Citizen Kane: Final Project

Citizen Kane








CHECKLIST FOR PLAGIARISM

1) (√) I have not handed in this assignment for any other class.

2) (√) If I reused any information from other papers I have written for other classes, I clearly explain that in the paper.

3) (√) If I used any passages word for word, I put quotations around those words, or used indentation and citation within the text.

4) (√) I have not padded the bibliography. I have used all sources cited in the bibliography in the text of the paper.

5) (√) I have cited in the bibliography only the pages I personally read.

6) (√) I have used direct quotations only in cases where it could not be stated in another way. I cited the source within the paper and in the bibliography.

7) (√ ) I did not so over-use direct quotations that the paper lacks interpretation or originality.

8) (√) I checked yes on steps 1-7 and therefore have been fully transparent about the research and ideas used in my paper.


Name: Hemanshu Agnihotri             Date Dec 17, 2012



Editing Checklist

1. (√) An introductory paragraph clearly introduces the subject. The topic statement is evident within the paragraph. The position taken is clear. If the position is unclear, put a question mark in the margin.

2. (√) The next two paragraphs have a single or main claim. Note each claim in the margin in a 3-4 word phrase. If you can’t identify the claim, put a question mark in the margin. If two or more claims exist, and tend to diverge from a coherent thought, put a question mark in the margin.

3. (√) The same thing holds for the next two paragraphs on the opposite side of the issue.

4. (√) The four paragraphs above all focus on the issue at hand; they do not wander off into irrelevant territory. If any paragraph wanders, put a question mark in the margin

5. (√) The sixth paragraph weighs the conflicting claims from the four paragraphs above and arrives at a conclusion. Why some evidence is more convincing than other evidence is explained. The ensuing conclusion is clearly stated. Circle it. If you can’t find the conclusion, put a question mark in the margin.

6. (√) The final paragraph returns to what was stated in the first paragraph and, in light of the evidence presented and weighed above, convincingly rephrases the position statement. If the conclusion expected by the assignment is to be finessed, justifying statements for the variance must appear here and flow-from the explanation in the sixth paragraph of your paper.

7. (√) Is each claim in paragraphs 2-5 supported by evidence? Are there any naked claims supported only by variations of "I believe...”? If so, put a big X in the margin beside that paragraph.

8. (√) Is each claim backed up by a reference? If a claim stands naked of supporting evidence or argument, put a big X in the margin.

9. (√) Does the paper do more than simply but gloriously restate the question? Examine the case study and cross out all ideas that appear in both the case study and in your paper. What remains-uncrossed out is your analysis. It should constitute the majority of your paper. If it doesn't, you haven’t done an analysis.

10. ( √ ) A sentence lacks either a subject or a verb; a sentence does not begin with a capital letter or end with a period (citations in parentheses go ahead of periods, not behind them).

I l. (√ ) A sentence begins with a relative pronoun such as Which, Who, That, Where, and When.

12. ( √ ) A pronoun lacks a clear antecedent; that is, a word such as it, he, she, or they does not have an obvious link to a noun (especially noticeable if a sentence begins with it, he, she, or they).

13. (√ ) A pronoun or verb fails to agree with its antecedent in number; that is, a single person or agency is referred to as they, or a plural subject is given a singular verb (such as, "members of the school board....gives their vote...").

14. (√ ) A sentence runs-on or uses a comma to splice independent ideas together; that is, complex ideas are not split into two sentences but are linked, often by a comma, into an overly long, wandering sentence.


Name: Hemanshu Agnihotri             Date Dec 17, 2012

The Searchers Vs. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid

The Searchers; Film Slug
Released in 1956.
Directed by the infamous John Ford.
Stars John Wayne as the lead character. Also features Jeffrey Hunter, Vera Miles, and Ward Bond.
Based on ‘The Searchers’ written by Alan Le May.
Screenplay written by Alan Le May
Distributed by Warner Bros.
Budget: 3.75 million
Box Office: 9.8 million
American Film Institute considers it the best Western film of all time.


Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid; Film Slug
Released in 1969
Directed by George Roy Hill
Stars Paul Newman, Robert Redford, and Katherine Ross
Written by William Goldman
Distributed by 20th Century Fox
Budget: $6,825,000
Box Office: ~$102,308,889

Analysis of the films

Right off the bat, it must be stated that both movies belong to the western genres. However, these films could not be more different from each other. The Searchers, which is considered the best Western film of all time, shows large landscapes, monument valley; something John Ford is automatically associated with. It features John Wayne, who has probably worked with John Ford in over 40 projects. It features all the qualities a traditional Western would behold; a rugged character that is tough, strong, intellectual, brave and in control of his
emotions. The film touches on several racial issues, as well, many of which will turn off the views people have today. Horses, gunfights, anarchist attitude, etc. this film is everything an old school western film will have, plus the mass genius of John Ford.

