This Week in Visions 2/13-2/19

Weekly Tasks 2/12-2/19:
2/12: Snow Day
2/13: Some follow up emails (20 minutes)
2/13: BYOFF--Goat and Compass (2 hours)
2/14: Directors' Meeting (2 hours)
2/14: Emailing Businesses (20 minutes)
2/15: Visions Class (8 hours)
2/16: Reading Non-UNCW papers (3.5 hours)
2/17: Development Meeting(1.5 hours)
2/18: Reading UNCW papers (2.5 hours)
2/18: Revisiting Films (1 hour)

The Un-filmable Lightness of Being

A pro to this paper would be that even though there is a lot of substance and research, it is extremely coherent and intellectual. It really challenged me to imagine the the intentions of the author versus the director, which was surprisingly easy given the descriptive imagery. A con of this paper would be is that it is prominently longer than the other papers and would need to be cut down if programmed. 

Cinema du Corps

A pro of this paper is that the structure of this paper was well organized and informative. I enjoyed it more so than the other Gaspar Noe paper. A con about this paper is that it lacks challenging material and would make for a long presentation as well.

Boys Will Be Girls

A pro to this paper is that it was well written and not a widely-known topic. A con to this paper was that it felt more like a biography than a topic of scholarly research.

The Active Viewer

A pro for this paper was that I liked the topic and I thought it was extremely thought-provoking. It was well researched and again, well structured. Something I found very interesting was about the means of storytelling multi-screen projection allows. It was along the lines of giving the projectionist creative control over displaying Andy Warhol's film that made no two screenings of the film alike. A con about this paper would be grammar but otherwise I think it would make for an interesting presentation.

13 Ways of Looking at Bill Murray

A positive for this paper is that it plays with humor and exploring audiences' infatuations with actors and their on/off-screen personas. I think that it is engaging and would definitely be a crowd pleaser. A con for this paper is that it was lacking in the research department which is ideally the main objective of a scholarly conference block. 

Gravity

A positive for this paper is that it is quite descriptive (almost overwhelming at times) but would make for some stunning visuals. I like the exploration of future cinema reverting back to initial ideas of cinema of attraction. A con to this paper was that it was filled with excessive jargon. I had to re-read sentences a few times to truly understand what point the author was getting at. 

Japanese Ghosts

A pro to this paper was the organization of thoughts. I liked the references to WWII in one of the films but was left confused as to what it had to do with the thesis, or the topic of the paper. A con for this paper was that it lacked insight into the background of the films described. 

Irreversible & Techniques of Looking

Still to this day I am left confused as to the last sentence in the introduction. "Noé challenges us to imagine what a representation of rape from a sympathetic masculine position might look like." No where in this paper does he go into detail or attempt to defend this claim. I was really quite curious what the author was getting at. I watched parts of Irreversible to try and understand the context of this paper and after doing so, I do not believe this film diverts from the generalized masculine gaze. A pro about this paper was that it was well-written.

Blues Brothers

Pro for this paper was that it was an interesting concept to redefine a film under a different context of genre from another country, however, it fell short of my expectations. It wasn't very well-written and I think that the presentation would be very scatter-brained like the paper. I wish the paper dived into it's thesis a lot sooner into the paper.

Orson Welles

A pro for this paper was that the paper gave adequate background into Welles' life and perspective and it is well researched. A con to this paper would be that I feel like the topic of Orson Welles is so overdone and it gets talked about. 

Murders Unavenged

This paper was very informative (about general police procedure) and you could tell the author was interested about this topic. A con of this paper was that it felt a bit repetitive at times and boring. 

Pied Piper

A pro for this paper was that it was well written and organized. A con for this paper was that it still seems more like a gender studies film analysis than a proper film analysis. The paper used a lot of plot summary and lacked research.