the amazing wonders of the film AVITAR

THIS IS WHY I AM DOING THIS COARSE.

FOR ME THIS FILM WAS PURE ESCAPISM !

Ok so i have to tell you that James Cameron does have a very special place in my heart from the word go as it was his masterpiece Titanic that made me want to make films. And today seeing yet another masterpiece that old feeling was brought spiraling back to me in the most beautiful neon glowing colors. ones that you cant quite fathom, it seems almost that someone managed to encapsulate the rainbow :) ah this film left me dizzy with excitement after watching it ( so much so that when sam asked me to keep a hold of his gloves i just sat them down and walked away with out them! ) Pure escapism, not for one minute was i aware that we were watching a film , no , we were just there in that world that he created for us. And i don't no much about technology and all this editing stuff but wow those eyes : and if you don't notice them its the last shot in the film, beaming back at you with emotion pouring out. amazing. William Langly of the telegraph asks - " is james Cameron's Avatar the future of movies" in his beaming article about the film. i would say yes and also no.

you may think this odd after my heavy use of emotive language but after watching this and then calming down all i wanted to do was watch the films that after the ignition of titanic kept my desire to create films alive. i watched in quick succession "wasp" by andrea arnold one of my favorite british female directors then i watched "last resort" a film filmed on kodak , and spectacular at that! no use of 3D technology here.

It wasn't the 3D special effects that got me it was the escape, the beauty and the magic of it even though it had very basic human themes running through it. And i think thats what inspires me because the films i watched afterwards are real life Avatar's. there gritty and yet expose that perfect everyday magic you can see if you just look - or the challenge for us is to create it capture it in a believable story.

i have no dreams of being some blockbuster making millionaire , but even then this film reminds me why i am here , to create little pieces of magic and wonder that occurs in everyday life.

Im so glad i went to see this :)

thank you James again

peace xxx

the cabinet of doctor caligari

Sorry this is late, very late.

however, i remember my first impression very well, it was that the film seemed very advanced in idea for it's time, it was edgy and cooky .

i really liked it in all its artsy wonder.

And thats it, it was a joy to watch and it made me want to watch other films of a similar type to compare and see if i enjoy to a similar extent.

peace xx

corrie

Ah this made my eyes bleeeeeeeddd...... OK so maybe it wasn't THAT bad but i think to begin with i tried to intellectualize it to much so on my first viewing i didn't enjoy it at all .
By the third time i watched it i think i had mellowed out and was just watching it, so i kind of liked it better.

these are the notes i took when watching Coranation street for the first time :

i just put on the latest episode of corrie on iplayer and started to watch it. i had to watch it three times, it opens with an old man taking to his nephew this is important because it goes back to that at the end , there is a seemingly newish character who has been introduced in previous episodes and his appearance seems to be reiterating the fact in this episode- at the start and then in the longer scene in the bookies. obviouse set ups for story lines are being arranged left right and center and its really easy to follow which character likes and dislikes who with use of camera angles and scrip etc.

there are a few different we things that happen in the episode and it works on a yo yo like effect, you see something and it is resolved or half resolved later on after you have seen the other bits and pieces. there seemed to be about four of these things.


so after watching it i made some more notes: the notion of real time means that the cliffhanger hook is always more of a moral dilemma. Exposition is a bad thing when thinking about writing scripts. You can have temporary resolution: weddings funerals etc were harmony is stressed but
are perfect for creating new story lines and because of the harmony small squabbles are intensified. There is defiantly an art to this type of story lining and script writing as there is such a massive archive of history for all the characters.

I am looking forward to getting to know corrie better and i do think it is an art form: however, i am going to have to get over my parents dislike for it as from a young age they banned me from watching it as they thought it was trashy and in bad taste.

peace xxx

thirteen a response for lucy :)

I watched this film when i first moved to Annan the town i went to my second high school in. in my previous high school by the time of entering second year i had already been offered cocaine at lunch time and witnessed my friend being held back a year for lack of turning up to school due to her alcoholic mother and druggy sister, i don't actually no how she's doing now but all these things made thirteen a personal experience and some sort of therapy for me.