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, although holds the traditional values and attitude of the Western genre, is quite different from The Searchers. Keep in mind that there is a 14 year difference between the release dates of the two films. During this time, not only did American film industry change, so did the attitude of the filmmakers and the society in general. In contrast to The Searchers, this film had a much greener landscape. The editing is stronger; action scenes have extraneous amounts of jump cuts compared to The Searchers. The direction is also more innovative; medium shots have now been replaced with very personal close-ups. In simple words, although the film maintains the characteristics of an old-school western genre, it is the director’s experimental/innovative delivery that separates Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid from the Searchers.

Relating the Films to the Text

Instead of taking the easy way out and relating the films to the chapter that talks about the genres, I would actually like to use Chapter 7- Acting.  What I find intriguing in this chapter that relates to the searchers, is the persona of an actor.  Persona, as defined by the Merriam Webster dictionary, is the personality that a person (as an actor or politician) projects in public. John Wayne played the same heroic cowboy in the Searchers he plays in almost every film that he does. Its to the point where it would seem that John Wayne, in every movie that he is in, plays the role of John Wayne; a stereotype that he forever will be associated with. It has even been reported that his attitude on the screen, “the tough leader that does everything the way he wants to,” was also visible off screen. Sadly, his racial views in the film were also reflected in real life.

For Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, I would like to relate the film to the Chapter 8- Editing. As mentioned before, it is the style of editing and cinematography that separates Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid to the Searchers. The film uses a great deal of jump cuts that made the action scenes chaotic and exciting. I don’t think there was ever a scene during the action sequences where the camera was on the same shot for over 4 seconds. The editor does a good job in managing spatial and temporal relationships between shots, as well.

Relation to the Theory

Instead of relating these films to a theory, I would like to actually relate these films to a form of film; the buddy film. Buddy films, for its majority, involves two main characters, both of same sex, that have different attitudes on life, but believe in each other till death. It’s easy to relate this form with Butch and Sundance but we see elements of this in The Searchers, as well. Personally, I think Ethan, from the Searchers, would have just been a plain character if he did not have Martin accompanying him on his journey. They both had different attitudes towards life, and although they did not get along at first, they did soon start to appreciate each other; Martin’s
character strengthened Ethan’s character and allowed Ethan to show his comedic, and somewhat of an emotional side.

Relating Articles to the Films (non journal)

For this paper, I wanted to find articles that poured some light on the characters of the Protagonists. Being these films are relatively famous and important to the film history, finding articles relating to them was not a difficult task. For this paper, I’m am using the article entitled, “Life in the USA-301-Yojimbo, The Searchers, and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid: A critical comparison concerning the Protagonist, Locations, women, and Authority.”  For the comparison of the Protagonist, the writer claims that Butch and Sundance where more sympathetic and morally people than Ethan. This is definitely true. You can clearly tell that Ethan, at times had no remorse, his feelings towards people of other culture were sour, and that his pride exceeded the likes of others. Butch and Sundance, although running for their lives, never intentionally wanted to harm anyone. In fact, Butch had never even killed anyone until more than half the film was over; a unique feature that a traditional western character would not posses. 

Relating Articles to the Films (journal)

For the Journal article, I would like to use the article entitled, "The Searchers: An American Dream" by Brian Henderson. In this article, we find how important The Searchers is to film industry. Directors like, Martin Scorocese, Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, Paul Schrader, John Milius, and Michael Cimino have been influenced by this particular John Wayne film. Scorcese and Spielberg even state that they make sure they watch The Searchers at least once a year. Spielberg has gone as far as calling John Wayne's performance in the Searchers the best of his career. The writer of the article also sheds light on the fact that the film, although set in 1860's really consists of  characters that portray beliefs of the audience in the 1950's.

Views on the films.

Out of the two films, I think I prefer Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. I find the story and the characters of BCATSK more appealing. And although John Ford is a greater director, the direction of BCATSK is more out of the box. And the fact that I simply got more chills watching BCATSK just makes me appreciate it more. The characters are more sentimental, and the action sequences are more entertaining. The over exaggerated acting in the Searchers also turns me off to the film. The jokes in the Searcher are quite corny. In fact, I actually really like the dialogues, and their delivery, in BCATSK. But the element I appreciate the most in BCATSK is its ending.  Now many can assume that they both go in the blazing fire, but did they? Maybe they survived and managed to somehow take out the Bolivian police. This open-ended ending is something that really appeals to me. Plus, I really like how the cops chasing Butch and Sundance where never shown; now I am not that aware of how most western antagonists are portrayed, but the ones that the viewers never get to see must have been an element seen in no other.

