Wednesday 30 September 2009
Family Guy clips
Visiting Ground Zero
Dinner With Jesus
Hitler and Eva
Three great Family Guy clips, poking fun at America and it's response to the attacks on 9/11, Jesus and also religion and finally Hitler and Eva Braun, turning their joint suicide into a little game. Family Guy is definitely a cartoon for adults and it works on differnet levels, two being its base humour and probing insight into 21st century American attitudes.
Tuesday 29 September 2009
Sunday 27 September 2009
Mixtape-directed by Luke Snellin
A superb short film. The first prize winner at last weekends Virgin Media Shorts Awards. Beautifully shot and edited. A simple idea that may give you some inspiration.
Making The Difference-directed by Andrew Oxley and David Williams
What is life without the unadulterated pleasure of a cup of tea and slice of cake? ‘Making The Difference’ celebrates that unsung time of the day - the blissful tea break. Sit back and relax with four members of our fine nation as they discuss their favourite complements to a cup of tea.
Stalking Ben Chadz-directed by Daniel Castella
A short film about two hopeless women in a car spying on a boy. Again a simple idea skilfully realised.
Friday 25 September 2009
DJ Shadow-Organ Donor (Live at The Brixton Academy)
DJ Shadow performing Organ Donor at The Brixton Academy. The track originally on his masterpiece Entroducing... is built on four samples: Someone by Bill & Tim, Tears by Giorgio Moroder, PM or Later (Instrumental) by The New Breed, There's a DJ in Your Town. Remix culture happening before our very eyes and ears. I've included a 30 second extract of the Giorgio Moroder track for your appraisal.
Thursday 24 September 2009
Simulacra and Simulation
Simulacra and Simulation (Simulacres et Simulation in French) is a philosophical treatise by Jean Baudrillard that discusses the interaction between reality, symbols and society.
“ The simulacrum is never that which conceals the truth--it is the truth which conceals that there is none. The simulacrum is true.[1] ”
Simulacra and Simulation is most known for its discussion of images, signs, and how they relate to the present day. Baudrillard claims that modern society has replaced all reality and meaning with symbols and signs, and that the human experience is of a simulation of reality rather than reality itself. The simulacra that Baudrillard refers to are signs of culture and media that create the perceived reality; Baudrillard believed that society has become so reliant on simulacra that it has lost contact with the real world on which the simulacra are based.
“ The simulacrum is never that which conceals the truth--it is the truth which conceals that there is none. The simulacrum is true.[1] ”
Simulacra and Simulation is most known for its discussion of images, signs, and how they relate to the present day. Baudrillard claims that modern society has replaced all reality and meaning with symbols and signs, and that the human experience is of a simulation of reality rather than reality itself. The simulacra that Baudrillard refers to are signs of culture and media that create the perceived reality; Baudrillard believed that society has become so reliant on simulacra that it has lost contact with the real world on which the simulacra are based.
Chris Cunningham-Gucci Advert
Chris Cunningham is commissioned by Gucci to make an advert for a new fragrance? Pretty unlikely on paper. In practice it works brilliantly. The generic conventions are toyed with, the music is ethereal and the way the girl turns into a flower is beautiful. The images have Cunningham's artistic stamp all over them. I think this works well as a companion piece to Sheena Is A Parasite (binary opposites). The music is I Feel Love by Donna Summer (produced by Giorgio Moroder).
The Horrors-Sheena Is A Parasite
The simplicity and starkness of the images is what i find most appealing here. The band dressed in black and white, all eyeliner and staring into space and the way the visual violence of Sheena's convulsion match the chorus add up to a visually arresting video. The lighting too is sparse yet incredibly effective.
Wes Anderson-Rushmore (Max Fischer clubs and extracurricular activities)
A great sequence from Rushmore by Wes Anderson. Max Fisher's extra curricular activities condensed into 1:12 of cinematic genius. The music is Making Time by The Creation. A scottish gentleman called Alan McGee used their name for a small record label he set up.
Wednesday 23 September 2009
Wes Anderson-American Express advert
A superb example of a tracking shot, used to great effect in this American Express advert directed by and starring Wes Anderson. Great attention to detail in terms of mise en scene, typical of Wes Anderson's work.
Opening sequence analysis-Juno and Let The Right One In
Task: compare the opening sequences "Juno" (2007, Jason Reitman) and "Let The Right One In" (2008, Tomas Alfredson).
Focus specifically on narrative information, character types and shot types.
Helpful questions:
Identify at least 3 different shot types/camera techniques used in each sequence and explain the impact on the audience.
