Sunset Boulevard Film Analysis

Sunset Boulevard and Double Indemnity, are just two out of the many incredible films directed by renowned director Billy Wilder. The two films which were released six years apart, (Double Indemnity- 1944, and Sunset Boulevard- 1950) are uniquely similar, in that both films share many of the same aspects, idea’s, and similar in narration, as one another. Both of these extravagantly, directed films are indeed classics. The films, both tell an intriguing story of spiritual loneliness of a female character, and how they use their power, money, and provocativeness, to “lure” the male character. We see the life of a once innocent (male) character, who is being hurtled towards his own self destruction, the character is “supposedly” unaware, of his own self harm through his seemingly ‘good/beneficial’ decisions that he makes.

The film’s main focus largely represents the Hollywood star system to which Norma Desmond is a victim of. The film particularly highlights the fantasy world in which Norma lives in, the world where she is the ‘greatest star’ (Norma Desmond, Sunset Boulevard, 1950). Sunset Boulevard steps into Norma’s mixed up world where hundreds of photos of herself clutter her crumbling mansion and where she watches herself on screen on a weekly basis. The crumbling and deteriorating mansion could be seen as a metaphor for Norma’s fall from stardom, the collapse of her career.

Dealing with the theme of assimilation, Hester Street, set in 1896 was a depiction of the immigrant Jewish community living in the Lower East Side of New York City. Throughout the film, we see the challenges the Jewish immigrant characters endure when their “Old World” traditions, practices, and ideas were juxtaposed with the “New World,” American values. Thus, Hester Street highly endorses the characters’ acceptance with assimilating to American values. Furthermore, the film also showcases the resistance and complications to assimilation as some characters try to maintain their culture.

The film Sunset Boulevard (1950), directed by Billy Wilder, Norma Desmond exemplified a Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) by being demanding, intense and unstable. These behaviors that are consistent with the elements of abnormality include suffering, social discomfort, dangerousness, and irrationality and unpredictability. The first element that is consistent with Norma Desmond’s character is suffering. Desmond being one of the greatest movie stars in history suffers as she experiences the fall from stardom. She also suffers from identity disturbance as she reaches an unstable self-image notion. In one scene when Desmond recognizes for a moment about her age, she claims, “Look at me. Look at my hands, look at my face, look under my

Sunset Boulevard (Wilder 1950) explores the intermingling of public and private realms, puncturing the illusion of the former and unveiling the grim and often disturbing reality of the latter. By delving into the personal delusions of its characters and showing the devastation caused by disrupting those fantasies, the film provides not only a commentary on the industry of which it is a product but also a shared anxiety about the corrupting influence of external perception. Narrated by a dead man, centering on a recluse tortured by her own former stardom, and concerning a once-promising director who refuses to believe his greatest star could ever be forgotten, the work dissects a multitude of illusory folds to reveal an ultimately

Sunset Boulevard follows an unsuccessful screenwriter, Joe Gillis (William Holden), whom a past movie star, Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson), hires to help her return to the big screen. Police find the body of Joe Gillis in a swimming pool. In a flashback, Joe explains events that happen prior to his death. Joe tries selling a script to Paramount Studios to pay for his car but they refuse his script. When a group of men try to repossess Joes car, Joe escapes by hiding the car in a deserted mansion. Norma hires Joe to rewrite a script that she wants to star in and accepts his situation by moving into the mansion. Joe learns that Norma use to be a silent film star who believes that she’s still famous. Norma’s butler, Max Von Mayerling (Erich von Stroheim), explains that he writes Norma fan letters and that Norma has made suicide attempts. Later, Joe wants to leave the mansion but returns since Norma cuts her wrists. At nights, Joe sneaks out to work on a script with Betty Schaefer (Nancy Olson) and the two fall in love. Joe informs Norma that no one remembers her and that there will be no comeback causing Norma to shoot Joe who falls in the pool. Policemen and reporters appear at the

The film, The House I live In, opened my eyes to the severity of unfair law enforcement and the depths of the battle with war on drugs. Theoretically, the more people are being arrested for drugs, the cheaper, purer, and more available the drugs become. Making these arrests are not helping get the drugs off the streets, it is only opening up more opportunities for other people to pick up the business.

