Everything Everywhere All At Once

Storytelling

    The storytelling of the film is kind of an overused trope about a mom not understanding her child, but the directors dive much deeper into that concept and expand on it. Not only does the mom (Evelyn) not understand her daughter Joy, but Evelyn is so consumed by all the business of life that she doesn't ever take the time to understand herself. She is living the worst version of herself that never followed any of her dreams, which is the reason why she doesn't pay attention to or get along with Joy. I like the message of the film, where in the end nothing matters so you should just do what fulfills you in life.

Cinematography

    After watching Everything Everywhere All at Once a second time I can definitely say that it is one of my favorite movies. I think the fact that it is complete chaos and all over the place is what makes it so different from other films. The setting/environment is constantly changing so you can't focus on anything for longer than a minute before it changes. Personally, this keeps my eyes on the screen because I won't ever get bored of a scene. I also really like the fight choreography because it reminded me of a cross between Doctor Strange and the John Wick movies but with more humor than blood and gore. Another part I liked about the cinematography was the close-up shots. In a lot of the scenes/shots where the camera was focused on a single character's face, it was either extreme close-up or everything but their face was out of focus. I think this aspect of cinematography gave it that fast-paced action movie feel.

Cultural Significance

    This is one of the largest films to date that features, represents, and celebrates both Asian American culture and the LGBTQ+ community. The film is from the perspective of an Asian American immigrant woman, and her daughter who is part of the LGBTQ+ community. One of the main plots of the film is the relationship between them. Evelyn is hesitent to accept that Joy has a girlfriend because that is not traditionaly accepted in their culture. Evelyn doesn't want to explain this to her father (Joy's grandfather) because she feels he won't accept it. By the end of the film Evelyn finally accepts Joy for who she is and proudly and sternly tells her father that Joy and Becky are together, not just good friends. It shows the growth that Evelyn went through and that culture and traditions can change with time.

Our Film

 

     With the short amount of time that the groups were given to make our short film there is definitely some aspects that could use more explanation and techniques. One of the biggest for our film was there isn't any background or explanations as to why anything is happening. Once our film begins there is just a cut to instantly finding people. To remedy this if we had time we could use some black-and-white scenes to explain everything that is happening sort of in a flashback kind of style.

    Another portion that could use work would be the audio in the film. When recording the audio for the clips was not good so we had to cut it and put music over it. So if we had more either equipment or focused more on the audio it would add much more to the film. Or if we had more resources we could use some better sounds to cover it up and make the feel of the film higher quality than what we were able to gather from our short time. 

    Some of the cuts also looked choppy which could be patched up as well. Possibly being able to reshoot some scenes would have been helpful because after meshing all the clips together we found that some portions were not needed and felt like filler. 

Moonrise Kingdom

 

Storytelling

    The basic story of Moonrise Kingdom (2012) is that two kids who each have problems at home, fall in love and run away together. The boy, Sam, is a 12-year-old "Khaki Scout" which is meant to mock Boy Scouts by giving them a more militaristic manner, and he is the hero in this story that rescues the 12-year-old girl, Suzy, who has problems with her family at home. The way the story is told makes it seem like Suzy's family doesn't care about her and that Sam is going AWOL from his "very serious" service in the Kahki Scouts. Sam is the hero that convinces Suzy to escape with him as they run away and have to avoid the evil police, who are just trying to find the missing girl, and the evil Khaki Scouts, who are just trying to find the missing boy. The comedy of it all is that the Police and Kahki Scouts take their job very seriously, even though they do it in the most ridiculous way. The Police enlist the help of the Kahki Scouts which is made up of one adult troop leader, and several children between the ages of 6-12. The kids make weapons such as clubs, bows, and spears as if Sam was this dangerous war fugitive. All while Sam and Suzy have their awkward but romantic escape.