What similarities can you identify between the two examples?
What are the differences?
Helpful questions:
- What kind of story is being told in each example?
- How much of the story is revealed to the audience?
- What are your first impressions of the characters you see?
- What role do you think the characters will play in their respective storylines?
What similarities can you identify between the two examples?
What are the differences?
Postmodernist film
Postmodernist film describes the articulation of ideas of postmodernism through the cinematic medium. Postmodernist film upsets the mainstream conventions of narrative structure and characterization and destroys (or, at least, toys with) the audience's suspension of disbelief to create a work in which a less-recognizable internal logic forms the film's means of expression.
Three examples of postmodernist film can be viewed in the previous posts.
Three examples of postmodernist film can be viewed in the previous posts.
Monday 21 September 2009
Postmodernism-a brief introduction
Postmodern texts deliberately play with meaning. They are designed to be read by a literate (ie experienced in other texts) audience and will exhibit many traits of intertextuality. Many texts openly acknowledge that, given the diversity in today's audiences, they can have no preferred reading (check out your Reception Theory) and present a whole range of oppositional readings simultaneously. Many of the sophisticated visual puns used by advertising can be described as postmodern. Postmodern texts will employ a range of referential techniques such as bricolage, and will use images and ideas in a way that is entirely alien to their original function (eg using footage of Nazi war crimes in a pop video).
Meme-a defintion
‘Meme’ is a popular term for describing the noticeable and often rapid uptake and spread of a particular idea in the form of written text, an image, a language ‘move’, or other piece or unit of cultural information (e.g., a catchphrase, a video clip, a recount of an event).
In research conducted by Lankshear and Knobel the key criteria for identifying a meme as a meme included:
• the meme is contagious, replicable, and has longevity (i.e., is discussed or passed on for longer than a period of a days)
• the meme encodes a recognizable element of cultural information, where cultural information is defined as some kind of meaningful idea, pattern, or chunk of ‘stuff’ that embodies and/or shapes some aspect of the ways of doing and being that are associated with belonging to a particular practice or group
• the meme is more or less wholly transmitted via electronic vehicles (e.g., email, websites, online discussion forums, chat spaces)
• the meme passes outside the shared affinity space within which it first came to prominence (e.g., insider-jokes generated within collaborative spaces such as Fark.com or SomethingAweful.com but that do not extend beyond the members of this space are not included in this analysis, which aims at examining memes that have a wide reach)
• the meme can be deemed ‘successful’ because it is strong enough or salient enough to capture online and offline broadcast media attention in the form of fullblown reports through to side-bar mentions in newspapers, television news reports or talk shows, widely-read trade publications and magazines.
Three broad elements that a successful meme may contain:
• Some element of humour, ranging from the quirky and offbeat, to chortle-worthy potty humour, to the bizarrely funny, to parodies, through to the acerbically ironic
• A rich kind of intertextuality, such as wry cross-references to different popular culture events, icons or phenomena, and/or
• Anomalous juxtapositions, usually of images
Taken from Memes and affinities: Cultural replication and literacy education
Michele Knobel and Colin Lankshear
Paper presented to the annual NRC, Miami, November 30, 2005.
In research conducted by Lankshear and Knobel the key criteria for identifying a meme as a meme included:
• the meme is contagious, replicable, and has longevity (i.e., is discussed or passed on for longer than a period of a days)
• the meme encodes a recognizable element of cultural information, where cultural information is defined as some kind of meaningful idea, pattern, or chunk of ‘stuff’ that embodies and/or shapes some aspect of the ways of doing and being that are associated with belonging to a particular practice or group
• the meme is more or less wholly transmitted via electronic vehicles (e.g., email, websites, online discussion forums, chat spaces)
• the meme passes outside the shared affinity space within which it first came to prominence (e.g., insider-jokes generated within collaborative spaces such as Fark.com or SomethingAweful.com but that do not extend beyond the members of this space are not included in this analysis, which aims at examining memes that have a wide reach)
• the meme can be deemed ‘successful’ because it is strong enough or salient enough to capture online and offline broadcast media attention in the form of fullblown reports through to side-bar mentions in newspapers, television news reports or talk shows, widely-read trade publications and magazines.
Three broad elements that a successful meme may contain:
• Some element of humour, ranging from the quirky and offbeat, to chortle-worthy potty humour, to the bizarrely funny, to parodies, through to the acerbically ironic
• A rich kind of intertextuality, such as wry cross-references to different popular culture events, icons or phenomena, and/or
• Anomalous juxtapositions, usually of images
Taken from Memes and affinities: Cultural replication and literacy education
Michele Knobel and Colin Lankshear
Paper presented to the annual NRC, Miami, November 30, 2005.
