Sound Workshop and Interviews

This was our second workshop and involved us learning how to utilise the sound equipment we would be using to film with – including boom and lapel mics. The importance of sound was also stressed to us, as many people seem to focus upon the purely visual aspect of film-making, however I found this session particular interesting as I have little practical knowledge of sound in film and am eager to learn more about it. We were taken step by step through the process of setting up the equipment and checking levels, before being sent out to record a short scene involving sound. Unfortunately my group and I neglected to pick up vital piece of equipment until the last minute and so had to rush to complete the scene. Hopefully this will be a good lesson for the future. We were then given an assignment to record two interviews – one using the boom and one using the lapel mic, which would be review in our next lesson. Filming the interviews themselves proved to be relatively straight-forward, though our efforts were admittedly undermined by our rather lax approach to planning resulting in a very improvised set-up. By focusing so heavily on sound, we also neglected other elements such as as composition and light, leading to a very dim image as the day wore down. Editing was also made somewhat more difficult due to the fact that we had failed to prepare questions for our subjects ahead of time and therefore failed to create a coherent structure for the interview.

Assignment 5 – Scene Recreation

For this assignment we were tasked with recreating a short scene from a film as closely as possible, down to location, acting, lighting and sound, whilst ensuring the scene is identical in terms of framing,camera positioning, script, shot number/length and scene length. After our first production meeting we settled on the naming scene from Reservoir Dogs and chose our roles. Having already worked as a camera man and director on previous assignments, I settled for sound.

The Crew

Director – Arielle Alverez                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                Producer – Matt Emons                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    Camera Operator – Paulina Janukowicz                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           Sound Operator – Karl Cross

We used Facebook to co-ordinate and plan, as well as cast our actors, which was one of our biggest hurdles, given the number of actor’s in the scene.  During another production meeting, we managed to break the scene down in terms of shots and other requirements such as costume, location, etc. Aside from casting, location would be our biggest pre-production headache as we required a fairly large open space to film in and it was not until our production meeting with David that we were able to secure a spot in one of the television studios. The space was not ideal but with the deadline closing in we decided it was the best possible option. With location handled, we sourced what few costumes we needed through charity shops, as well as asking our actors to wear anything that even vaguely matched their on-screen counterparts.

The Set-up: Getting ready to shoot

We arrived at ten in the morning to begin setting up before our actors arrived, but found that the studio was in somewhat of a state, which set us back by a good half-hour, meaning that by the time our actors started to trickle in, we were still setting up. As boom operator, there was little for me to do at this point aside from helping to set-up the equipment and greet the actors. However, with a little help we were able to get everything ready for our first string of shots, beginning with the close-ups.

Lighting Mr Brown

We used a three-point lighting set-up throughout the shoot and continually adjusted the set-up throughout in an attempt to mimic the lighting in the scene, however this proved to be more difficult than we had initially imagined as the original scene heavily utilises natural light whereas our set was entirely closed off. Adding in our relative inexperience with the lights, we (in my opinion) heavily over-lit our subjects in several shots with a fairly hard light. I believe this may have been because our strongest light was also our fill light, rather than our key light and was quite close to the  subjects in certain shots.  As shooting continued, time began to become an issue. A certain line from Mike Figgis’s  Digital Film-Making  seemed scarily appropriate at that moment; “It’s only the last hour into a four hour shoot that people begin to realise they’re in trouble.” We had just less than an hour left, with still quite a bit to film as well as pack away our equipment. It was only by all pulling together that we were able to quickly run through the last shots.

The Crew (Minus producer)

Post-production proved to be equally fraught with difficulty, largely due to conflicting schedules. Editing was very much a piecemeal process though the fact that we had decided to edit as a group gave us some leeway, as well as the fact that our job was to simply copy pre-existing work, rather than make our own artistic decisions. Below is the finished product, as well as the original scene itself.

Realism- Formalism assessment: The Bicycle Thieves/ Italian Neo-realism

In this essay I will identify and analyse the dominant stylistic approach of the film Bicycle Thieves, as well as its effect on the audience and the overall importance of realism in film as a representation of reality.

Bicycle Thieves was made in 1948 while Italy was still reeling from the effects of the war that gave birth to neo-realism and it was in this year that the movement had reached the height of its power with Roberto Rossellini’s Germania Anno Zero  and Luchino Visconti’s La Terra Treme  also being released that year. It seems natural then that placed within this context, with the neo-realist movement at its zenith  and “with Italy reborn not as a socialist paradise but as a capitalist purgatory beset with massive unemployment.” (Chesire, 2007) that  Bicycle Thieves would become a classic example of Italian neo-realism.

Despite a relatively sizable budget, De Sica clearly opted for a very consciously neo-realist approach to production by shooting on location and using non-professional actors to achieve a certain visual authenticity. Shooting on location provides a mise en scene with a realism all of its own beyond the verisimilitude offered by constructed sets and De Sica’s choice of location is deliberate:  the union hall,  the church, the apartment blocks and the parade of market stalls (1) are all typical working class environments that illustrate in great deal the world that Antonio  must navigate.  Similarly by casting unknown and  non-professional actors, De Sica renders his protagonist (and the rest of the cast by extension) as “at once as perfect and as anonymous and as objective as his bicycle” (Bazin, 1949, p56) and so creates a mirror for his audience, an everyman free of the preconceptions attached to known actors or stars. This neo-realist approach can also be seen in the story itself, written by the notable neo-realist theorist  and proponent Cesare Zavattini, which is at base remarkably simple and direct concerned as it is with the minutia of a single unremarkable event in an ordinary person’s life. It is in this way that the film reveals a social conscience of sorts and a quintessential neo-realist preoccupation with the problems faced by the working class in the face of existing socioeconomic problems. Throughout the film  we are subtly drawn into a world of sharp class divides (witness the scene in the restaurant in which Antonio and his son sit behind a much richer family) and impoverished individuals not unlike the protagonist. This key point is further reinforced by the film’s conclusion in which Antonio is himself reduced to thievery, thus demonstrating how this seemingly individual story plays into the greater narrative of a broken society.

1. The use of these specific locations provides a physical social context for the story.

In terms of  technique the film relies upon simple yet effective methods such as long takes and deep focus that purposefully show us as much of the city and it’s inhabitants as the protagonist himself. It is the use of deep focus that opens the image up and allows for a type of “realistic” vision in which the audience is not directed to observe a specific detail but can allow their eyes to wander over the image. Static camerawork is also heavily utilised to further heighten realism by being as unobtrusive as possible to mask the role of the camera and create a more direct relationship between the audience and the actors on screen.

However there are notable occasions during which the camera deliberately draws the viewer’s attention to certain details through sudden and unexpected movements such as panning away from Antonio completely to follow a street urchin as he begs an  apparently affluent gentleman for money (2).

2) Camera movement is at times used to draw attention to small details that illustrate the desperation of the society the protagonist inhabits.

Camera movement is also used at times to imitate the perspective of a given subject, sacrificing a degree of objectivity in order strengthen the relationship between the audience and the subject. An example of this occurs in the pawnshop as Antonio watches a man deposit his pawned linen on a shelf; the action cuts between Antonio and the man, with the movement of the camera matching Antonio’s gaze.

The editing is function and unobtrusive, aimed mostly at moving the story forward though it is used at times to more expressionistic ends such as the scene in the pawn shop or a sequence later the film as Antonio frantically searches for an old man in a church. During this sequence relatively rapid  cuts are employed to compliment the action on screen and accentuate Antonio’s growing anxiety.

Aside from the visual aspects of the film there is also the matter of the sound. Throughout the film diegetic sound, such as the performers in the music hall or the chattering of the merchants in the market square, is used to compliment the locations and further ground them as authentic physical spaces. However the use of non-diegetic sound seems to disregard the film’s overall dedication to authenticity by relying upon the score in an attempt to artificially heighten the emotional tone of key scenes and thereby manipulate the audience.  This can be most clearly seen in the film’s climax as the score becomes increasingly melodramatic  as Antonio is apprehended after attempting to steal a bicycle and publicly shamed in front of his son.

When examining Italian neo-realism as a whole and its suitability as a vehicle for representing the world, it is impossible not to take note of Andre Bazin’s writing on the subject. Bazin believed that neo-realism represented ” a triumphant evolution of the language of cinema” (Bazin, 1948, p26) however he also recognised that realism “can only be achieved in one way-through artifice” (Bazin, 1948, p26).  Despite this Bazin’s views on realism largely seem to rely upon restrictive ideals that overlook the practical nature of film and the essential impossibility of completely separating the subjectivity of the filmmaker from the film itself.  Even with the use of long takes, a static camera and deep focus, a camera is by it’s nature exclusive and must therefore be directed to some degree, requiring the director to interpret reality to a specific end.

This said the use of neo-realism as a stylistic choice works in the case of the Bicycle Thieves in large part due to subject matter of the film.  As the story concerns a simple working class man on a search through a city for a missing bicycle it seems appropriate to use an approach that emphasises the mundane nature of the narrative and the underlying messages concerning the social and economic ills of post-war Italy. The difficulty of Antonio’s search is communicated to the audience through  the indifference of the fractured and stratified society around him. It is by using techniques typical to neo-realist films, mise en scene over montage, deep focus over shallow focus and medium to long shots over close ups,  that De Sica creates this continuous physical and psychological world, a maze not only of architecture but also of people, that exists beyond the protagonist.

References

Bazin, A., 1949. Bicycle Thief. In:  H. Gray, ed.  1972. What is Cinema Volume 2. Berkeley: University of California Press, pp.47-60.

Bazin, A., 1948. An Aesthetic of Reality: Neorealism. In:  H. Gray, ed.  1972. What is Cinema Volume 2. Berkeley: University of California Press, pp.16-40.

Cheshire, G. , Bicycle Thieves: A Passionate Commitment to the Real. 2007. [online] Available at:<http://www.criterion.com/current/posts/467-bicycle-thieves-a-passionate-commitment-to-the-real>  [Accessed 06 January 2012]

Bibliography 

Bazin, A., 1955. The Evolution of the Language of Cinema.  In:  H. Gray, ed.  1968. What is Cinema Volume 1. Berkeley: University of California Press, pp.23-40.

Nowell-Smith, G., Italian Neo-realism. In: P. Cook, ed. 2011. The Cinema Book. London: Palgrave Macmillan, pp.233-237. 

Zavattini, C., 1953. Some Ideas on Cinema. [pdf] Available at:  <http://filepedia.org/files/Cesare%20Zavattini%20-%20Some%20Ideas%20on%20the%20Cinema.pdf>  [Accessed 04  January 2012]

Comedy

For this week’s seminar we studied comedy and how to differs in relation to tragedy. Where as tragedy is concerned with separation, comedy revolves around the integration of society and positive change. Old Greek Comedy, exemplified by the work of comic playwright Aristophanes, used the absurd and the surreal to mock the proud and important (most notably Socrates in The Clouds), as well the institutions around him. His heroes, and their struggles, were larger than life and took often took place on a grand scale such as The Birds  or Lysistrata. His protagonists, through means either sensible or ludicrous, sought to establish new societies in the face of great opposition and would ultimately triumph, despite their often ridiculous methods.  This is a common theme in Old Comedy. Old Comedy also mirrored tragedy in certain regards, such as catharsis; ” “We notice that just as there is a catharsis of pity and fear in tragedy, so there is a catharsis of the corresponding comic emotions, which are sympathy and ridicule, in Old Comedy” (Northrop Frye – The Educated Imagination and Other Writings).

Over time however, New Greek Comedy was born. Unlike Old Comedy, New Comedy was notably more down to earth and realistic, focusing on more mundane plots relevant to the “every man”, as can be best seen in the work of Menander. Menander’s work primarily derived humour from ordinary human relationships and common character flaws. To this end he employed basic stock characters such as the Senex Iratus (bad tempered old man/father figure) Miles Gloriousus (the boasting soldier/arrogant rival) and the Dolosus Servus  (the cunning slave).

As part of our work on comedy we were asked to adapt the play Aulularia  (The Pot of Gold) by the Roman playwright Titus Maccius Plautus and provide a summary approximately one page long.

Aulularia

Euclio /Eugene Inverlair – old man/former mi6 agent who has a microfilm containing incredibly valuable and confidential information from his professional days.

