Participation and Grades

There seems to be some concern over how students gain participation points in Film History.  First of all, as a student in the class you must actually participate in the class.  Arriving late, missing class, or being inattentive does not meet the criteria for participating in class.  However, discussing films and related materials, posting comments on this blog, viewing films without the need to check your cellphones, and being an ACTIVE participant in the class will ensure you of getting your full total of points - and additional help.  Students who have issues with this should see me in person and I will advise you on how to engage in the course more effectively.  Ask yourself the following:  how do you approach the class?  Do you have a commitment to the class or just there to waste time?  Are you engaging in the class or are you disruptive?  If you answer these questions truthfully, I am sure your grade reflects your actual contribution.

Happy Thanksgiving!

The Matrix - Exploring the Nature of Reality

The Matrix (1999)  explores many interesting philosophical questions.  Can we really be sure of our reality?  Maybe we are living in a computer generated dreamworld?  How do we really know we are here?  These questions are a branch of philosophy called scepticism - we can't fully be sure our knowledge is accurate.  As mentioned in a prior post - the French philosopher Rene Descartes traces all our knowledge and thoughts down to one thing - Cogito, ergo sum.  I think, therefore I am.  We can doubt everything except the fact that we are actually thinking right now.  This is twisted in the film The Matrix.  We are being deceived by AI who use us as an energy source.  Descartes also came up with this idea before the Wachowski's, he came up with the idea of an 'Evil Demon' (sort of an evil God) which was deceiving us all the time.  Descartes didn't really think this was true, but it could be a possibility.

A further line of exploration involves the idea that reality is just our experiences, thoughts, and memories.  Our thoughts and memories can be doubted - people with amnesia, or people that use drugs have warped memories.  What about our experiences?  Can our experiences be certain?

Another philosopher George Berkeley (1685-1753) endorsed a view that the only reality we can be sure of is our mental reality - Idealism.  All reality is mental.  For example the color red - what is it exactly?  Doesn't is change in certain lighting conditions?  Isn't it just electromagnetic wavelengths that our brains interpret?  Color is a mental attribute, not part of the physical world.  This is the same for everything else that exists for idealists.  Plato spoke to this with the Allegory of the Cave.  What we see is false projections of the ideal.  

What do you think the film tells us?  How can the film be applied to our lives today?

Blade Runner Assignment

New Blade Runner Assignment:

Use the Evaluating a Film Handout to write a critique on Blade Runner.  Don't just answer the questions - use the handout as a guide to write out your essay.  The length should be 1.5 pages minimum.

This will be due next Monday - 11/25.

Nighthawks at the Diner

The above painting is Edward Hopper's magnum opus: "Nighthawks at the Diner." The painting was an inspiration for the look of Blade Runner.

Scott, a painter himself, repeatedly showed the painting to the film's production designer. 

See the similarities?

Blade Runner: What Does It Mean To Be Human?

Blade Runner - the 1982 film by Ridley Scott -  presents us with many interesting philosophical questions.

  How do we know we are human?  What is a human?  What are our memories and can we trust them?  What is reality?  Can we allow the mistreatment of a minority group?  Should we create  artificial intelligence?  Can we/should we extend our natural life span?  What is the meaning of life?

The film brings these questions to light in a bleak LA of 2019, but reminds one of the overcrowded cities of China with its decay and endless garbage.  Based on Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep the film follows Deckard, a retired law enforcement officer who must track down replicants (human-like androids).  He meets and falls in love with another replicant named Rachael while visiting the Tyrell Corporation.  The renegade replicants are seeking information that will extend their short four year lifespans.  Deckard hunts down and eliminates the replicants except Roy who dies naturally while fighting Deckard.  Rachael and Deckard then run off together.

Since the replicants look and act exactly like humans, they can only be exposed by a variety of questions that seem to focus on empathy.  Apparently the replicants show less empathy than humans, although as depicted in the film this seems reversed in most of the human characters.  Even the violent Roy displays some compassion at the end of the film, while most of the humans are robotic and unfeeling.  The replicants even have memories implanted to make them as the Tyrell Corporation's motto states "more human than human".  With all the similarities between humans and replicants  how do we know we are human, and what exactly does this mean?  If our memories cannot be trusted, how can we trust anything?  The French philosopher Rene Descartes (1596-1650) investigated this same problem and came to the conclusion that everything can be doubted except the fact that he is thinking.  Since we are thinking - at least those reading this - do we exist?  Can we really trust our memories though?  What if they were programmed in like the replicants?  What if we hit our head and we lose them?  If memories cannot be trusted, can anything  ever truly be certain.  What are memories?  Electrical implants?  Don't memories change over time?  Doesn't everything?

The philosophical issues that this film highlights are deep and worth investigating.  As you will see there are many other films that touch on these same issues.

Class Discussion Questions

1)  What if there wasn't a test to expose the replicants - would that mean the replicants are human?

2)  Rachael and Deckard express love for each other despite the fact that they are replicants, since they show love how are they not human? 

