Journal #3 Finding Nemo

For the third journal I chose the film Finding Nemo, written/directed by Andrew Stanton, and Lee Unkrich. Andrew Stanton, Bob Peterson, and David Reynolds wrote screenplay. Starring the voices of such actors as Albert Brooks, Ellen DeGeneres, Alexander Gould, and Willem Dafoe. Even for a cartoon this film was quite enjoyable for me, I really like all the humor within almost every scene even with lots of trouble surrounding the plot. It starts out with the fish marlin and his wife talking about their kids, his wife is killed along with 399 of his babies that lead him to greatly appreciate his son Nemo and be very overprotective. While chasing after the boat that captured his son he meets another character named Dorey that is the voice of Ellen DeGeneres. He becomes friends with her with in pursuit of his son Nemo. The story continues on in which Nemo is involved with the fish in the aquarium in plans to escape to save him from the wrath of the dentist’s niece, which inevitably would be his death. Marlin searches the ocean wide trying to attempt to find the place of “P. Sherman 42 Wallaby way, Sydney, Australia”. The Dentists tank becomes exceedingly dirty thanks to the plan of Gill and they are well on their way to escaping. Marlin is then almost digested by two different animals first of these is a whale, secondly a pelican, but as he is almost eaten he is saved by another pelican which is a friend of Nemo’s.
The actors chosen and the reasons why are the topic for this journal that I chose to research upon further. The first character is marlin and his rugged questionable voice brings out the character within him and how overprotective he is from the loss of so much in his life. Actor Albert Brooks plays marlins voice and he has sense of anxiety about his voice, which can really relate to Marlins pent up attitude towards life in comparison to his friend in the film Dorey. Marlin grows to understand that you have to trust sometimes in one another that things can be accomplished, somewhat learns this from trusting his friend such as when they are near death inside of the whale. Another character is Dorey who is the voice of Ellen DeGeneres in which she plays this very well with her excitement and tone of voice always flowing throughout her character in the story. She takes on the role of annoying sidekick in which DeGeneres seems to fill that spot like a glove, with her nasally voice fitting perfectly to Doreys character in which she has short term memory loss throughout the film. The third character to examine more in depth is Nemo, whose voice is played out by child actor Alexander Gould, which is hard to describe since this was his first major role. He has a sense of curiousity about his voice that suits Nemo in the film flawlessly with his ability to test the limits of his father. He has a sense for adventure and his higher pitched voice filled with excitement matches up to the playfulness of a young nemo quite well.
                       

                      

Journal #2 The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

The film I chose to review out of the top 100 was The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, Directed by Sergio Leone and Produced by Alberto Grimaldi and MGM in 1960. Luciano Vincenzoni, and Sergio Leone wrote the Screenplay. Main character Clint Eastwood (Blondie) highlights this film playing the “Good” along with Lee Van Cleef (Angel Eyes) playing the role of the “Bad” and finally to round out the main characters Eli Wallach (Tuco) playing the so called “Ugly” in which he seems to do very well in the opening scene where he jumps out of a window wearing very haggard clothes and holding a chicken leg with his pistol in the other.
Clint Eastwood plays the most admirable role in the film I would say helping most honest people but not to claim him entire innocence he does help the “Ugly” out of his fair share of due punishment. Clint Eastwood goes by the name Blondie in the film and seems to team up with Tuco who is the so called ugly when he saves him it would first appear but he actually is just bringing him into town to claim ransom money. The next scene shows Tuco hanging from a rope where he is read his crimes and how he is wanted in 14 different counties. Then a cloud of smoke appears and Blondie steps out in the background to shoot him loose from his rope and set him free, The next would show the two exchanging money as if they had some previous notion of this kind of deal. This goes on again but Blondie begins to realize the risk and how Tuco’s worth is depleting to him, they ride into the desert and Tuco is left to fend for himself 70 miles away from the nearest town, Tuco swears his revenge on the double cross.