Phaedria /Prudence Inverlair- Eugene’s pregnant daughter

Lyconides /Luke Philby – Prudence’s secret fiancée and a current mi5 agent

Strobilus/Steven Fleming – Luke’s friend and low-level mi5 employee

Megadorus /Mervyn Philby – Luke’s father,  former mi5 agent and current business mogul.

Location: Burford, Oxfordshire

Having long since retired from life as a professional spy, former MI6 agent Eugene Inverlair lives a quiet life in Burford with his longsuffering  and currently pregnant daughter Prudence. Among his many souvenirs left over from his career, Eugene jealously guards an old microfilm that contains highly confidential information that he purposely retained to guard against any attempt against his life by his former employers.  Government agents, eager to reclaim the microfilm and keep news of the situation spreading, quietly urge Mervyn Philby, a former mi5 agent, business mogul and old friend of Eugene’s, to  quietly. obtain the film. Unable to otherwise convince the paranoid Eugene part with the microfilm, Mervyn tasks his nephew Luke, a current MI5 agent to retrieve the footage by any means necessary, barring violence.

Unbeknownst to his uncle or Eugene however, Luke is the father of Prudence’s child and is understandably uneasy with the situation. Luke visits Eugene in the hopes of searching the house but is quickly found out and inadvertently confesses his relationship with Prudence. Eugene, now more paranoid than ever, forces Luke out and forbids him to return.  Prudence is infuriated when she discovers that Luke revealed their relationship to her father and cuts off contact with him. Exasperated, Luke relates the story to Steven Fleming, his friend and junior agent. With no viable solution in sight,  Luke coerces Steven into accompanying him  in order to  break-in to Eugene’s home and steal the microfilm. Steven complains but in the end reluctantly acquiesces when Luke pulls rank. When the break-in goes wrong, Luke and Steven are forced to flee as Eugene searches the house with a double-barrelled shotgun. When they return the next day, they find the area swarming with police. Despondent, Luke tells Steven he will tell his uncle that he cannot retrieve the film and hints that he will shift the blame onto Steven.

Fed-up with the entire situation, Steven concocts a plan to steal the microfilm. Posing as a police officer, he gains access to the house and secretly explains the situation to Prudence, who agrees to create a distraction so that Steven may obtain the microfilm. Steven then later visits Eugene minus his disguise and introduces himself as Luke’s intermediary. He returns the microfilm on the condition that Eugene forgives Luke and agrees to allow him to marry Prudence. Eugene agrees. Unaware of these developments, Luke then arrives having been earlier called by Steven. Much to his surprise, he finds himself welcomed by Eugene, who immediately tells him that he may propose to Prudence. Luke does so at once, thereby prompting Eugene to hand over the microfilm, realising that he no longer needs protection as Luke will be his son in law.

Stylistic Analysis: The Prestige (Dir. Christopher Nolan)

Stylistic Analysis: The Prestige (Dir. Christopher Nolan)

In analysing The Prestige as a whole, one might choose to focus upon the way in which the film is edited and how this in turn reflects and effects the themes and structure of the film, however by focusing upon one scene in particular it is possible to fully appreciate film’s very exacting and effective use of mise-en-scene and cinematography to subtly reveal detail, build narrative and physically ground the story in a particular time and place.  The scene I have therefore chosen to analyse is that of the film’s opening which cuts between two points in the film’s narrative to set the stage, as it were, for what is to come and is in itself a magic trick, revealing to us the entire scope of the film in less than three minutes.

