The style of Wes Anderson

The style of Wes Anderson

Wensley Wales “Wes” Anderson is a curious American director and screenwriter. Given the fact that he was born and raised in Texas, one would think his movies (which are either war or western movies) are loaded heavily strong American patriotism. This could not be more wrong. Wes Anderson (or at least his movies) are nothing like any other popular American movie. This is because Anderson himself is not a typical American man, and, actually, not a typical 21st century director.

Anderson has an incredibly distinctive filmmaking style. If someone sees a movie from him, that person person will recognise every other Anderson movie later. His style is not restricted to visualities, sound, or the narrative: it is recognizable in every aspect of his movies.

The first and most important thing of Anderson’s filmmaking is probably that he loves the past. This is obvious when one takes a look at his movies. If the setting itself is not explicitly in the past (like that of the Grand Budapest Hotel (GBH) or Moonrise Kingdom) all of his movies seem to be set quite some time before they are watched. Also, Anderson often makes his characters voice longing for the past.

His love of the past, however, is traceable in other aspects or techniques. For instance, he often utilizes oldschool camera movements. He is particularly fond of moving the camera on a rail and following running characters. During these cuts, the camera does not turn or zooms, it is both static and dynamic this way. The audience is able to follow the events but is not “drawn” into the movie: they are only spectators. Another things Anderson often does is to have a camera in a static position, focusing on something unmoving (like a dialogue) and then make a swift 90 degrees turn to the sides and possibly zoom in. Again, this strengthens the feeling of spectating.

However, the camera movements are not the only elements in his visual style. After watching a few scenes from an Anderson movie the viewer will realize that Anderson is probably obsessed with symmetry. Basically all of his sets and backgrounds are symmetrical. Moreover, the backgrounds usually make up some pattern (for example, the trees behind the Grand Budapest Hotel or the arrangements of furnitures in a room). Altogether, these two gives his movies the feeling that they are set in a dollhouse. Yes, in an old, antique dollhouse.

The last technical feature of Anderson is the music and soundtrack of his movies. It should not be a surprise by now that (with the exception of GBH) that the soundtrack of his movies is mostly provided by a band from the fifties and sixties. For example, The Kinks was used for The Darjeeling Limited, David Bowie for The Life Aquatic, or Hank Williams for  Moonrise Kingdom.

Moving from the technical curiosities come the themes and motifs. The most important one is the family. Most of his movie's’ plot revolves around some family matters. At the end of his movies, the members are able to make up their minds and reconcile with each other. Needless to say that the importance of family is again something that comes from the love of the past. Family, of course, is always important, but it always see less so nowadays.

Lastly there is nor more thing. Anderson has favourite actors and makes his movies with a relatively small amount of them. The recurring actors, of course, do not really has anything to do with Anderson’s nostalgia. Nevertheless they are an important part of his movies and his style. Anderson particularly likes Bill Murray, Owen Wilson, Willem Dafoe,m Kumar Pallana and Jason Schwartzman. All of them appeared at least in 4 of his movies.

Anderson was described as a polite man, who seems to have come from a century before. After looking how he makes his movies, how much he likes the past, the times that are gone, there is not much more to say that his movies are similar to the director. He puts his very self to his movies, all the things he loves and care for.

Review of a Review: Witcher 2

Review of a review: The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings

This is a review of IGN’s The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings review, which was published in 24 May, 2011. The author is Charles Onyett who is a PC Executive Editor at IGN. The intended audience of the review are gamers, especially RPG game fans.

The author approached the game in a different manner than most game reviewers: as IGN has not received early copies, he could not rush the game and present a release-day review. Instead, he played the (actually really long) game alongside with his audience and wrote the review in tiny bits. His idea was that this way he “makes the review process transparent”. Additionally, this way he could show the audience his first impressions more accurately.

The main topics of the review are mostly related to the gameplay rather than to the plot. Thus, he mostly analyses and introduces the combat system, performance, visuals, in-game activities (such as crafting and magic) and briefly speaks about the tone and accessibility of the world and even more briefly about the plot. He states that the combat is difficult and takes time to get used to it, and remains challenging throughout the game. The graphics is beautiful but it comes with great cost: the game is really performance hungry. He describes the in-game activities as things that either helps the player in beating the game or just help the immersion into the game. When coming to the plot, he does everything to avoid spoilers. He, however, mentions some little events to illustrate how realistic the world of the game is. To support these arguments, he uses screenshots for the game (for graphics, for example) and some short videos (for the combat system).

The style of the review is definitely not academic and sometimes is on the verge of informality. The language he uses is clear and perfectly appropriate for a video game review. The author is familiar with the many termini tehcnicuses of video game journalism. There are no special features in his language. He rarely addresses the reader, but when he does, he uses ‘you’. Other than that, his tone is professional and analytical.

The review itself is clearly organized, with the introduction explaining the special way it was written. It is followed by a short overview of the game, then he brings up the main topics and the arguments for those in separate paragraphs.  The only thing which is unusual is the lack of conclusion at the end. As the review was written while playing the game instead of after finishing it, the author probably thought it is unnecessary to write a conclusion.

To sum up, this is a well written review with well supported arguments. All the things the author mentions are clear and important, there is no redundant information. The only weird thing is the lack of conclusion and final thoughts. Overall, I liked the review but I would have spent less time discussing technical things (such as gameplay etc ) and more on the game itself, that is: atmosphere, story, themes and so on.

Recurring elements in Edgar Wright’s Cornetto Trilogy

The Three Flavours Cornetto Trilogy consisting of three films from three completely different genres.  Shaun of the Dead is a bloody zombie apocalypse film, Hot Fuzz is a typical police action movie set in a mysterious small town, while The World’s End is a catastrophe film with an alien invasion, robots and a heroic quest. These films not only share their director and leading actors – there are a lot of recurring elements, themes and motifs, which connect the three film and make the three different movies into a series.
 

The films were given the name Three Flavours Cornetto Trilogy, before Wright started to make the last one. In an interview the journalist pointed out that the Cornetto ice-cream is a recurring element in his films. It was an inside joke, as Wright cured his hangover in college with Cornetto. He said, that he will make a last film, and the three will be the Three Flavours Cornetto Trilogy just like Kieslowski’s Three Colours Trilogy. Every film is represented with different ice-creams: Shaun of the Dead with the strawberry (red for blood), Hot Fuzz with Original (blue for police), and World’s End with mint-chocolate chip (green for aliens).

The films has the same leading actors, Simon Pegg, and Nick Frost, who previously starred in Spaced together. In the three films, there are several recurring actors, for example Julia Deakin from Spaced, and Martin Freeman and Bill Nighy also played in all of the three films. There are also big Hollywood names and other famous people who only play a small cameo in the films, most of the time in costumes, which makes it hard to notice them, or only appear for seconds. In Shaun of the Dead, Chris Martin, the singer of Coldplay plays a zombie, while in Hot Fuzz Cate Blanchett dressed as a crime scene investigator and Peter Jackson, the director of the Lord of the Rings played a crazy shopping-mall Santa Claus.

In both of the films, the main character is always a piteous man, who just lost his job, his girlfriend or who simply lives in the past, but through the film he becomes the hero and with his friend(s) he saves the town/city/world from crazy retirees, zombies and aliens.

The screenwriters are the director, Edgar Wright and one of the leading actors, Simon Pegg. They have stated several times that they are “notorious film fanboys” (Wired, 2013).  All of the three films are full of film references. They name the sights in their films after great actors and directors (Fulci, Foree, Popwell), Shaun of the Dead is based on two of the greatest zombie apocalypse films (28 Days Later – Boyle, Night of the Living Dead – Romero), and its title is a pun on the title of Dawn of the Dead. In Hot Fuzz they recreated scenes from Bad Boys and Break Point and there are references to other films, such as Monty Python films, Addams Family, Dirty Harry, Die Hard and so on.

All of the films include pub scenes, what is more, The World’s End is about a quest where the main character and his friends are trying to complete the golden mile – they want to visit 12 pubs and drink a pint in each of them. Near the end of the films there is a pub fight in every one of them and there is also a fence scene, where Simon Pegg and Nick Frost are doing a “shortcut” with more or less success.

The interesting, creative character names are also characteristic of the Cornetto films. In Hot Fuzz, the main character’s name, Nick Angel is a homage to a real Nicholas Angel, who is the music supervisor of most of the famous Working Title films, such as Notting Hill, Bridget Jones, and Love Actually. He was also the music supervisor of the Cornetto Trilogy. In the World’s End, the main character’s name is Gary King, who think on the Golden Mile challenge as King Arthur and his knight’s quest. His friends name are Knightley, Prince, Chamberlain and Page.

The last recurring element, which can be noticed in all of the films is the presence of twins. Most of the time they are scary, or even weird and they are on the side of the “bad guys”. In Shaun of the Dead the twins are zombies, in Hot Fuzz they are scary butchers, and in World’s End there are two twin pair: both of them are aliens. The only twins who are not scary or weird are the police officers in Hot Fuzz, but it may be because the other characters do not even notice that they are twins until the end of the film.

To sum up, Edgar Wright succeeded in uniting his films with a lot of recurring actors, elements, themes and motifs. With the same leading actors, the Cornetto, fence and pub scenes, and the average characters who later became heroes and saved the world, he created the same atmosphere and connected the three movies, despite the fact, that they have different storylines and are mocking completely different genres.

References

Crump, A. (2014). ‘The World’s End': Cornetto Trilogy Tie-Ins, References, & Cameos. Retrieved from http://screenrant.com/worlds-end-hot-fuzz-shaun-of-the-dead-easter-eggs-spoilers/

Wired. (2013). The Best Running Gags and Easter Eggs of the World’s End Trilogy. Retrieved from http://www.wired.com/2013/08/cornetto-trilogy-easter-eggs/

Koski, G. & Rabin, N. (2013). Talking over the Cornetto Trilogy. Retrieved from https://thedissolve.com/features/the-conversation/109-why-the-worlds-end-is-the-most-complex-of-the-corn/

Handling Pressure and Agression in Good Will Hunting

         Good Will Hunting is an American drama film from 1997, directed by Gus Van Sant. It is about a genius but problematic boy, Will Hunting (Matt Damon), who does not study but has a great mind, and a professor, Gerald Lambeau (Stellan Skarsgard) starts to support him. Pressure and emotional outbursts are present all through the film; introduced from different point of views, proposing different interpretations in connection with different characters. It would be difficult to decide which one is the correct behaviour and these samples are worth comparing with ordinary, real life situations.

The three main characters’ reactions to difficult situations are very uniquely represented; each of them introduces one of the main ways of handling pressure. Will’s emotional journey is in focus; that is the most aggressive and also the most controversial type. He came from the southern part of Boston, which is the poorer, working-class part of the city and he spends most of his time with his friends. They usually mock each other and others as well, they get into troubles; Will have been already brought to trial several times because of public fights, auto theft or assault. He seems to be uncontrollable and very stubborn. Swear words are used by them in nearly every sentence, especially when they are nervous. Will’s aggression also appears in the slow-motion public fight scene where he brawls with his old enemy, or in the intellectual dispute with the Harvard student, where he saves his friend from shame. There are some scenes in which his acute mischievousness is shown; for example when he meets the psychiatrists. All of them fails to handle Will’s behaviour, except for Sean Maguire (Robin Williams), a college roommate of Professor Lambeau. Will terrorises them mentally, he embarrasses them and that is how he shows his defiance. Finally, Sean characterises him as a kid; he knows everything from books but hasn’t experienced these things so he cannot show his own personality. “I ask you a very simple question and you can’t give a straight answer” – says Sean, revealing that the boy is quite doubtful towards himself. The apex of his overflowing aggression is when he confronts with Skylar, his lover. He also has arguments with the professor and the psychiatrist; but Sean tries to show him how to control his emotions and stress in his life.

Professor Lambeau has a completely different personality: he is calm, confident and he never shouts or swears. When he is angry at someone, he uses sharp cynicism or contempt. He rather fights with words than with tone or acts. He really wants to help Will; he wants him to find a high-quality job and to use his great talent. Sean Maguire’s personality is in between the two previously mentioned characters. He represents the golden mean: he is calm, patient and honest, but he is not afraid to let his voice out or show anger when he feels so. He seems to be funny and immovable but when Will finds his weak point, his wife, he freaks out: “If you ever disrespect my wife again, I will end you” – and jumps to his throat violently. After talking to Will for several weeks, he seems to be very successful in expanding the boy’s comprehension and reducing his aggression. When Lambeau asks him to lead the boy towards high-toned job opportunities, he refuses to do that. “Direction is one thing, manipulation is another.” – he says, highlighting the manipulative attitude of the Professor. After getting to know Will, he realises his own mistakes as well, he has to face that his life was stuck when his wife died, and opens up for moving on.

The three presented ways of dealing with pressure and the difficulties of life are the considered but sharp behaviour of Lambeau, the fierce, aggressive but dishonest behaviour of Will and Sean’s patient and calm personality. Every people are familiar with situations that they cannot solve, they cannot change and which put a great pressure on them. Gus Van Sant’s film shows three possibilities to solve or to let go these negative feelings. The three mentioned characters assimilate, change and form each other; although they lived their life according to their own experiences before. People handle stress differently, and each way of processing pressure and negative experiences have some mistakes and advantages; but for sure, even such great and genius minds as will must be able to control themselves.

Bibliography:

Curtis, Quentin. Robin Williams brings off sharpness and tenderness. 1998, The Telegraph. Web. 03.05.2015

Pierce, Nev. Good Will Hunting. 1998, BBC. Web. 03.05.2015