Ultimate film list (Top 50)

With great difficulty I have managed to produce an ultimate film list (Top 30) of the films I have seen. This includes World Cinema.

1) Shawshank
2) Green Mile
3) Schindlers List
4) Gran Torino
5) American Beauty
6) Taken
7) The Usual Suspects
8) John Q
9) American History X
10) Leon
11)Man on Fire
12) Rain Man
13) And Your Mother too
14) Dark Night
15) One Flew Over the Cuckoos nest
16) Pirates of the Caribbean
17) Silence of the Lambs
18) The Fugitive
19) Apocalypto
20) Bourne films (no favourite)
21) The Bank Job
22) Face/Off
23) Unforgiven
24) The Orphanage
25) Gladiator
26) Nikita
27) Million Dollar Baby
28) Misery
29) Inside I'm Dancing
30) La Haine
31) Lost Boys
32) Blood Diamond
33) Catch Me If You Can
34) The Sting
35) Cast Away
36) The Rock
37) The Jacket
38) Taking Lives
39)Match Point
40) Rob Roy
41) Hellraiser
42) Disturbia
43) Insomnia
44) Thelma and Louise
45) Mirrors
46) Italian Job
47) Dark City
48) Australia
49) The Big Blue
50) The Big Job

Screenplay ideas

The Screenplay is the next peice of coursework, for which various ideas are to be produced. This leads to a final screenplay, with dialogue, character monologue and micro and macro. For now, I need to come up with ideas to base my screenplay on (these ideas being the characters and the basic narrative). These ideas should be influenced by the studies of World Cinema and my own studies. I would like the genre of my screenplay t be Drama, involving two key characters, both in their late teens, early 20's. I will involve tecniques used in the World Cinema films we have studied and I have have watched myself.
The idea I produce will be completed by the 20th January.

Small Scale Study

The final version of my small scale study was handed in on Monday. This included the annotated catalogue, presentation script and the presentation itself. Now I need to focus on revising more on Mexican, Hollywood and British cinema and do more past papers for the exams next year. The first, in January, is a resit of FM2: British and American film.

Clint Eastwood presentation and close study film

Having now presented my Clint Eastwood presentation, there are several changes I need to make to the script, one being the signatures. In order to write an in depth response to my area of investigation statement, I will need to focus on three signatures, rather than four. There are several reasons for this, but the main reason is so I can write more, in a lot more detail. There are a few parts of the presentation itself that I like, such as the comparison of John Fords work to Eastwoods, using two almost identical shots but from different films. This needs to be done by 9th December. A FM3d form must also submitted as thsi is the final deadline for the peice of coursework.

Now onto the films. We have been studying three films, one of which will be our close study film for the exam. In order to gain a clearer understanding of each, we have been asked to produce presentations, so it gives people the opportunity to ask questions. This will be useful, as we can refer to the powerpoints for revision, when the final exam approaches.

The presentation for Babel will be this Thursday. I also need to go through past exam papers (both AS and A2) to practice my exam technique.

World Cinema blog update

I have just been updating my World Cinema blog and I have now, also, related La Haine to the micro and macro aspects.

Link: http://lawrencesmitha2worldcinema.blogspot.com/

With regard to my small scale, I am now focusing on Eastwood as a director. I will be identifying key themes and similarities in my three focus films, which are now;

• Outlaw Josey Wales
• Unforgiven
• Gran Torino

In each of the films I will identify key themes and similarities, as my area of investigation statement.

New blog - World Cinema

I have just created a new blog specifically for World Cinema, where I have analysed the REC screening from last Monday (http://lawrencesmitha2worldcinema.blogspot.com/)

Meanwhile my research is still well underway. Im currently producing the presentation and making a start on a few of Eastwood's books. Im also reading The Cinema Book where there is a brilliant section on The Western and many other interesting topics.

Eastwood opposes abolition of UK Film Council

Eastwood has credited the UK Film Council for helping his production company with his latest film in London. The UK Film Council is to axed due to the government spending cuts and the end of the year. Eastwood was among 50 actors who apposed the abolition and mentioned how much damage to the industry it will do if the plans go ahead. According to The Observer, lottery funding has increased to support the production of new films. The overall figure is estimated to be around £3 million. 

   http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-10911948