in terms of setting the scene explores three main spaces; the ingenieur’s  well-lit  studio, the stage/house of the theatre and the back stage, mirroring the threefold structure that runs throughout the film. By cutting between these specific settings the film indicates to us that this is set around the turn of the century but more importantly it takes use to the very heart of one of the film’s major themes; that of duality. The stage itself, though dark, is still fairly well lit and contains far more colour than that of the second image, which is dimly lit by a hazy, almost chiaroscuro light that compliments and enhances the earthy tones of the backstage. This would suggest that these settings are purposefully juxtaposed to subtly alert us to this idea of separate realities ; the vast grandeur and wonder of the stage as the magician works his magic and the drab mechanical reality that lies beneath the stage. One key aspect of the set design is the bizarre machine that occupies most of the stage and acts as but one piece of the puzzle that makes up the entire narrative; presented with the mystery of this machine the viewer is thereby drawn further into the film. Backstage however, the viewer is offered a further clue in a POV shot that reveals a large glass tank set beneath the machine, which heightens the already pre-existing tension. Put simply, due to their proximity (both physically and in terms of editing) we want to know what these objects mean and how they relate to each other in the larger context of the narrative. The machine serves another function however, emblematic as it is of another of the film’s themes, namely that of obsession. It represents the obsessions that haunt not only the protagonists throughout the film, but secondary characters as well, such as its creator Telsa.  The space is also used to differentiate the settings; the size of the theatre is emphasised early on, creating a sense of distance and alienation around Angier – through the use of spacing he is presented as every bit the aloof showman.

The space that Borden occupies for the majority of the scene however is closed in and filled with bits of machinery, support beams and other background details that help the viewer to relate this set to that of the stage though it could be argued this also ties into his character; throughout the film Borden is shown to be brilliant but practical and dull in his approach to magic, what he possesses in technical skill he lacks in showmanship.

It is important to note that the lighting in both of these settings differs greatly to the first (that of the ingenieur’s studio) which is brightly lit by what appears to be soft natural light alone, resulting in a brighter image and a less sinister tone overall. By choosing to light the set in this way, Nolan very neatly separates it from the stage and backstage sets on a purely visual level.  The lighting in the theatre however is designed specifically to create a ense of foreboding and mystery, as well as an almost supernatural tone as a result of the contrast between the generally gloomy lighting that runs throughout the scene and the sudden flashes of hard blue light cast by the machine on stage. Furthermore, the lighting also helps to further place the film in time through the use of gas lamps backstage (fire being another natural light source).

As one would expect for a period drama, the costumes worn by the various characters are all appropriate not only to the time, but to their specific function in the scene; Angier is dressed smartly as the stereotypical magician in a black suit complete with coattails (5) and so the viewer’s attention is instantly drawn to him when he appears, where as Borden’s clothing is dark and inconspicuous, allowing him to appear as just another audience member, though it is by creeping off backstage and removing his beard we realise that something is afoot. The characters in the studio however are dressed in much brighter clothing;  Cutter wears his clothing open,

with his sleeves rolled up and this illustrates how relatively at ease he is, particularly when compared to Angier and Borden. Interestingly, Cutter’s costume also features a red scarf that acts a contrast to his otherwise plain clothing and this same splash of colour appears as the inner lining in Angier’s coat, perhaps hinting at the close relationship that exists between both characters throughout the rest of the film.

Of paramount importance is the performance of the actors themselves as this scene features little to no dialogue and in terms of sound, is guided almost completely by Cutter’s voiceover.  Their performances of both actors in this scene are extremely physical; it is through their movements, expressions and body language that we understand what is happening. We know instinctively that when Borden darts offstage and protests that he is part of the act that he is acting deceptively. In technical terms, both Jackman and Bale keep their performances in the middle range and act “realistically” though the scene is too brief for their characters to be fleshed out to any great degree.

Cinematography plays a key role in setting the pace and style of the film. Despite being set in the past, the film feels and looks (in terms of camerawork) distinctly modern at times and this can be put down to the use of handheld cameras –  “We shot most of the movie with a handheld camera, and designed settings that didn’t tie the actors down to hitting marks.” (Christopher Nolan; A Conversation with Christopher Nolan by Bob Fisher; OnFilm). By utilising handheld cameras, Nolan is able to keep the motion fluid and loose, whilst also gaining a greater flexibility when shooting. This scene however seems to feature both handheld and more fixed camerawork, particularly during the stages sequences – an excellent example of which would be the long shots of the stage during which the camera and performs a smooth pedestal motion; upwards when we are first introduced to the theatre as a whole and later downwards, after Angier as fallen below stage. By moving the camera this way, the audience’s attention is either focused or shifted to where it is needed.

Assignment 4 – Lighting

This brief for this assignment was:

“In groups of 4, create a one-shot interior scene in which two characters interact without speaking.