Work Cited

Henderson, Brian. ""The Searchers": An American Dilemma." Film Quarterly 34.2 (1980): 9-23. abstract. (n.d.): n. pag. Print.
Yao, Liz H. "Life in the USA-301-Yojimbo, The Searchers, and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid: A Critical Comparison Concerning the Protagonists, Locations, Women, and Authority." Wordpress. Wordpress, 26 Nov. 2008. Web. 29 Nov. 2012. <http://lizhuoyao.wordpress.com/2008/11/26/life-in-the-usa-301-yojimbo-the-searchers-and-butch-cassidy-and-the-sundance-kid-a-critical-comparison-concerning-the-protagonists-locations-women-and-authority/>.

CHECKLIST FOR PLAGIARISM

*** (x) stands for criteria has been met

1) (x)  I have not handed in this assignment for any other class.

2) (x)  If I reused any information from other papers I have written for other classes, I clearly explain that in the paper.

3) (x)  If I used any passages word for word, I put quotations around those words, or used indentation and citation within the text.

4) (x)  I have not padded the bibliography. I have used all sources cited in the bibliography in the text of the paper.

5) (x)  I have cited in the bibliography only the pages I personally read.

6) (x)  I have used direct quotations only in cases where it could not be stated in another way. I cited the source within the paper and in the bibliography.

7) (x)  I did not so over-use direct quotations that the paper lacks interpretation or originality.  

8) (x)  I checked yes on steps 1-7 and therefore have been fully transparent about the research and ideas used in my paper.

Name: Hemanshu Agnihotri                                            Date: 11/29/2012

Pan's Labyrinth

Film Slug:

Directed and written by Guillermo del Toro.
Stars Ivana Baquero as Ofelia, Sergi Lopez as Captain Vidal, and
Maribel Verdu as Mercedes as the main characters.
Officially released in October 2006 and distributed worldwide in December of 2006.
The film made a good profit; Budget= 19 million and Earned= ~83 million.
Won 3 academy awards; Best art direction, cinematography, and makeup.
Also won 8 Ariel Awards, 3 BAFTA awards and many others in different academies.
Received 100% on Rotten Tomatoes, and is ranked 15 in the highest rated movie of all time at Metacritic, which makes it the best rated film of the 2000’s.

Pan’s Labyrinth is set in 1944 civil war era of Spain. The story tells a tale of Ofelia, a young girl mesmerized by fairy tales and a firm believer of magic. Ofelia’s guardians include a sickly pregnant mother and a cruel stepfather; a Captain of the Spanish army, known to show no apathy for his enemies. His only intention with Ofelia’s mother is for her to deliver him a son. Living amidst this sad life, Ofelia soon finds magic. A fairy leads her to a Faun, and soon her adventure begins.

Ofelia now has her a mission; to get to the magic land, and avoid getting into trouble in real life, a task harder than one would think. Chapter 2 in our book talks about verisimilitude; the quality that convinces us that the world portrayed onscreen is convincing and believable. For the third question, I will be using this term to relate the movie to the text. The director does a great job in separating Ofelia’s magic and real life. The viewer, for the most part, will believe that the magical things that are happening in relation to Ofelia are real and are actually happening. Whereas one can see in the end how Ofelia’s magical land could represent her escape from her dreadful reality. In my opinion, the director did a great job of meshing realism and antirealism and completely tricking the viewer into believing that everything happening was literal. 

For a film theory that relates to the movie, I pick the formalist film theory. The main focus here will be on the appropriate use of sound and color.  The film presented the dark/gothic tone of the labyrinth with eerie music; which I think enhanced the experience. The scenes where Ofelia was in magical realms had a very bright color to it. Now, the stunning thing is that the faun, who is a friend of Ofelia’s is shown in dark, and the scenes that required her to step inside danger were all bright; a great way to reverse common ideology- dark is danger, light is comfort.

Article #1 is a review of the film from BBC-

 "Dark, dreamlike and dangerous, Guillermo del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth is a fairytale every bit as scary and moving as they were always meant to be. In both the real world - civil war-riven Spain - and the fantasy underworld she discovers, our heroine Ofelia must battle against the most twisted, nightmarish evils to survive. Transcendent, passionate, full of beauty and endlessly affecting, this is without question the movie of the year.

