Everything Grows; Final Course Essay

By: Blake Voros

How Journey to Italy, Bonnie & Clyde, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, & Avatar, have all represented their genres well, while still growing and evolving over time.

In this essay, I’m going to be talking about how movies have both remained the same since 1965 until now, but have grown as well. I don’t think change is the correct word, because so much has remained the same, but just grown.

 

There is a lot of historical, critical, and textual proof about how films have evolved. I’m going to lay it all here to show the films have and will always be the same, but will continue to grow. The films I watched over the last few weeks have been a beautiful evolution. I’m going to be referring back to my own blog posts, and also a few of my fellow classmates. There will also be trailers, and critical reviews to show the growth in all of these movies.

Key dimension of film

cultural and artistic: Films are an art form with changing styles.

To begin, This picture could be interpreted as primarily art, entertainment, business, or even social. The truth is, beyond anything else, films are an art. Art is meant to be interpreted, just like films. Films are special to different people for different reasons. This is the most important thing I learned from this class. It was nice learning so much about films and what goes into it, but I think the most that comes out of it is interpretation. If a director gets mixed reviews, I think they did a great job, they were able to affect different people in different ways. Films are an art that is meant to be interpreted. They also grow and change as people’s styles grow and change with time.

Some people can believe they are a medium to expose social, political, and cultural struggles, which they are and a great resource for that. But, above any of those things, I strongly believe the first thing a film is, is art. It takes art and creativity to create a film to expose any of those problems.

I’m going to emphasize the key dimension of films being cultural and artistic with changing styles. This fits so well into my personal views of movies.

Film genres and styles change over time, to keep up with humans style constantly changing and evolving. Here are more than four films that show the evolution in film genres and styles changing over time, and how they fit so well with the time they were made! There are critical and primary sources along with textual evidence to support this.

I’ll begin by talking about Journey to Italy.

Here is my blog post about this movie:

http://collaboratex.com/2019/10/journey-italy-deceived-viewers/

My classmate Lauren’s was also helpful for me when making decisions about this film. Here is hers:

http://collaboratex.com/2019/09/journey-italy-journey-indeed/

Here is the first piece of primary historical evidence, which is a movie trailer for Journey to Italy. I felt this was a great start to show an unconventional movie, that fit the style for it’s era.

This film is a great start, because it’s in black and white. This shows how the art of film making alone has evolved, along with the art in technology to create this film.

Here is a piece of textual evidence from Journey to Italy, some dialogue, to show how language evolves with it’s viewers. The dialogue is clearly from 1965:

Katherine Joyce : What did Charles’s cough tell you?

Alex Joyce : That he was a fool.

Katherine Joyce : He was not a fool. He was a poet.

Alex Joyce : What’s the difference?

in 2019, people wouldn’t even care to think of a poet, yet compare one to a fool. This shows how dialog has evolved as well.

I’m next giving the trailer for Bonnie & Clyde. After, I’m going to provide trailers for 2 newer movies, which shows how they have evolved. All these films are true to their genres, whether made in 1965 or 2009, but have evolved to fit the era.

This shows some evolution because the film is now in color. This is only a 2 year difference. I think it’s cool how the art of the film has already evolved, and this is proof by comparing their trailers, great pieces of primary historical evidence.

The textual evidence I’m going to talk about for Bonnie & Clyde is The story line. The story line for a romance or crime film would be much more evolved now compared to 1967. This would be a weak storyline now, and people would only like it because of the history behind Bonnie & Clyde.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1967/10/21/bonnie-and-clyde

This review linked above, is textual evidence because it was written at the time of the movie. Also, she tells the story line very much in depth. A story line review for a movie like this now would have sex, nicer guns, and a lot more mainstream things to keep up with the audience. Art evolves!

Here is my blog post about the movie:

http://collaboratex.com/2019/11/bonnie-clyde-romance-crime/

Comparing horror and action sounded hard, but it came naturally. Here is my blog post for when I compared Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

http://collaboratex.com/2019/11/horror-action-great-genres/

The next trailer is for The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. This is a rough transition from 2 romance movies, but remember, these aren’t supposed to be the same. Looking at only the art here, you can see some growth.