Shoot the scene 2 times: once creating a ‘natural’ look making use of daylight, and the second time using only tungsten lights. The locations of the two scenes need not be the same, although the action must be the same (the actors, however, can be different in each scene).”

Though we managed to meet the brief and complete the project, this assignment proved to be far more difficult than I had initially expected. Our first big hurdle came as a result of scheduling conflicts and the difficulty of finding a suitable interior location. As de facto director, I coordinated with the group’s producer (Anne Martine Myking) who was able to secure a suitable and convenient location for our shoot. With a definite location in mind I was able to come up with an idea I thought might be visually interesting if filmed correctly.

Our initial plan involved shooting in two locations, a common room at Usher Hall and the atrium in the Grove. We arrived in the morning and commerced shooting our first scene in the atrium as allowed us to make excellent use of daylight. As my group and I had missed the previous lesson in which the lighting induction was undertaken, we were unfamiliar with the equipment however I had volunteered to help out another group in order so that they might return the favour and briefly run us through how to use the lighting kit. Despite this there was still a certain reluctance among the group about handling the lighting kit and camera, no doubt as a result of unfamiliarity with the equipment.

Shooting at Usher Hall: High angle and natural light. 

Though in theory I was familiar with the three-point lighting set up I had never had to deal with it practically meaning that my initial idea (involving 180° pan) didn’t quite work as my movement with the camera played havoc with the lighting. However after some discussion I decide to instead film from a high angle whilst slowly zooming out and tilting upwards so that I could still capture the same level of detail whilst also keeping the shot visually interesting.

After relocating to Usher Hall  to film the second scene we suffered another potentially disastrous setback as the SD card we were using experienced some kind of technical problem and all data was lost – including the scene we had filmed in the atrium. As time was pressing and the brief didn’t require two locations, we decided to simply film both shots at Usher Hall.

Despite the numerous problems that plagued this project I am satisfied with the finished piece and have gained a vital insight into the practical realities of filming using artificial lighting.

Legendary Characters: Presentations and Pitches.

For this lesson we were put into group and assigned legendary characters to research and analyse in order to give a twelve minute presentation and pitch an idea for a contemporary film based on said character. My group (Adam Amini, Anne Martine Myking and Leo White) was assigned Don Juan, the fictional Spanish libertine who originated in The Trickster of Seville and the Stone Guest by Gabriel Tellez.

We each chose a certain aspect of the character to study and present to the class. I opted to research the major artistic representations of Don Juan and acted as overall co-ordinator for my group – gathering the information my group had researched and assembling it into a presentation, as well as keeping track of everyone’s progress. Though it was difficult for us to arrange meetings due to various complicating factors (conflicting schedules, illness, etc), we managed to communicate effectively online. As a whole I feel that my colleagues and I worked well, though doubtlessly our presentation would have been improved if we had been able to rehearse it in advance.  I also feel that I could have supported my group better and encouraged them more in their efforts to research.

We came up with our pitch by looking over our research and piecing together common elements found in the  various representations of Don Juan and then looking for a way to create a story suitable for modern audiences, which we did by neatly updating the character of Don Juan to reflect changing social norms.We created a character who, like many young men in modern society, struggles with his masculinity and has difficulty with romantic and/or intimate situations.

The original pitch developed by my group;

Meet Don Johnson; a high-flying advertising executive with a reputation as a “Don Juan”, however unbeknownst to his friends and colleagues, Don is useless with woman and even worse when it comes to holding down relationships. Though unhappy, Don muddles through life until one day he meets Darcie Annsworth – the daughter of his boss and falls in love with her. Though she also falls for Don, her father (who was previously good friends with Don) disapproves and is determined to prove that Don is an untrustworthy womaniser.

Don must then desperately maintain his facade whilst simultaneously maintaining his relationship with Darcie. Things come to a head when Don is publicly denounced by his boss with “evidence” of his womanising tendencies and fired. Realising that he must reveal the truth about his reputation to win the love of his life and his job back, Don stages a dramatic scene by sneaking back into his workplace and telling everyone the truth. Darcie’s father apologies to Don and endorses their relationship . Don then proposes to Darcie, who happily accepts.

