so bad that he was released from his boxing contract and was merciless impeded from fighting. Correspondingly, deprived of work the bulldog began to undertake hard labor during the Great Depression to counterbalance myriad bills and overdue payments. Moreover, Braddock and his wife Mae together had three children to nourish. Correspondingly, years later, Joe Gould played by Paul Giamatti, was Braddock’s old boxing manager and contracted him one last concluding fight, which he won. Hence, the Bulldog started to train again and James J. Braddock was reborn after countless winning comebacks. Ultimately, Jimmy undergoes a fairy tale rise from a poor local fighter to the heavyweight-boxing champion of the world.

The film is about a group of 5 people fighting to find and keep the

Ed Gein, and is about a man named Norman Bates, who runs a motel owned by his family.

When it comes to the film industry, entertainment is the tool used to acquire what is desired, money. The main goal for filmmakers when they create a film is to attain money in addition to the money spent to make the movie. Therefore, in some films that they like to base off of true accounts, it is somewhat necessary to dramatize or embellish the story to really tug at the heartstrings of the films audience. They achieve this goal by the use of dramatic music, ambient lighting, and a small amount of tweaked diction. The Fighter is an excellent example of this dramatization in action because throughout the film the characters are faced with a multitude of decisions that must be made. The choices they make require the characters to choose

In “The Departed”, which takes place in South Boston, State Police are tasked with bringing an end to Irish American organized crime. One of the stars of the movie is the great actor Leonardo DiCaprio, who plays undercover cop Billy Costigan. The cast is packed with high demand actors; one of them being Irish mob boss, Jack Nicholson, playing Frank Costello. Costigans counterpart is Colin Sullivan, played by Matt Damon. Both men just-graduated from Massachusetts State Police Academy; Sullivan is on the side of the mob, and joined the police force to be an informer for the mob boss. There is a key interplay between each man, and the people they are trying to deceive. The stakes are high, as each operative becomes entrenched in their double life,

Triumph des Willens (Triumph of the Will) is a film directed by Leni Riefenstahl that was commissioned by Adolf Hitler. The film details events around the 1934 Nuremberg Congress, the people who were in the rally and how they responded to it. Triumph is fundamentally a pro Hitler film that was meant to be a documentary that “records history as it happened” (Barsam 1975, p12). In essence though it was a propaganda film meant to unite Germany under Hitler’s regime. As in any good propaganda film Triumph focused on portraying the good points of the Nazis and not a single negative point was seen about them in the film. Hitler knew that for the film to be a success as a propaganda film showcasing too much of a political view would cause Triumph to be less successful. That is why he wanted the film to be more artistic and aesthetic. The film itself was described to be “aesthetic, not political” (Levinson 1998, p237). This did not mean though that the film was not political. Triumph was filmed in a way that it subtly expresses the political views and standpoints of the Nazi party to involve and manipulate the people who were not interested in politics. The main purpose of the film was to garner support for Hitler’s regime be they in the form of inspiring people into joining the army, or other supporting assets for Germany such as farmers, miners, fishers or labourers. Techniques in how these were achieved will be discussed in this review as well as its reception both domestically and internationally.