Son Of Rambow
Son Of Rambow (2007) by acclaimed music video directors Hammer & Tongs. Their first effort The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy was a big budget misfire.Son Of Rambow saw them return to their roots. A lo-fi low budget movie about two young boys attempting to make their own version of Rambo.
500 Days Of Summer
The trailer for 500 Days of Summer starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel. A romantic comedy of sorts, It dwells on a break-up instead of ending happily ever after. Useful as a twist on a rather tired genre. Interesting music choices too. Marc Webb started as a music video director, most notably for My Chemical Romance and Hot Hot Heat.
Sunday 20 September 2009
Web 2.0-A Definition
Web 2.0 (or Web 2) is the popular term for advanced Internet technology and applications including blogs, wikis, RSS and social bookmarking. The two major components of Web 2.0 are the technological advances enabled by Ajax and other new applications such as RSS and Eclipse and the user empowerment that they support.
Tim O'Reilly is generally credited with inventing the term, following a conference dealing with next-generation Web concepts and issues held by O'Reilly Media and MediaLive International in 2004. O'Reilly Media has subsequently been energetic about trying to copyright "Web 2.0" and holds an annual conference of the same name. There is, however, some dispute about whether O'Reilly is responsible for the original coinage. Joe Firmage, for instance, used Web 2.0 to describe using the World Wide Web as a platform in 2003.
One of the most significant differences between Web 2.0 and the traditional World Wide Web (retroactively referred to as Web 1.0) is greater collaboration among Internet users and other users, content providers, and enterprises.
Originally, data was posted on Web sites, and users simply viewed or downloaded the content. Increasingly, users have more input into the nature and scope of Web content and in some cases exert real-time control over it. For example, multiple-vendor online book outlets such as BookFinder4U make it possible for users to upload book reviews as well as find rare and out-of-print books at a minimum price, and dynamic encyclopedias such as Wikipedia allow users to create and edit the content of a worldwide information database in multiple languages. Internet forums have become more extensive and led to the proliferation of blogging. The dissemination of news evolved into RSS.
There is no clear-cut demarcation between Web 2.0 and Web 1.0 technologies, hardware and applications. The distinction is, to a large extent, subjective. Here are a few characteristics often noted as descriptive of Web 2.0:
Some industry pundits are already claiming that Web 2.0 is merely a transitional phase between the early days of the World Wide Web's existence and a more established phase they're calling Web 3.0.
Tim O'Reilly is generally credited with inventing the term, following a conference dealing with next-generation Web concepts and issues held by O'Reilly Media and MediaLive International in 2004. O'Reilly Media has subsequently been energetic about trying to copyright "Web 2.0" and holds an annual conference of the same name. There is, however, some dispute about whether O'Reilly is responsible for the original coinage. Joe Firmage, for instance, used Web 2.0 to describe using the World Wide Web as a platform in 2003.
One of the most significant differences between Web 2.0 and the traditional World Wide Web (retroactively referred to as Web 1.0) is greater collaboration among Internet users and other users, content providers, and enterprises.
Originally, data was posted on Web sites, and users simply viewed or downloaded the content. Increasingly, users have more input into the nature and scope of Web content and in some cases exert real-time control over it. For example, multiple-vendor online book outlets such as BookFinder4U make it possible for users to upload book reviews as well as find rare and out-of-print books at a minimum price, and dynamic encyclopedias such as Wikipedia allow users to create and edit the content of a worldwide information database in multiple languages. Internet forums have become more extensive and led to the proliferation of blogging. The dissemination of news evolved into RSS.
There is no clear-cut demarcation between Web 2.0 and Web 1.0 technologies, hardware and applications. The distinction is, to a large extent, subjective. Here are a few characteristics often noted as descriptive of Web 2.0:
- blogging
- Ajax and other new technologies
- Google Base and other free Web services
- RSS-generated syndication
- social bookmarking
- mash-ups
- wikis and other collaborative applications
- dynamic as opposed to static site content
- interactive encyclopedias and dictionaries
- ease of data creation, modification or deletion by individual users
- advanced gaming.
Some industry pundits are already claiming that Web 2.0 is merely a transitional phase between the early days of the World Wide Web's existence and a more established phase they're calling Web 3.0.
J.J. Abrams' Mystery Box (TED lecture)
J.J. Abrams (Lost,Alias,Cloverfield,Star Trek) talking at a TED conference in 2007 about the creative process. TED (Technology Entertainment Design) is worth checking out for inspiration from some of the most creative and brilliant thinkers working in the media and related areas.