Cinematography

    As in any Wes Anderson film, the cinematography makes the movie. He uses a specific color pallet in all his films including Moonrise Kingdom. The pallet has very whimsical shades of yellows, blues, greens, and reds. These colors are meant to reflect the child-like adventure story that the film tells. In every shot in this film, everything is symmetrical. Wherever the characters are on screen, they are always centered and/or framed by the background they are standing in. Moonrise Kingdom was shot on 16mm film to give it a grainy older look to it to match the time period the film is meant to take place.

Cultural Relevance

    The cultural relevance of Moonrise Kingdom is that it shows childhood innocence and the desire to escape the 'real world'. Wes Anderson uses this escapism trope as the two kids go on an adventure of self-discovery and love. Both Sam and Suzy are going through rough times emotionally as Sam is stuck in a military-like Khaki Scout Camp, and Suzy is having troubles at home with her family not caring about her or letting her be a kid. This film plays into that desire as a young and reckless kid, to just run away from all your home problems and be free with someone you love. What I like most about this film is the absurdity of the whole situation. In the real world, the police would just find the missing kids and bring them home. But in this story, we have the bad guys and the heroes. It is kind of like how I imagine a kid would dramatize running away, where the kids are going AWOL and the military and police are after them, so they must protect themselves.

Swiss Army Man

 

Storytelling

    The way that the Daniels tell this story makes it seem like any other cast-away movie at first but as it continues we see just how abnormal and strange this film really is. It starts with a very dark scene of a man about to hang himself from inside a cave on the beach when the man (Hank) sees a person laying in the water. As he yells to get the person's attention, he slips and accidentally hangs himself until the rope breaks. This sets an extremely dark tone right away but is immediately followed by comedic relief as the person turns out to be a dead body, and begins to fart. This tells the audience that this is not going to be a normal cast-away film, but more of a comedy as it lightens the mood. The rest of the film depicts the cast-away Hank using a now alive-dead body named Manny as a tool to survive out in the woods. Manny becomes Hank's best friend as Hank tries to teach Manny what life is like in the real world. During the entire duration of the film, we think that Manny might just be in Hank's head but Manny seems so real. At the climax of the film, Manny actually carries Hank instead of the other way around, onto Sarah's property (the woman who Hank has seemingly been stalking). Sarah's little girl sees the two men and talks with both of them, making us think that Manny really can talk and is real before he drops to the ground and "dies" again. The audience is meant to think that Hank really is crazy and has been right outside Sarah's home this whole time talking to a dead body, but all of our expectations are reversed when we see Manny come alive again and speed off into the ocean in front of everyone, including the police, Sarah, and Hank's father.

Cinematography

    The cinematography of this film makes it feel like everything we see on screen is actually a dream. The saturation of color in many of the scenes has kind of an unnatural hue that could make us think that maybe what we're seeing isn't real. I think one of the main reasons it feels like a dream to me though, is the stop motion-esk videography. In some scenes, particularly when Hank uses Manny as the Swiss Army Man, everything kind of slows down and zooms out making it look more like Manny is a puppet or just not real. It almost reminds me of some scenes shot in the Where the Wild Things Are (2009) movie. I think I have also seen similar dream-like sequences in movies like JoJo Rabbit (2019), where you feel like what you are seeing is not real, but the movie reminds you that you are watching a movie and it is real for the characters in the film.

Examples of how the directors use wide angle shots and either slow down or speed up the video whenever Manny is being used as the Swiss Army Man, shown in the trailer.

Cultural Relevance

    The cultural relevance of this film shows through the emotions of two men. Normally we see men in movies as physically strong, mentally strong, and masculine. But this movie shows the vulnerability of men and how they express their emotions. The relationship between Hank and Manny starts off with Hank just needing Manny to survive but as Hank teaches Manny more and more about the real world, they become best friends. At one point during the movie, Hank pretends to be a love interest to teach Manny what it is like to love someone and that is when their relationship could be perceived as much more intimate. I think we really see this come into play when Hank tries to save Manny with a rescue breath underwater, but both Hank and Manny are smiling and it ends up being more of a life-saving kiss.