One of the symbolic representations in La Mission is where it takes place, in the mission district of San Francisco. It represents the traditional stance of Che the main character and compares it to the shift to a more hipster neighborhood with new people like Lena moving in who haven’t been in the neighborhood until recently. He also restores old cars into low riders which is historically Mexican American style of car. The music featured in this movie is a mix of traditional chorales, native drums and guitars mixed with newer more modern version that also show the transition that this community and culture are facing coming to terms with change and homosexuality that is culturally unacceptable.

Sixteen candles was written by John Hughes, this movie was his first 1980s teen movies. Hughes was inspired by Molly Ringwald, to write the screenplay. As, he was finishing up writing the screenplay for Mr. Mom and National Lampoon’s Vacation, Hughes' agents at ICM gave him a stack of photos of young actors. When he was going through the stack he noticed Molly Ringwald, then began write the screenplay for the Sixteen Candles. John Hughes finished the script over a single Fourth of July weekend. Hughes also was so impressed with Anthony Michael Hall's performance in National Lampoon's Vacation that he created the role of Ted “The Geek” just for him. Michael Schoeffling got the role of Jake Ryan, as the leading male because of his good

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,

Paradise Now is a 2-hour film released in 2005, it depicts a perspective alternative in a highly controversial topic of suicide bombers or also known as a ‘martyr’. The movie takes place in Palestine during the Israeli occupation and illustrates the mundane life and frustration felt by the main characters Said and Khaled due to the oppression experienced during the conflict. A key feature that is also portrayed is the reasoning, and almost justification of an attack on that level. However, the perpatrators can be seen showing feelings of hesitance and even inquisitiveness in relation to the afterlife that they are promised and whether violent resistance is the last option. This paper, will discuss how “Paradise Now” provoked my views and

The opening shot is Robert DeNiro’s character, Travis Bickle’s eyes in the review mirror intensely gazing at the city. It then transitions to the view outside of the taxi to the colorful, hectic streets of New York City. This exaggerates the importance of the taxi itself and the main character’s point of view from within it. Bickle is a veteran Marine who can’t sleep and decides to take the job of driving the long hours. He narrates the film as well using dialogue from the journal that he keeps. Through the imagery and symbolism of the taxi itself, the musical backdrop, and the artistic editing, Martin Scorcese’s American psychological thriller captures the filth and futility and filth of

The tragic movie Fruitvale Station (2013) was about a young black man named Oscar Grant (Michael B. Jordan) who was shot by a police officer that ended his life. Grant was unarmed and Police mistook real gun for a taser and shot him in the back. This movie was based on a real-life story that happened on the New Year’s Eve 2009 at Fruitvale BART station. Filmmaker Ryan Coogler made a fantastic movie portraying the reality of the situation through hard work. He wanted to make this movie because he believed that it could have been him getting shot because of his color. The movie has portrayed the struggles of a low-class family throughout. Grant had to pay the rent when he had lost his job and help his sister when she was struggling to make ends meet. He was also faced troubles with the law near the end of the movie.

The movie Moonlight- directed by Barry Jenkins- is a movie that breaks the stereotypes of black masculinity. Moonlight is a film which follows its main character Chiron through three pivotal stages in his life. Theses stages are titled; Little, Chiron, and Black. Little follows the main character as a child, Chiron follows him as a teenager and Black follows him as a young man. Each of these chapters shows things the character is going through and depicts him showing various emotions. One of the main aspects the film focuses on is Chiron's sexuality, which is a topic that is not usually portrayed in cinema, specifically black cinema. The film also explores the topics of drug addiction, fatherhood, poverty and of course, masculinity. It is

In the movie, Raising Arizona, the protagonist, Hi, a rather unintelligent man, leads a life as an unsuccessful convenience store robber who finds himself in and out of prison. This is where he meets his future wife Edwina, or Ed for short. Upon leaving prison for the last time, Hi proposes to Ed and the two get married. Ed desires to have a child so they constantly try to have a child but find out that Ed is barren. Hi and Ed look into adoption but are denied because of Hi’s past. About that time, the Arizona family have quintuplets and Hi and Ed decide the only way to get a child is to kidnap one of the babies. Hi attempts to become a better man but is constantly influenced by his surroundings to turn to his old way of living. Hi and Ed live in constant fear of people trying