Ofelia is journeying to meet her facist stepfather, a ruthless captain chasing leftists in the hills of Northern Spain, with her painfully pregnant mother in tow. Unknown to Ofelia's stepfather, the leftists have secretly infiltrated his household. This electric intrigue elegantly ties into Ofelia's other, mythic, journey in which she follows an insect into a labyrinth and then receives quests and promises from Pan the mysterious faun. Ofelia's retreat offers no respite from the real-world danger and fear. Drenched in mud, blood, rain and tears, and met on all sides by skin-crawling creatures, she must rely on her wits and her heart to prevail. 'COMPELLING FROM FIRST TO LAST.' Del Toro's trademark visual flair gets its finest ever chance to shine, rendering the tale onscreen so perfectly that the subtitles are barely needed. Every actor - most notably, Ivana Baquero's wide-eyed Ofelia and Sergi López's vicious, glittering Captain – excels. Compelling from first frame to last, Pan's Labyrinth never misses a chance to wrench, quell or quicken your heart: this visionary project propels Del Toro into the highest league of filmmakers. There can be no excuses. See this film." (Trout) 

For my second article, I picked an article entitled, "The Paradoxes of Film and the Recovery of Historical Memory: Vicente Aranda's Works on the Spanish Civil War." The article is written by Steven Shwartz. Here is an excerpt from this article that relates to Pan's Labyrinth, "Nearly seventy years  after  it ended,  the Spanish civil  war  of 1936-39,  and  its  immediate  after math,  suddenly  regained the attention  of  the global  public  when  El  laberinto  del  fauno (Pan's  Labyrinth,  2006,  written  and  directed by the Mexican filmmaker Guillermo  del  Toro),  won  Academy Awards  in 2007 for cinematography, art direction, and makeup. Pan's Labyrinth is a fantasy set in 1944, in which the girl-child Ofelia (played by Ivana Baquero), the step-daughter of a fanatical Franco army officer, escapes the  cruelties and hypocrisy of the  dictatorial regime through an alternate universe. Del Toro's entry into the field of European historical memory was surprising given that his previous work (e.g Hellboy, 2004) was technically ultra-fashionable, but primitive in its intellectual conception. But what can be said about such issues? Obviously, computer gaming and effects, and the sudden respectability of comic books, have already transformed cinema art so that a leap from the infernal fantasies of video games to the real suffering in the aftermath of the twentieth century's most poignant and passionate historical conflict was unsurprising." (Shwartz 501)

In my view, the film is simply spectacular. It has something for everyone. The kids will enjoy it for its innocence, sci-fi fans would love it for its amazing look and graphics, and I'm sure fans of history might get introduced to the Spanish Civil war. In fact, the writer of my second article states how a film (like Pan's Labyrinth) entices viewer's interest in history. I, like the writer of the first article, agree that the movie was "compelling from the beginning to the end.” The acting was very believable, and the story was well written. Most of all, I personally think that the story was unpredictable for the most part; the twists just kept coming out of nowhere. I would have no problems recommending this film to anyone. The bottom line is, the movie received 76 different awards in various different academies, and rightfully so.

Work Cited:

Schwartz, Stephen. "The Paradoxes of Film and the Recovery of Historical Memory: Vicente Aranda's Works on the Spanish Civil War." Film History Politics and Film 20.12 (2008): 501-02. Jstor. Indiana University Press. Web.

Trout, Jonathan. "Pan's Labyrinth Review." BBC News. BBC, 19 Nov. 2006. Web. 18 Oct. 2012. <http://www.bbc.co.uk/films/2006/11/20/pans_labyrinth_2006_review.shtml>.

CHECKLIST FOR PLAGIARISM

1) (x)  I have not handed in this assignment for any other class.

2) (x)  If I reused any information from other papers I have written for other classes, I clearly explain that in the paper.

3) (x)  If I used any passages word for word, I put quotations around those words, or used indentation and citation within the text.

4) (x)  I have not padded the bibliography. I have used all sources cited in the bibliography in the text of the paper.

5) (x)  I have cited in the bibliography only the pages I personally read.

6) (x)  I have used direct quotations only in cases where it could not be stated in another way. I cited the source within the paper and in the bibliography.

7) (x)  I did not so over-use direct quotations that the paper lacks interpretation or originality.  

8) (x)  I checked yes on steps 1-7 and therefore have been fully transparent about the research and ideas used in my paper.

Name: Hemanshu  Agnihotri                         Date: October 23, 12