The Force Behind The Pendulum

Postmodern intellectual discourse and fiction refers to simulacrum not only in the original sense of the term – an image and a representation of an object – but also in a discussion and critique of different modern cultural, political, and social phenomena. If to summarise three main postmodern intellectual writers discussed in the theoretical part of the present Master thesis, Jean Baudrillard was interested in different manifestations of simulacrum and simulation in contemporary culture and society, Umberto Eco, on the contrary, in his essay was mainly focused on how various museums, tourist attractions, and historical places around the United States are exhibiting and producing replicas, while Gilles Deleuze in his discussion of simulacra paid more attention to the concepts of identity, appearance, representation, model, difference, and repetition. Thus, all of three had their own focus and approach to the study of simulacrum, simulation, and

The theme in “The Pit and the Pendulum” is death and hope. This is displayed in the poem when the narrator realizes the razor sharp pendulum that has been over him swaying from side to side is not an image, and is getting ready to kill him at any second. In the “Pit and the Pendulum” on page 276 it states, “It was the painted figure of Time as he is commonly represented, save that, in lieu of a scythe, he held what, at a casual glance, I supposed to be the pictured image of a huge pendulum, such as we see on antique clocks.” This means the whole time the narrator was in the dungeon he thought the pendulum was nothing but an image of time. When the rats bite through his restraints, he has a feeling of hope that he will escape and not die He feels the same thing

Surrealism is a movement that built off of the burgeoning look into art, psychology, and the workings of the mind. Popularly associated with the works of Salvador Dali, Surrealist art takes imagery and ideology and creates correlation where there is none, creating new forms of art. In this essay I will look to explore the inception of the surrealist movement, including the Surrealist Manifesto, to stress the importance of these artists and their work in the 20th century and beyond. I also will look to films from our European Cinema course to express how films incorporate the influence of surrealism both intentionally and unintentionally.

To support this idea, Bordwell illustrates how art cinema motivates its narratives differently, through two principles: realism and authorial expressivity. Firstly he proposes the notion that art films reflect realism in their characters, space, and time. Psychologically complex characters are present in real worlds dealing with true-to-life situations. Art cinema is concerned with the characters ‘reaction’ to these situations, rather than their ‘action’. Thus it bares an element of psychological subjectivity as the characters survey the world they are in, which aids the realisation of the distress of

The Pit and the Pendulum is about a man who is sentenced to THE PIT during the Spanish Inquisition. The story starts out as describing his trial and quick sentence to THE PIT. Next as he is in

The temporal setting “oppress the character with the shape of a pendulum” (3) He fears its deadly velocity which represents his final hours of life. He feels terror of the doom that will “cut” his time on earth. As everyone knows, this symbolizes that death is inevitable.

Realism wishes to “revolt against the exotic subject matter… and for this reason it is also commonly referred as bourgeois realism.” One finds this aspect of realism as well in “The Lady with the Dog” in which

Popular music is often one of the best lenses we have through which to view our own cultural orientation. Many of the artistic and experimental shifts in popular music have mirrored changes in our own society. For instance, the emergence of Elvis Presley as a public figure would signal the start of a sexual revolution and the growth in visibility of a rebellious youth culture. Similarly, the folk and psychedelic music of the 1960s was closely entangled with the Civil Rights, anti-war and social protest movements. In this regard, we can view popular music as an artifact through which to better understand the time and place in which it is produced. In light of this, the state of popular music today may suggest troubling things about our society.

A long time ago the difference between perception and reality was defined as the act of understanding in contrast to the act of being real. Reality could be tricky; most of us including myself depending on scenarios of our lives tend to give in to ideas which are not applicable to reality as a whole. The best example of this is written in the short story “All Over” by Guy de Maupassant. In which his main character Lormerin is very self conscious and narcissistic also Lise de Vance, a former old love plays a big role in hurting Lormerin ego and opening his eyes by showing him, his real self. Many would say that when reality knocks it could be harsh and confusing. In the next couple of

Dystopia and Utopia can be explored in many forms of media such as artwork, film, music, poetry and even dance. The easiest and most vivid way to depict these genres to the audience is in films. Films specifically incorporate visual symbolism through colors and settings and screenshot width and filters. Films may also incorporate a subliminal message to the reader through background music used in different scenes. Displaying utopian and dystopian societies through film leaves some imagination to the audience while allowing them to visually compare with the real world around them. For the purpose of exploring aspects of utopia and dystopia through films, I have chosen the films Metropolis by Fritz Lang (1927) and the episode Nosedive from

Due to the growing power and influence of the media, what people think is “real” is actually just a representation, but they cannot separate or distinguish the two. This failure to separate reality from imitation is an important aspect to simulacra. It makes it more powerful than a simple representation. Simulacra become the reality. Dr. Dino Felluga, of Purdue University, talks about the

“The Pit and the Pendulum” is a short story about a guy who is at trial before the spanish inquisitors. He receives the death penalty for an unknown crime. He was put in a cell in darkness where he discovered a, what seemed to be endless, pit. He soon found himself strapped down on a wooden board with only head head and left arm free. There was a pendulum descending down on him, waiting to take away his life.

In this essay, I will be discussing the two movements ‘Dada’ and ‘Futurism’, with reference to their conceptual contexts and representative plays, there will also be analysis to how these two movements contrast to realism/ naturalism. Links will also be made to the plays, with the use of scholarly sources to back up the argument and then coming to a final conclusion at the end of the essay.

In module 4, realism was discussed as self-effacing storytelling, which included a coherent organization of space and time. Fabe suggested that “realism encouraged viewers to become too vicariously involved with fictional action, a process that, it was thought, siphoned off their revolutionary energies” (Fabe 22). In module 9, it is discussed that neorealist films tell stories that place in the present day, focus on common, quotidian events in the lives of the poor and the working class, while ending without a closure, poor-quality black and white film stock, low budget, documentary or newsreel look without usage of professional actors. Killer of Sheep involves both the ideas of realism and neorealism, particularly, it adopted documentary style with black and white, no dialogues, we only study the action of the people, mise-en scene, both of them have involve long take and shots. On the hand, Burnett’s adaptation of Neorealist involve nonlinear unfolding of time and there are events laid out for us, which gives us an anti-illusionistic sense.

A simple pendulum consists of a mass that is attached to a string of length ‘L’ that is fixed to a point, in this case, a cork suspended by a clamp stand. This allows the mass to be suspended vertically downwards and allows it to be displayed at an angle that it swings. A period ‘T’ of oscillation is the time required for one complete swing. For this to happen ideally its mass must swing from an angle that is