Saturday 19 September 2009
Pastiche-a brief definition
A pastiche is a literary or other artistic genre that is a "hodge-podge" or an imitation.
Pastiche is prominent in popular culture. Many genre writings, particularly in fantasy, are essentially pastiches. The Star Wars series of films by George Lucas is often considered to be a pastiche of traditional science fiction television serials (or radio shows). The fact that Lucas's films have been influential (spawning their own pastiches) can be regarded as a function of postmodernity.
The films of Quentin Tarantino are often described as pastiches, as they often pay tribute to (or imitate) pulp novels, blaxploitation and/or Chinese kung fu films, though some say his films are more of an homage. The same definition is said to apply to the video games of Hideo Kojima as well, since they adopt many conventions of action films.
Pastiche can also be a cinematic device wherein the creator of the film pays homage to another filmmaker's style and use of cinematography, including camera angles, lighting, and mise en scène. A film's writer may also offer a pastiche based on the works of other writers (this is especially evident in historical films and documentaries but can be found in non-fiction drama, comedy and horror films as well).
Kill Bill: Vol. 1 trailer (2003)
Lady Snowblood trailer (1973)
Pastiche is prominent in popular culture. Many genre writings, particularly in fantasy, are essentially pastiches. The Star Wars series of films by George Lucas is often considered to be a pastiche of traditional science fiction television serials (or radio shows). The fact that Lucas's films have been influential (spawning their own pastiches) can be regarded as a function of postmodernity.
The films of Quentin Tarantino are often described as pastiches, as they often pay tribute to (or imitate) pulp novels, blaxploitation and/or Chinese kung fu films, though some say his films are more of an homage. The same definition is said to apply to the video games of Hideo Kojima as well, since they adopt many conventions of action films.
Pastiche can also be a cinematic device wherein the creator of the film pays homage to another filmmaker's style and use of cinematography, including camera angles, lighting, and mise en scène. A film's writer may also offer a pastiche based on the works of other writers (this is especially evident in historical films and documentaries but can be found in non-fiction drama, comedy and horror films as well).
Kill Bill: Vol. 1 trailer (2003)
Lady Snowblood trailer (1973)
Friday 18 September 2009
Homage-a brief definition
Homage: a reference within a creative work to someone who greatly influenced the artist would be homage. It is typically used to denote a reference in a work of art or literature to another, at least somewhat widely known, work. In literature and film, homage is similar to allusion, except that whereas allusion merely refers to another work, homage typically repeats a recognizable scene or stylistic element from the other work. Homage can be similar to parody, except that parody typically exaggerates characteristics of target works for comedic effect.(wikipedia)
Excellent examples on this blog are the Death Proof trailer (Quentin Tarantino) and the Beastie Boys video (Sabotage) by Spike Jonze.
Thursday 17 September 2009
Wavves-No Hope Kids
Wavves are a lo-fi punk band from San Diego, California. Nathan Williams and Zach Hill are the current members. Together they make the scuzziest, noisiest most unselfconscious sound. They have already released two cds 'Wavves' and 'Wavvves' (can you see what they did?). The video is a great example of low budget film making.
Sigur Ros-Glósóli
Glosoli is one of the tracks released as a single from the 2005 album Takk...(Thanks...). The video has a haunting quality. The first boy is like a mini Pied Piper, that is before they all turn into lost boys and girls (Peter Pan ref.). Whatever your take, it's a memorable piece of film.
Wednesday 16 September 2009
Tuesday 15 September 2009
Monday 14 September 2009
Quentin Tarantino-Death Proof trailer
Quentin Tarantino's Death Proof is a cross between pure Grindhouse carsploitation and a Russ Meyer babe-fest. The Vanishing Point trailer (1971 directed by Richard C. Sarafian)is included as a reference point). Vanishing Point was also the inspiration for Primal Scream's 1997 album of the same name. Homage? Pastiche? Postmodernism?
The girls of Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! (1965 Russ Meyer)
The Dead Weather-Treat Me Like Your Mother
Short film directed by Jonathan Glazer for Treat Me Like Your Mother by The Dead Weather.
One of the four posters produced to accompany the short film.
Beastie Boys-Sabotage & Starsky and Hutch opening credits
The 1994 video for the track Sabotage by the Beastie Boys is essentially a homage to 1970's U.S. cop shows. A fine example is included for your viewing delight. Starsky and Hutch was a top rated tv show in the 1970's. Both David Soul and Paul Michael Glazer were international stars, David Soul even managed two number one singles in the UK.
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