I think the thing that works for me about the film is its kind of like watching a version of my own life, and because the themes are universal it doesn't matter what your poison is, for me it was never drugs but the themes still work and are very recognizable for allot of teenage girls. It looks at obsessive relationships, the ones were you are like oh she's my sister best friends for life etc. I don't think that either girl is wrong to be honest, Evan Rachel Woods character welcomes with open arms the new life she went looking for, extremely naive but also just real, what you do when your thirteen and want to change. To your point Lucy about not knowing girls like this at that age, this is the exact age that people are most likely to have a problem getting over there changes physically and mentally as the body goes through these every seven years being 13/14 is the time as a teenager you would be making the biggest mental and physical changes. We see this in the film , even with the small roles of her other friends who stay on the 'right' path of school work and don't do drugs or have sex, you can see the pain they are going through at the loss of there friend. you could make a film about them and there problems however opposite they would be and it would still work. Simply because each would look at the theme which runs through every teenagers life of : acceptance, belonging and friendship.

I really enjoy watching this film and even though the new equilibrium at the end of the film is no better than the one at the start you can see that in herself she has learnt some uncomfortable truths and has made herself a stronger person by coming out the other end even if its screaming :)

i have allot of love for this film and the director ( even if she went on to make twilight )
and i agree totally that the actors performances - from the whole cast - were a very high standard.

peace xx

ideas and thoughts about the past term, :)

it really doesn't seem like we have had a hole term it kinda feels like this should be half term brea or something, its flown by that quick!

so much has happened socially and on the learning front!!

Getting here was a party, i went through Edinburgh freshers and stopped of in stirling for a few nights of parties and then got my ticket to glasgow in time for our 3 day induction !

I really enjoyed that week , although

to begin with i thought i was

the only one in the whole of my halls, until i met D. that was a bit of an adventure in-itself , i don't think i have met anyone like D and our first night out at BUFF was interesting to say the least :)

By the time freshers week came along i felt happy in the class dynamic we quickly established , everyone is similar in many ways but then we all have things that make us different so it worked really well from the beginning and as that was one of my

big worries before i came here i'm really glad it worked so well so quickly. As a class we must have gone to the cinema nearly everyday in the early days we soon established it was an expensive game so we all got cineworld cards which enabled us to go to the cinema several times a day without the worry of being skinted by the experience.

in that first we period i went to see : Away we go , sorority row, 500 days of summer, toy story 3d, district 9 , surrogates , fame , dorian grey. that was in the time i came to glasgow and the 05/10 :) so you can see how busy we were. the first lesson i have notes for was on the 8th of october, it begins with the title " what does tv mean to me? " my answer was a personal response and i remember being embarrassed reading it out when i heard others had a more academic approach to answering but i have soon learned that the personal response is a good thing. I had answers like , childhood, saturday night with Sher etc, i think i would answer this one differently if asked now the lessons have defiantly de-personalized the television experience for me and i now find it very hard to sit down and watch television, in fact i have probably only watched 5 or 6 hours since i have been here. This you may think is a bad thing but i don't think it is, i'm always tuned in to things as if they might help me with future ideas, i pull things apart that i watch trying to think why it was made like that , script and theme etc.