A blatant theme that appears to me in this film is greed, no matter what good fortune is thrust upon any of the three characters it is truly unsatisfying until they achieve that final goal of finding Bill Carson which in turn would lead them to the lost Confederate cash box containing an estimated $200,000. The “Bad” goes by the name Angel eyes in the film and he is the one closest on the trail to the coins already having killed one of the men who knew of the moneys whereabouts. Tuco insistent on finding Blondie for his revenge on him for leaving him to die locates him but a stray fragment does Blondie some luck and frees him. Tuco follows a trail of cigar butts thru the desert until coming across Blondie once again.
The film has the same kind of western sounding music throughout the film, which comes around every time there seems to be a new break in the story or twist into the plot. The characters seem to have a sort of outlaw dialogue about themselves especially Tuco and Angel eyes, Blondie has sort of a refined way of speaking to people which leads you to take him as the “Good”. The overall plot can be believable in aspects that the Wild West was as ruthless as stereotypes have led you to believe in the past. The actors were very believable and truly seemed like the role they were playing considering the “Ugly” is a very scrappy looking person and the “Bad” had this sinister look to him. The lighting for the most part stands out as very high-key, a few scenes in which it is low are when Angel Eyes kills Baker in one of the opening scenes, another low key could be the church in which all the wounded from the war are gathered for help. The scene in which Tuco has made it back from the desert is hard to believe but his condition leads you to believe it in which he looks near death with the look of his skin and complexion to be horrid. Camera movements when following them thru the desert usually seemed like a handheld motion but higher angles were used at times to make Clint Eastwood’s weak condition very obvious. There is one particular scene in which Tuco and Blondie are taken into a Union prison camp because they are clothed in Confederacy uniforms when they pass by, this scene has a very slow melancholy tune playing when Angel Eyes and accomplice beat the information out of Tuco regarding the coins. For the most part lengthy seemed shots in exception to the scenes with quick gunfire and fighting such as when Tuco is hanging from nooses they make sudden cuts to and from him and Blondie. Overall an enjoyable film to watch with a cool calm early stage Clint Eastwood with rhythmic music truly inspired by the theme of the Wild West.

                          

Critique the Critic

JUNO

The Film I recently have seen is Juno, which interested me too begin with because of the actor Michael Cera from the film Superbad which I have really enjoyed watching. Also the involvement of Rainn Wilson From the Office was another aspect of the film I enjoyed and thought was a good character. My overall view of the film was that it was interesting throughout with a few odd things intertwined such as the connection the husband Jason Bateman made with “Juno” actress Ellen Page in which I thought was a bit odd considering he was happily married it so appeared but yet he was not yet ready to move on to a father stage of his life.

The Critic I overlooked was oddly close in my relation to the view of the this movie which that it was a good film in which teaches a lesson about how life can be rough but never necessary to jump to desperate measures such as actress Ellen page shows when she realizes the value of her unborn child’s life while waiting at the abortion clinic. The critic mentions on how Juno’s nimble tongue and adolescent slang wins your sympathy over and you grow to like her character quite a bit.

My opinion on the overall review of this film is that it was judged quite fair and honest. A good comedic film in which teaches you a lesson in ways of life, but not forgetting how life is never fair to everyone but yet to look upon a brighter side of such things like an unwanted pregnancy and embrace it. I can somewhat agree with the solid score of 93% on the “tomatometer” the general consensus of “brightest” comedy of the year not so much the funniest in general. Overall it’s a movie worthwhile enjoying while its still popular, but in my mind nothing worth going too far out of you’re way for.

Ace Ventura

This scene combines many different shots with the beggining showing the entrance of the snobs on the stairs with a somewhat long shot where full bodies and some surroundings are shown. High key lighting used in the entire scene in which the mood is happiness. The low angle at the beggining is used to create a powerful image of the two walking down the stairs which in turn obviously think highly of themselves.

Favorite movie

Favorite movie would have to be something along the lines of Dumb and Dumber considering Jim Carey is one of my favorite actors and just one of the better movies in my life, hard to not enjoy watching it and easy to relate the humor with everyone cause it just has a broad audience which makes the movie that much better. (Photo Credit: Star tribune).

Critics and reviews.

Critics for the most part seem to agree athough they say the film lacks maturity and has an abundance of bodily functions , it is very much a good comedy and Jim Carey does well with his role becoming an original person over and again.