Instruction
Select ONE essay from two possible prompts: 1) Style as a Formal System, or 2) The Science Fiction Genre.
elect ONE out of two essay prompts above to write a thesis-driven essay with specific examples taken from course examples.
Essays should have a central claim (statement) that you develop through multiple paragraphs with topic sentences (sub-claims) and descriptions of film scenes as evidence for your views.
I) Style as a Formal System: Do the Right Thing (1989)
The four elements of style in a film work together to form a coherent whole, a formal system that structures how audiences should interpret a movie.
Examine Spike Lee’s use of mise-en-scene, cinematography, editing, and sound in Do the Right Thing, and write an essay where you 1) catalog and describe at least one use of each stylistic technique that forms a pattern in the film. Then, 2) interpret those patterns of techniques for the meaning they construct.
In your interpretation, you’ll want to consider how these elements of style comment upon the narrative question of what causes the tragedy of the film’s conclusion. In what way does the film’s use of style contribute to its message of “Love” and “Hate”?
II) The Science Fiction Genre & Gravity (2013)
Alfonso Cuarón's Gravity has been praised by critics such as A. O. Scott or Roger Ebert as rewriting the conventions of the science-fiction film for a new period of the genre: one that centers itself not on cosmic epics (2001, Star Wars, or Avatar) but rather on individual characters and interior emotions (Interstellar, The Martian, Arrival).
Examine Cuarón's use of the conventions and iconography of the science fiction genre, and write an essay in which you 1) catalog and describe at least four genre elements present in the film. Then, 2) evaluate how well the film innovates within the genre to produce something unique to the genre.
Do you agree with film critics who say that the film is significant for its influence upon the contemporary genre? Or, do you critics such as Bill Newcott who complained of the film "yanking us back into a contrived fantasy version of space"? Why or why not?
Here the films to watch
1) Do the Right Thing (1989)
https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/do_the_right_thing
2) Gravity (2013)
https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/gravity_2013