3)  Replicants are so human-like that it seems wrong to use them as forced labor.  What would need to be different about the replicants to allow us to use them for forced labor?   

4)  Is there anything that you know that is an absolute certainty?  How so? Explain

5) How is Blade Runner a dystopia?  

6) What are the parallels between Blade Runner and Metropolis?

7) Describe the similarities with German Expressionism

Dystopia & Modern America

Week of 11/12 - 11/15:

Plenty of fun, optimistic, and uplifting films this week!  >>Sorry just the opposite<<

There is a long tradition of contemplating speculative societies that are dehumanizing, frightening, and invasive in print and film.  This week we will examine one of my favorites - Eric Blair, otherwise known as George Orwell.  A man who wrote about anti-fascism, anti-Stalinism and actually fought in the Spanish Civil War against Franco's fascists.

The main focus for Film History this week will be media manipulation, surveillance and the lost of freedom in modern America.  We will examine the juxtaposition of Orwell's 'Doublespeak' and modern news terminology, the rise of the NSA surveillance state (thanks to Edward Snowden's release of classified information) vs freedom, and also examine films that portray these frightening societies.  The first film we just viewed Metropolis - depicts a hierarchical state  which attempts to add a compassionate mediating element in order to moderate the opposing social classes.

Later in the week we will view the film Blade Runner (1982), which depicts a very rainy LA around the year 2019 - only six years from now!

 Your assignment for Film History will be to analyze Blade Runner.  Due next Friday 11/22.  

Address the following:

• Compare modern America to Blade Runner's LA
• Analyze the technology in relation to our own
• What aspects of modern life seems to be moving toward those in the film?
• What is the film's main message? 
• What is the message about technology? How does it relate to Metropolis?

Radiohead, Metropolis, Dystopia, and Frankenstein

The stark and impressive imagery of Fritz Lang's 1927 silent opus, Metropolis, serendipitously syncs with the music of British band, Radiohead. The version of the film we watched yesterday in class was assembled by a graphic designer from Arizona.

He briefly describes the creative process on his film blog, "Electric Shadows":
http://electric-shadows-film.blogspot.com/2010/07/metropolis-radiohead.html

The above link will also allow you to watch the film at home if you so desire! Impress your friends! Convey the important message that the mediator between the head and the hands must always be the heart, an idea that directly correlates to your next assignment.

Metropolis is a film that portrays a terrifying imagined future, or in other words, a dystopia. The word dystopia refers to "an imagined place or state in which everything is unpleasant or bad, typically a totalitarian or environmentally degraded one."

In the 20th century, many writers and directors alike envisioned a future plagued by technology and advancement: worlds in which humanity suffered in the wake of new technological discoveries.

In some ways, this idea can be traced back to Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Life, as created by technology, goes awry, and a demonic monster is birthed by the science of man.

• The same thing happens in Metropolis: Rotwang makes a robot, a "maschinenmensch." Chaos ensues.
• The scientists in 28 Days Later attempt to cure rage. They discover a "rage" virus, and thanks in part to the good intentions of some animal rights' activists, chaos ensues.

Both films explore the negative effects of intermingling nature and science, and ultimately, both films depict dystopias. 

In my mind, both of the aforementioned films can be considered the progeny of Shelley's idea of the "Modern Day Promotheus": Frankenstein's monster.

We will finish our discussion of Frankenstein thusly:

• Watch this succint but thorough summary courtesy of our man, Sparky Sweets.

• Read an excerpt from Stephen King's "Danse Macabre" in which he explores the enduring legacy of Shelley's creation. He attributes the popularity of the monster to the brilliance of the idea and to the now classic film adaptations. I will distribute copies of the essay in class, today.

Your Task:

• Compose a 500+ word essay (3 full, typed pages; double-spaced; size 12 Times New Roman)  in which you explore the creature's continued omnipresence.
• Support your response with 
• specific references to films we have watched in class (or films you have watched on your own),
• references to the plot of Shelley's Frankenstein (the novel itself), 
• and references to Stephen King's essay.

Your completed, typed essay must be turned in by Friday, November 15th.

No complaints, please. After all, I could make you read the novel in its entirety, a novel Stephen King refers to as a "rather slow and talky melodrama."

I agree, Mr. King.

Metropolis: A Solution for Society?

We watched Fritz Lang's Metropolis (1927) on Monday 11/4.  Please be ready to discuss the film and there will be questions on the film for you to answer.  This film was made at the end of the German Expressionist movement - see if you can evaluate the elements of German Expressionism in the film.  Also, what does the film say about society?  Workers? The Elite?  What is the solution for the differences between social classes?

Questions are due tomorrow (11/6)

German Expressionism

German Expressionism was an artistic movement from 1919-1927 which in contrast to realism, attempts to portray emotions.  Huge sets, weird angles, jerky movements and eccentric images are the main aspects of this unique movement first centered in Germany after WW1, but later is exported to America.

The most important films that we will view are:  The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1921),  Metropolis (1927), and a later film M (1931).



Here is The Cabinet of Dr Caligari:

Here  is M: