North by Northwest & American Beauty

           Having never seen North by Northwest before I was skeptical on how suspenseful a movie from 1959 could actually be when compared to today’s suspense movies.  I was quite blown back by how well Alfred Hitchcock was able to make this a suspenseful movie.  The movie kept me in suspense throughout the entire film.  Hitchcock used several establishing shots in this movie.  For me, two of these really stuck out.  The first was the establishing shot of the United Nations Headquarters.  The second was the establishing shot of Mt. Rushmore in South Dakota.  The house on the top of Mt. Rushmore reminded me very much of a place I have visited in Pennsylvania.  This place was Falling waters, which was the home to the famous architect Frank Lloyd Wright.  After doing research the house was a set that Hitchcock wanted to look like buildings designed by Wright.

            Arguably the most famous scene in the whole movie is the crop duster scene.  I knew Thornhill was being set-up and that he wasn’t actually meeting up with Kaplan in the middle of nowhere.  It gave me a great sense of suspense as to what was going to happen to Thornhill.  When the car had pulled up and let the guy out who was waiting for the bus out, I thought for sure he was sent there to kill Thornhill, or Kaplan.  I saw the crop duster in the background, but never paid it any attention until then man noticed something funny.  He turned to Thornhill and states that it was weird that the crop duster wasn’t actually dusting any crops.  At that moment I had a gut feeling it would be coming after Thornhill.   To me that was the best scene of the movie, and most action packed.

            I have only ever seen bits and pieces of American Beauty.  After watching the whole movie I thought it was pretty good.  We learn right away that Lester will die by the end of the movie, and it had me guessing the entire time how he was going to die.  It created a sense of suspension right from the get go.  My first suspect was Ricky because after Jane had been complaining about her father, Ricky had asked if he wanted him dead and she said yes.  That lead me to believe Ricky was going to kill him.  I think we are giving hints to his true murderer early on.  After the gay neighbors welcome Ricky and his father to town, Ricky and his father have a discussion about how homosexuals make them want to barf.  We learn right away Ricky’s father is uncomfortable with the idea.  It wasn’t until after Lester is dead that I realized it wasn’t his wife who shot him, but rather it was Ricky’s father.

            The red roses are used as a motif throughout the movie.  They symbolize true love.  I think it’s interesting how whenever roses are involved in Lester’s dreams about Angela, they are rose pedals, and everywhere else in the movie they are full roses.  To me this symbolizes a false love.  A full rose represents love, but when you take it to just rose pedals, it’s not really a rose anymore.  So in Lester’s dreams the love is real to him, but when he finally gets to the moment to have her, he realizes that it was never real love, but just lust.

The Shining

The Shining was a breakout performance for Jack Nicholson.  In my opinion he was born for that role and his performance really lead me to believe he had gone mad.  From his facial expressions, his body language, and his voice he truly sells the part. 

Wendy finally realizes that Jack has lost it when she looks through his work and sees what he’s been writing.  On every single page Jack typed, ‘All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.’  I think Wendy began to notice Jack slipping was when he cursed at her and flipped out at her for interrupting him while he was working.  Jacks conversation with Wendy is one give away that Jack has stepped out of civility.

Another art direction to suggest Jack has gone mad and stepped out of civility is the use of colors.  The color blue is linked to people with compassion and care for others.  While red represents violence and rage.  In the scene when Wendy finds Jack as he’s having a nightmare she wakes him up and he tells her how he had a horrible nightmare in which he murdered Wendy and Daniel.  Before this scene Jack wears blue, but after it he prefers to wear red.  Also the bathroom that Jack meets the old caretaker in is red, and this is where he tells Jack to take care of Wendy and Daniel.

Another art direction is the set of The Shining.  For starters there is a history of death and violence there.  Also, we learn early that the hotel was built on ancient Native American burial grounds.  To me this kind of hints that this hotel encompasses a lot of violence and rage.

The Graduate

The Graduate uses many cinema techniques in throughout the film to really aid the viewer in being a part of the movie.  The very first scene of the movie is a close-up shot of Ben Braddock sitting in an airplane seat, and the camera slowly zooms out into a long-shot.  The very next scene of the movie is one of the most famous and one that has been reproduced by countless films after this one.  The scene is the tracking scene of Ben moving along the automatic walkway through the airport.  For me, both of these scenes gave me the sense that Ben was sort of lost and confused.  Next was the scene of Ben coming downstairs to meet the guest of his welcoming party after graduating college.  We already have the feeling that Ben is uncomfortable, but we get a better sense of that through the camera as Ben first makes his way into the party.  The camera is very close on Ben and the guest as they talk and it gave me the sense of awkwardness and being uncomfortable.  The next scene that stuck out to me was Ben’s 21st birthday.  It’s the point of view shot as Ben is looking out of the goggles of his scuba gear.  I got a sense that Ben feels trapped by his parents, and this can be seen in this scene as he's trying to surface the water we see his parents pushing him back under the water.

I noticed a lot of use of symbolism used throughout this film.  One symbol being used was the colors black and white.  The color combination is used several times throughout the film, including the awning of the Robinson household.  I think that the black and white are symbols for Ben being locked in a life he doesn’t necessarily want. His parents are strongly pushing for him to go to graduate school, however Ben purposely avoids it.  Another symbolism was Ben and his aquarium.  To me, I made the connection that Ben was sort of like the fish in that aquarium.  He’s just kind of aimlessly floating through life with no real purpose or intent.  This is evident to me when Mr. Braddock confronts Ben while he's floating in the pool.  Mr. Braddock asks Ben what he’s doing and Ben’s reply was simply just drifting.  Another symbol that struck me as ironic was Elaine’s room.  Mrs. Robinson used the portrait of Elaine as an excuse to get Ben upstairs.  Then Mrs. Robinson appears naked in front of Ben in Elaine's room, and finally makes her true intent known to Ben.  I think the purpose was to forecast Ben future relationship with Elaine to us, and I find it ironic that the start of Ben and Mrs. Robison starts in Elaine’s room as well as end because that's where Elaine is when she discovers the truth.

One question that was left unanswered was what happens to Ben and Elaine after they run off together. We never find that out, and to me the ending scene doesn’t give any indication on whether they stay together down the road.  They seem to be in love with one another, and he travels all that way to find her, and when he does she ends up running from the church with him.  They both seem to have abandoned their parents to start a life together.  To me this all seems fast because they barely know each other and only had one real date.  It seems like it was all an infatuation with one another because in that last scene they finally have each other.  Nothing is stopping them and as they sit there in the back of that bus, they don't seem all that happy.  It’s almost to me as if they wanted each other so badly because they knew it was not approved, yet when they finally had it in their grasps it lost its value.