Creating Your Viewing Guide

Today, you watch and take notes on your chosen film, with the end goal of creating a viewing guide for you film. At this point, we've gone over what to take notes on and how to craft questions. REMEMBER: This is the first part of your final! 

FORMATTING

The viewing guide should be easy to read/follow, typed, and have appropriate grammar. The questions should be chronological, and you should include the following at the start:
Name: ____________
Name of Film (year released)
Directed by
List major characters

The construction of this viewing guide should attempt to show your knowledge in analyzing this film. If you simply ask plot questions or make simple charts, this will not get accomplished. The guide should demonstrate a healthy knowledge of film and this film in particular.

HERE and HERE are two exemplars of a student-created viewing guide for Jaws.

Jaws/Creating a Viewing Guide

Creating your own viewing guide: CRAFTING QUESTIONS

• After you complete your note taking, you are ready to create a viewing guide. viewing guide questions point to and ask about specific scenes, characters, camerawork, music, editing, lighting, etc. These are not plot questions! Appropriate questions to ask are questions like "why did the director make this choice?" and "what effect does this choice have on the viewer?"
• For Jaws, let's do this together.

Your Final: Choose your own film to bring in, watch it, take notes, and then create your own viewing guide. Look and study the viewing guides I have created and given you the past quarter—they are a great model.

• Use charts, fill-ins, questions, scene breakdowns, etc.
• Ask questions that guide someone to break down scenes or the film
• Ask questions that refer to why a director made a certain choice or how it affects the audience
• Address a variety of film concepts-Focus on lighting, editing, camera angles, sound, camera movement, etc. USE YOUR FILM TERMS.

Fun/other stuff concerning Jaws:

• Great analysis of Jaws from Empire Magazine
• What if Jaws was a romance?
• Jaws re-enacted by bunnies...in 30 seconds

Jaws/Final/Create-own-viewing guide

For this film, we will be doing things a bit differently. At this point in the quarter, you should be more acquainted with looking at a film critically, and noticing certain things that a director does to affect the viewer. The aim of a viewing guide is to force the viewer to look critically and thoughtfully at what is on the screen. 

The first part of your final is to create your own viewing guide. We will watch Jaws and use that film as a model of exactly how to create your own viewing guide-- 

First step: TAKE NOTES
What do you take notes on? Take notes on things you notice: mise en scene (composition), music, camera movement, editing, colors used, etc. I find it best to take notes by first noting what the scene is, then what it is I notice, and then finally (after viewing the film and re-watching the scenes) why I noticed it/what I think it means (what the director’s point is).

Noir

• Powerpoint synopsis of the first hour of LA Confidential...
• Notes on the noir elements found in both Double Indemnity and LA Confidential

Film Noir-LA Confidential

There was a time that the label ‘noir’ could legitimately be applied only to a specific cycle of post-World War II Hollywood films. In recent years, however, there has been increasing acceptance of a much more flexible use of the term –both to draw in pre-World War II examples and, more importantly, to expand the category sufficiently to include the phenomenon of “Neo-Noir.”

This widening of the term, of course, complicates one of the questions that critics continue to debate. That is, what kind of classification is 'noir'? Is it a visual style, a tone, a genre, a generic field, a movement, a cycle, a series - or just a helpful category? Rather, it is a ‘network of ideas’ that can be borrowed from and played with. Therefore, a “Neo-Noir” is a film that harkens back to the original genre, but also re-invents itself for more modern sensibilities.

The transformations of the genre in Neo-Noir have helped to clarify some of the constant, recognizable elements of 'the noir vision', most importantly the moral ambivalence of the protagonist and his (or her) ill-fated relationship with a wider society that itself is guilty of corruption and criminality.

L.A. Confidential is one such film.

Film Noir

Film Noir was born out of the post-war disillusionment of World War II, and involves hard-boiled detectives, femme fatales, and gritty, urban settings. Here are some notes.

In this unit, we will watch two films: Billy Wilder's classic Double Indemnity, and then Curtis Hanson's LA Confidential, which is a terrific example of how the genre has evolved for contemporary audiences.

We will compare the two films using this sheet. In the meantime, check out this article on defining the genre, as well as a montage of film noir images to get you into the mindset of the genre.

The Shining Analysis

As we continue our study of The Shining, and going through the viewing guide, we'll also be watching, reading, and discussing some interesting and compelling analyses. There are hundreds of theories and and ideas about what the film truly means, and we'll sift through them and discuss their validity. There's a neat documentary, Room 237, that showcases a few of these crazy analyses--like The Shining is actually about the moon landing being staged by Kubrick, or the film being about the US Government's genocide of Native Americans. Sounds crazy, right? Interesting ideas...and fun!
Also...

• What if The Shining was a romantic comedy?
• Or re-enacted by bunnies in 30-seconds?
• Or spoofed in the Simpsons?

The Shining

"Masterpiece of Modern Horror"

Typewriter from The Shining' Stanley Kubrick exhibit at EYE Filminstitut Netherlands, AmsterdamMarcel Oosterwijk from Amsterdam, The Netherlands - All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy (The Shining)

Stanley Kubrick's The Shining is not only one of the scariest films of all time, but also a prime example of what is meant by "Kubrickian." As we watch this film, we'll look at how tension and fear are built, as well as what makes Kubrick...Kubrick.

Check out some full notes on the film, which is based on a Stephen King novel of the same name. The viewing guide is comprehensive...Stay focused!

Just to give you an idea of where we are headed, your assessment of this unit will be an essay, so really pay attention to film techniques, and how these aid in the themes of the film--isolation, madness, alcoholism, abuse...