Once in class we gave our presentation and listened to the other presentations, taking notes so that we could then judge each presentation and pitch. In the end I voted for the Sir Percival group as I found their adaptation of the original character to be the most plausible and interesting.

The second part of the assignment, to be conducted out of class, was to write a short critical account of our research (included within this post) and pitch for our presentation, as well as further develop our pitches individually to tell a more “personal” story. I opted for a complete reversal of my group’s fairly light-hearted romantic comedy and developed a story more along the lines of a black comedy which could be easily surmised with the line “Don Juan meets his match.” I went down this route as I felt it might be potentially interesting to not only take the character back to his roots as a remorseless and hedonistic psychopath, but to then create a female antagonist who is perfectly capable of defending herself from the protagonist, as well as outwitting him. The moral of the original story is also subverted; Don and Darcie are rewarded rather than punished for their reprehensible actions while the only good characters in the story (Darcie’s father and Detective Lonnrot) suffer undeserved deaths. This is the essence of comedy – “Comedy aims at representing men as worse, Tragedy as better than in actual life.”

My own interpretation:

Meet Don Johnson; a high-flying advertising executive working at one of London’s most successful ad agencies with a reputation as a “Don Juan”, however unbeknownst to his friends and colleagues, Don is in fact a psychopath who delights in ruining the life of any woman that catches his eye. Forever unsatisfied with the ease with which he is able to seduce women, Don finds his match in the equally ruthless and manipulative Darcie Jacobs – his fellow colleague and the boss’s spoiled daughter. Determined to prove his superiority, Don attempts to woo the ice-cold Darcie only to find himself being strung along. Furious, Don realises that he has, against all odds, fallen in love with Darcie. (The inciting incident and also, I suppose, an example of anagnorisis, as Don makes a critical realisation concerning his own feelings)

Willing to stop at nothing to win her heart or bend her completely to his will, Don launches a campaign of psychological warfare that culminates with Darcie burning down his apartment while Don, in response, murders her father and plants the corpse in her car, before alerting the police. Unable to go through with it however, Don aids Darcie in staging an accident to make the death look like a suicide in order to throw suspicion off of her. Detective Marlow Lonnrot (in this plot twist, the true antagonist is revealed)  however believes that something more is going on and refuses to let the case rest, thus beginning a game of cat and mouse as he tirelessly works to prove that they are behind the apparent “suicide”.

Realising that the detective is close to the truth, Don and Darcie resolve to work together to kill him. In a tender moment as they complete their task and dump the corpse off of a cliff, they confess their mutual love and respect for each other. Furthermore, with her father now dead, Darcie has inherited his fortune as well as the agency itself. Don proposes on the spot and Darcie gleefully accepts.

Tragedy

In this week’s seminar we began to discuss the four categories or genres; comedy , tragedy, satire and romance, though the main focus of the lesson was tragedy. A lot of  what was discussed was based upon Aristotle’s  Poetics as well as the work of literary critic and theorist, Northrop Frye and the philosopher Nietzsche.

According to Frye there are two basic categories; the comedic – comedy and romance (positive change, integration) and tragic – tragedy and satire (negative change, separation), all of which are aligned with specific seasons (as illustrated in the image above). Tragedy corresponds with autumn as it is the season of decline; inevitable and necessary, yet cruel. The world continues regardless of what has been lost. This is, broadly speaking, the key point of tragedy; people make mistakes for which they undeservedly suffer and often die, yet the world will go on. This is idea is best summed up by a painting we were asked to study in class (below) in order to decide which category it belonged to. It was my opinion (and that of the person with whom I had discussed the painting) that it was a tragedy, though our reasoning was based purely upon the overall aesthetic of the painting; the somewhat washed-out and cold colours, the great foreboding expanse of water that dominates the picture and the mostly gloomy backdrop of the sky. What we (and most of the class) failed to pick up on however, was the figure disappearing into the water in the lower right corner of the painting. Like the figures in the painting, we completely ignored the painting’s most important subject; the fall of Icarus.  We were also directed to Musée des Beaux Arts,  a poem by W. H. Auden discusses the painting and reflects upon the nature of tragedy.