Piece of textual evidence:

I chose this as my textual evidence for this film because it shows the killer, his weapon, and the scenery so well. So much art to be interpreted in it!

Many said back then, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre was made for no reason. This is a huge growth because now, horror movies are extremely common and do well. Another growth, yet this movie is a pretty horrific story line, for 1965 or now, so it has remained the same in that sense.

Critical Resource: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre did well for it’s genre, and critics at the time agreed.

https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-texas-chain-saw-massacre-1974

The next primary historical evidence I’m providing is for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. I am most excited to talk about this one because there is so much growth between this movie and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Some would expect it wouldn’t have so much growth since it’s a foreign film, and Hollywood is the heart of film making. China has a studio equivalent to Hollywood, so don’t underestimate.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, has so much art and beauty to be interpreted.

Here is a critical resource, a review of the movie, confirming it was so good for it’s genre and time.

https://www.metacritic.com/movie/crouching-tiger-hidden-dragon

Here is a textual evidence from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. I chose this because it shows the beauty and art the movie has.

But to be blown away even more, Avatar is saved for last. The art and first impression of this move is amazing, and it shows the growth from 1965.

Even though the art is beautiful, critically it didn’t do the best! How fun is it interpreting such a gorgeous thing, but being disappointed? But not being disappointed by something as lame as a chainsaw fake killing people! How ironic.

I think Avatar has more art in it, than political or cultural views, even though many would disagree. Some could say it was made FOR the cultural or political views, and that’s great! It is such a beautiful art which we need to continue to interpret.

Even though this film was 10 years ago, I can’t think of anything off the top of my head to beat this. The art and beauty is literally out of this world. But, even the most beautiful, best selling art, gets bad reviews!

People and critics were disappointed with Avatar’s weak story line. Here is a critical resource to support this:

https://www.businessinsider.com/i-watched-avatar-for-the-first-time-2016-7

I decided to give two critical resources for this film, because the above one was negative and snooty. This second one gives it more positive light and talks about how it did very well.

https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/movies/story/2019-07-22/james-cameron-is-a-good-sport-about-avengers-endgame-surpassing-his-avatar

I also decided to give a piece of textual evidence for this film, since it’s going to be hard to beat something so well done to the first view of it.

It will be interesting if they make a sequel, how the beauty and art will compare to the first one. Will it be the same, will they over do it and people like the originals, or will they improve the original look and people love it? The art interpretation has no end.

Here is a blog post by a classmate I found helpful:

http://collaboratex.com/2019/11/run-technology-forrest-gump-avatar/

My last blog post I decided to post was the first one ever for the movie of our choice. I am not going into depth about this movie or using it as one of my four, but I thought it was more evidence to help support how movies grow. girl interrupted was filmed in 1999, so it’s kind of smack in the middle of 1965 and now. (Maybe off some, but still)

http://collaboratex.com/2019/09/girl-interrupted-deeper-view/

I hope this shows you how much movies have both stayed the same and change. All of these movies are great for their genre, and have grown over the years. It’s cool seeing all these movies lined up and growing. Art is constantly growing and changing. I’ve seen some crazy art in San Francisco and have thought, “Who would buy that?” I do the same with movies. I’ve not watched movies because they weren’t up my ally, but that doesn’t matter!

If you don’t like Aliens, you will enjoy reviewing an sci fi movie. Even if you don’t like the movie and watching it, interpreting it is the best. And maybe, a movie can actually get you to like that topic or genre. I never thought I’d like a foreign film until watching Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

Art is meant to be interpreted, even if a movie isn’t your cup of tea, that makes it even more fun to interpret. This is something really big I learned from this class.

To say these films have not grown over time is impossible! They have also grown at a pace to please the people who are viewing them at the time, and what is “in” at that time. One could say they have changed and not just grown, but I personally think growing is a much better way to put it.

-Blake