its a new way of watching tv . Classes were painfully easy at the beginning of the term i think thats the reason for my early blogging being done so often, as the classes got more in-depth and challenging i felt i had less time and concentration at the end of the day . Blogging felt like a fun thing, to be able to not have a structure like in english and history felt like a heaven sent for me, as i was never good at this at school. Our first piece of written work to be handed in was the short story for Richard's class, i love creative writing and i felt that i flourished at that task , i even felt confident in reading my story to several members of the class. screen writing was ever emotionally challenging and i feel that i probably could have been more open, sharing personal thoughts has never been something i can do easily and by the end that class began to annoy me in that i felt some people were using it as a personal therapy maybe that was the whole idea but i don't think i got as much out of that class as others. i am however exited about working on writing in my own time now richard is away to la. The post secret task however was so interesting and extremely tense in the class , the discussions over our beliefs was particularly difficult for me as i couldn't help feel personally offended when someone said religion was disgusting! But from the beginning that was a clear favorite class i think that Richard's teaching style was really effective and his lessons were always eagerly anticipated. As friendships really flourished in the class i found myself settling in really quickly and beginning to feel at home in Glasgow. One of the best nights i had out was when me and Julia went to see Tommy Reily: we didn't have tickets but bought some in the line for cheaper than the asking price :) it was one of the best gigs i have been to and it

was fun sharing the experience with a new friend. Going to gigs has been a staple since then although getting tickets for cheap has not!! Green day set me back £60! ouch :)

anyway all that was fun for the night time but during the day was fun to, Rays class is probably the most interesting for me because everything is new and i think that overall it has come quite easily to me so i'm glad and thankful about that. I found his assessment to be relaxing and that is a first for anything of that nature, so far the camera seems a logical step forward for me from photography and i cant wait to start going out on shoots. ( that is when we get our health and safety induction !) Im proud of my note taking for this class as well because they are concise and really helpful for me, which was the whole idea. i have bought a new leather journal for keeping them all together stylishly.

As for Rays class..... oh my , the one class i cannot and have not got my head around! my note probably make sense if you no what editing is but i just cant make sense of it and the whole things is very stressful even his room is claustrophobic and far to hot!> much worst even than agos9!

on the subject of agos 9 i don't think its a great learning environment , i like sitting in a horse shoe shape its good to be able to see everyone and when someone is talking you can focus on them, the room is just to low sealing and not enough windows or natural light.

what can be done about that i don't no but anyway agos nine is not my favorite.

one lesson i found particularly fun was the one were we had to make up a game show i thought my teams idea of 'get your man back' was quite funny and people seemed to think it was a good idea. i like working with people to create ideas and in every class i feel my ability to work with others in a collaborative way had been positive and i have found these situations enjoyable.

To be honest this really isn't what i was expecting at all! i thought it would be hard graft reading , shooting footage, editing etc.... however, next term i'll probably regret taking this term for granted! its been FUN overall :) and the best thing is i feel at home here now and have a new DFTV FAMILY WOOO :)

peace xx

the shawshank redemption

i chose to write about this film because i enjoyed watching this one the most in class.

i had seen the film once properly before and had never truly loved it untill i watched it again in class. i think the reason it was better the second time was that in a group environment together you can get behind characters and feel for characters, on my own i felt the same but had no one backing me up so it was a really good together atmosphere i felt that day in class and i think i enjoyed the film more for this.

The film is very warm and this i feel is due to many factors, morgan freemans voice is very warm in tone and soothing, the colours of the film is subtly positive i feel giving the underlying hope that andy has through out the film , his goal in the film is to escape to a life near the mexican Pacific ocean ,

"They say it has no memory. That's where I want to live the rest of my life. A warm place with no memory"

even in this quote you can tell that this is not your average dreary prison movie which depresses and leaves you a little deflated, this movie is an uplifter , a joy bringer :) i think i can say this in confidence as well . the scene which i feel is the best example of this is the one were andy turns on the classical music over the tannoid , he knows that the rare piece of joy would be enough to bring some raw human emotions: hope and happiness to the me in the prison grounds, they could be free men in there emotions for that short period of time, even the theme of the movie shows this

" hope can set you free, salvation lies within."

i guess thats going to give you a good feeling no matter what, but its not really what in my opinion makes this film a classic, i feel that the ingredients working together, good acting , lovely cinematography and colours, and most importantly an amazing script. your drawn in from the word go and don't loose concentration until you see the Pacific ocean and end credits! I got into the film in a big way and at no point was thinking that i was watching a film.

i enjoyed this film the most out of the ones we watched as i feel it is the one which made me the most happy :) this is an important asspect in watching a film for me, i would like to see the film again but only with a large group of people because i think that really helped, 8/10

peace xxx

Jenifer’s body blog

A comedy horror? If there is such a thing!