“In Breughel’s Icarus, for instance: how everything turns away 
Quite leisurely from the disaster; the ploughman may 
Have heard the splash, the forsaken cry, 
But for him it was not an important failure; the sun shone ” 

Landscape with the Fall of Icarus – Pieter Bruegel (1558)

We also explored some of the ideas raised in Aristotle’s Poetics in regards to tragedy and it’s structure, some key terms of which I have elaborated on below. Aristotle held that a true tragic hero must meet a certain criteria;

• The protagonist must be essentially good or virtuous.
• The protagonist must be noble or otherwise above the common man, thereby emphasising the tragedy of his fall.
• Possessed of a “tragic flaw” or commit a tragic mistake that leads to a largely undeserved yet inevitable downfall.

Follow this criteria we can note many tragic heroes through history from Oedipus to Hamlet, though more modern examples do exist. One example of a modern tragic hero would be Charles Foster Kane. Kane, while essentially good and most certainly “above the common man” if only by virtue of his impressive fortune, is ultimately undone by his harmartia, which in this case is Kane’s need to be loved and his complete inability to love anyone on anything other than his own terms. Over the course of the film we are shown how this hunger for love ultimately destroys Kane from the inside out. When he cannot find the love he desires within his marriage he steps outside of it; first to the political arena and then to the arms of another woman. By the end of his life, Kane is alone, save for his servants and possessions.

We also looked at Nietzsche’s views of tragedy outlined in his book The Birth of Tragedy, in which Nietzsche outlines the struggle between the Apollonian (order, individuality) and the Dionysian (chaos, unity) that weighs upon the tragic hero who, by his nature, rises above the common man and  is doomed to be destroyed because of it.

Key Terms

Mimesis: Mimesis means imitation and refers to Aristotle’s assertion that plays/stories should contain some degree of realistic imitation in order that the audience may identify with the characters and their experiences. 

Catharsis: In drama, catharsis relates to the release of energy as a play/story reaches it’s conclusion, it is an emotional purging/cleansing experienced by the characters or the audience. In contrast to Plato, Aristotle believed that plays and poetry were important to help people control their emotions by providing them an outlet. 

Peripeteia: A turning point or the reversal of fortunes. Peripeteia refers to the stage in a play/story when a great change (both internal and external) occurs, marking the tragic hero’s decline towards doom. 

Anagnorisis: Anagnorisis means “moment of recognition” and refers to a critical discovery made by the hero, either by way of insight into their own nature/character, someone else’s or the the world around them. An example of this can be found in Oedipus Rex  wherein Oedipus comes to the realization that he has murdered his father and slept with his mother. 

Hamartia: The true meaning of this term is still hotly debated with some claiming it means simply  “error or frailty” that the tragic hero makes whilst others hold that it refers to a “tragic flaw” inherent in the tragic hero’s character such as pride. For example, Hamlet’s indecision, his inability to take action leads to his decline into madness and his eventual downfall. A more contemporary example of hamartia can be found in the character of Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader in Star Wars; Anakin’s fear of losing his loved ones leads to him taking action that in turn leads to the fall of the Jedi,  the death of his wife, and his own horrific disfigurement. 

Part of our work on tragedy involved discussing the issues involved on UniHub. Here is my contribution:

“Tragedy, in Nietzsche’s reading, suggests that the fate of a tragic protagonist is unavoidable. Do you think that certain people are doomed from the cradle, or are tragedies avoidable given the right action and circumstances?”

Within the literary or cinematic framework of a book or film respectively, Nietzsche’s ideas hold true, however when it comes to the real world these questions are far harder to answer and depend almost entirely upon the individual’s world view. As an atheist and somewhat of an absurdist, I do not believe in fate or a predetermined destiny. No one is doomed from the cradle, however it is possible that some people, through the choices they make in life and the personalities they develop, may set themselves on a seemingly inevitable path towards doom.

“Does the classical definition of tragedy have meaning for us today?”

The classical definition of tragedy has little meaning for most people these days outside of academia. While the original meaning is still important in terms of analyse and criticism, it has been diluted over time and now means, to most people, “a disastrous event, usually involving death”.

“Can society reach a place where people, if they choose to and with the right help, will not suffer?”

No. Suffering is a natural and necessary part of life.