Gracie's Blog

     There Will Be Blood is a film about Daniel Plainview. The movie follows him through his life, first as a miner and then getting into the oil business. While there are a few missteps, he follows through to the bitter end. Daniel Day-Lewis plays Daniel Plainview. While I knew of him, I never got to investigate his acting techniques and character development. Not only does he prepare for roles, but he also gets into the mindset of that character, even when they are a complex person to act as.     Upon further research, I discovered that Daniel Day-Lewis was heavily prepared for this role. He read a book that described oilfields and used that in his method of acting to bring the character to life. Edward Doheny was someone that he studied. This man was born in 1856 and dedicated his life to the oil tycoon. For the voice, which is not his regular voice, he said he listened to recordings. While there were no recordings during the time this film was set, he liste...

 Batman is one of the most iconic characters in media. Fighting for good, Batman is seen rocking black or grey, stopping crime, and defeating the Joker in Batman from 1989. But does anyone ever ask why and how he became so iconic? Several factors, including what he wears, the gadgets used, and the setting, create the beloved story of Batman as well as his enemy, the Joker. Gotham City, the city of crime is the heart of where good versus evil takes place. From the looks of it, darkness lurks in all corners. Smoke, fog, and debris fill the air. The darkness and eeriness of the setting in Gotham City create a sense of danger. It is the perfect environment for crime to take place in the cover of darkness and fog. The factory where a lot of the violence and fight scenes happen is the perfect environment for a cat-and-mouse chase seen between Batman and the soon-to-be Joker. Every location seems to make perfect sense for a comic book fight or chase.  Batman uses several gadgets to ...

    It Follows is a horror film that was designed to scare it's audience. The story follows a victim that acquired an entity that kills after reaching the victim. Every aspect of the film, from the story to the setting, creates the perfect area to create tension through music and camera focus. Several elements, from the special effects of the makeup, camera work, and music play onto the emotions of the viewer.      The makeup in this film does wonders for the shots of the dead figure. We see several people that portray the monster, or ghost that chases the victim. Most of these figures are unsensored, or different versions of what they would be in real life. Specifically, they had little clothes, heavy bags, or dark eyes. Two figures that stick out are the little boy and the tall man that walks in the bedroom behind the friend. Both have dark eyes and dark makeup that draw the viewer to the eye. This makeup lets the viewer know that this is in fact the entity th...

      Jurassic Park is my first memorable dinosaur experience. Between the characters running for their lives, experimenting with creating them, and adapting to a world where humans and dinosaurs exist, Jurassic Park changed the general public's knowledge of dinosaurs. Through the special effects used, the filmmakers's choices, and the comparison to new movies, this movie changed the film industry.      The special effects used in Jurassic Park worked incredibly well. Dinosaurs are not in existence, sadly, so several techniques were used to make them look as realistic as possible. In some scenes, puppet dinosaur heads or full figures interacted with the actors. One of my favorite scenes was with the Triceratops in the field that was sick. The use of a puppet when Alan is listening to the breathing was incredible.  The movement of the belly moving up and down made the scene intimate. CGI was used to create smooth movement compared to stop-motion as well...

    Memento is a movie to pay attention to. With the flashbacks, color, and montages this was an incredible watch. Christopher Nolan did a great job of portraying and telling the story of Leonard, a man who has had memory issues ever since attempting to protect his wife from invaders. We see him not only try to remember anything he can but also use pictures and notes to live his life. Using black and white versus color pictures, flashes of different memories, and discontinuity make for a great movie.     Several instances in the movie show black and white scenes while the others show scenes in color.  Black and white in this movie represents when time is moving forward. Most of the scenes the viewer sees, with color, are moving backward in time. The backward and forward movement of time seemed to overlap towards the end when Leonard developed a picture showing the viewer that the stories from both had connected. I loved this aspect of the film because I had neve...

      Cinematography is the art of camerawork. Film productions use many different techniques when deciding how they want the film to be interpreted by the viewer. Using a camera, films can limit, expose, frame, and put a perspective on the shot to get the point of the scene across to the viewer. The film mentioned here is set in a world where people have stopped reproducing. There is little faith in humanity until hope is discovered. Children of Men follows one character, uses a handheld camera, and uses natural lighting to produce a story that the viewer feels a part of.       Children of Men is a story that follows Theo attempting to get Kee, the only pregnant woman in the world, to safety. The viewer knows this because he stays in frame mostly from beginning to end. We start by following him out of the shop and end when he dies. Throughout the film, there was some use of pov shots including looking down at a cat and when Kee sees the boat at the en...