About a beautiful girl who after a slight slip up with her being sacrificed to the devil becomes reliant on eating humans , but at the same time capable of leading her normal life. I have seen this film three times, the first I watched on my computer when I first arrived at the academy, how it was already on line and ready to stream in high definition I do not know , but it was and I watched it.

My first reaction to it was that I was a little scared and a little board. I felt that I needed to see it on a larger screen to get the full scared feeling , the story felt lacking to me on my first viewing and I didn’t really rave about it to anyone. However, there was something pulling me towards the cinema to see it.

So i went along quite excited to see it again after waiting the month and a half for it to come to the cinema, i think the wait had heightened my liking of the film and i went in with high hopes of being scared and for it to be more of a laugh than a boar! Yes , it was more scary – only marginally – at the cinema but i noticed that they panned away from the gore allot and the scares in the film were more suspense driven than gore , which i liked because it took the emphasis away from the horror to focus more on the comedy. I felt that it was more satirical comedy than laugh out loud gags. ( although the sex scene did make me lol )

Named for the Roman satirist, Horace, this type of satire is meant to be playful. It seeks to criticize some vice in society (oftentimes identified as foolish rather than evil) through gentle, mild, and light-hearted humor. Tools employed in this form are wit, exaggeration, and self-deprecating humor. This form is often sympathetic in tone. Horatian satire is far more common in modern society.

I think this explanation does explain the idea behind Jenifer’s Body- on a personal level for me anyway i found myself relating to both Jenifer and Needy the protagonist in the film . They both represent the emotions you feel as a teenage girl and i think that if you take away the “demon” and replace it with “bitch” your half way there to realising Jenifer’s body is just another metaphor for teenage life. Mean girls with a harder sexier edge maybe but still sticking to the Gide lines and following the similar themes which pull the teenage girl audience in ! The fatal flaws is not that she is a demon it is that she is so self loathing that Jenifer feels the need to crush and break everyone around her to make herself feel better, and was there not a girl like her in every school , someone that if you got close to them you would find they were really just as insecure as you were. The opening line of the film is “hell is a teenage girl “ and for anyone who has ever been bullied I think they would agree. or am i looking into this to much ? however, can we not expect there to be some underlying "teen themes" coming from the writer of Juno ?

i must say the film was very simple in plot and the story line like many comedy horror's was very straight forward and predictable - this being i think a comedic thing in itself and it worked really well this way and with the easy to follow story we could get to no the characters allot better .

i think the advertising for this film was some of the best i have seen: it mostly appealed to teenagers yes but this film which if advertised wrongly could probably have flopped completely is drawing in a teenage boy audience and allot of older males as well ! The trailers varied to lend them selves more to the genre of film that was going to be on , for example when i went to see saw they showed the trailer that made it look like a gory, sexy horror and when i went to see zombieland they showed a trailer that made it appear to be hilarious and full on slapstick teenage comedy. All the while reminding the girls that it was the makers of Juno and look another female protagonist you can all relate to . i think this was genius advertising especially and the hype around it seems to be working as everyone was really exited to see it at the cinema this week !

overall i think this film is a really good idea and has really played to its strengths, the acting is that of a teen drama and tat is all it needs to be , the direction is like that of juno and i think that the familiarity is a good link because i enjoyed it a similar amount that i did of Juno . I think three times is enough but to be honest i wouldnt say no if everyone was going to se it again its a good fun movie :) 7/10 peace xx