1. This week, I have enjoyed all of the movies that we watched this week. I did not think that I would like High Noon because I am not the type to watch a “western.” I ended up actually liking this movie. Something I thought was neat was when the marshal was leaving for his honeymoon, a striking minor chord sounds just as he opens the letter, to find out about Frank Miller, and the chord underlies until the couple leaves again. When the fight scene builds to the climax, I felt that the trumpet provided the action of the scene and the low brass provided the intensity of the fight. I have seen To Kill A Mockingbird a couple of times before, and I like it more every time. I enjoyed the scene where Atticus kills the rabid dog with one shot…it amazes me every time I see it. I also like the courtroom scene because there is no music, only tension from everyone in the courtroom. In the Heat of the Night was interesting. I did like the story a little bit more than the music. Sidney Poitier did an excellent job at playing the role of Mr. Tibbs. I believe that American Graffiti has to be my favorite movie that we have seen this week. Instead of listening to mostly composed classical music, I was glad to hear songs that were popular back in those days. I felt that the music was appropriately put in the right scenes where they had music.
2. In the book, I learned more about movies that I would like to see and who composed them. Also the films that we saw in class helped me to understand what I had read and if it was a movie that I would want to see. I also enjoyed reading about the movies from the 1960’s to the 90’s. Also while reading the book, I found out that because of Julie Andrews, who is one of my favorite actresses, The Sound of Music became one of the most top-grossing films of all-time. It is also of my favorite movies.
3. I liked being able to see the different movie clips that we had in class because it helped me to understand what I was reading about in the book. The clips that I thought were cool were Forbidden Planet and Planet of the Apes. I liked these two because they might be movies worth watching to me someday.
Friday, January 23, 2009
Friday, January 16, 2009
Respone Blog #2
1. I thought that the movies that we saw this week were very interesting and quite enjoyable to watch. The Silly Symphonies were probably one of the ones I enjoyed the most because of the way the music was used to go along with the body movements. Another movie that I liked was The Adventures of Robin Hood. In this film, we can definitely see the “Mickey mousing” that we talked about in class. I actually thought that the fight scene they had when King Richard comes back, was awesome because of how they attempted to match the “battle” scene with the music. King Kong was also a good movie. It too had the mousing effects and a lot of in the frame music, but one thing that I liked about the movie was the ability to create suspense by using silence. For instance when Kong was on top of the Empire building and it wasn’t until the airplanes begin shooting at him does the music come back strong and in full force. The suspense that Steiner used was the perfect edge-of-your-seat moment.
2. I found it to be pretty slick to find out that movie theatres began selling popcorn and drinks to keep the audience coming to see the movies…I always wondered if that was something that they thought of later on in the years. Something that I found interesting in the book was the use of the electronic instrument the theremin. I thought that what it would be used for fit perfectly. The word film noir was something that caught my eye also. I didn’t know that the French used it to describe U.S. films that included gloomy nature, but capture the realistic style and nature of people. Another tidbit that interested me was for The Lost Weekend the composer Rozsa, tried to tell others that the temp track would not work for the movie so they put his original score in and it became an instant hit.
3. In class I was surprised to find out that John Williams had help for his Star Wars theme from Korngold. Being able to hear how Korngold wrote it versus the way Williams evolved on it was quite astounding. So I guess that’s how the composers got their way around the copyright policy. I also felt in was enchanting to know that The Adventures of Robin Hood literally saved Korngold’s life. It is mind boggling to think that Korngold would have been in a concentration camp if he had not have decided to compose for the movie.
2. I found it to be pretty slick to find out that movie theatres began selling popcorn and drinks to keep the audience coming to see the movies…I always wondered if that was something that they thought of later on in the years. Something that I found interesting in the book was the use of the electronic instrument the theremin. I thought that what it would be used for fit perfectly. The word film noir was something that caught my eye also. I didn’t know that the French used it to describe U.S. films that included gloomy nature, but capture the realistic style and nature of people. Another tidbit that interested me was for The Lost Weekend the composer Rozsa, tried to tell others that the temp track would not work for the movie so they put his original score in and it became an instant hit.
3. In class I was surprised to find out that John Williams had help for his Star Wars theme from Korngold. Being able to hear how Korngold wrote it versus the way Williams evolved on it was quite astounding. So I guess that’s how the composers got their way around the copyright policy. I also felt in was enchanting to know that The Adventures of Robin Hood literally saved Korngold’s life. It is mind boggling to think that Korngold would have been in a concentration camp if he had not have decided to compose for the movie.
Friday, January 9, 2009
Response Blog #1
Wanda Sanders
Dr. Berry
1/9/09
1. In watching A Trip to the Moon, The Great Train Robbery, and The Battleship Potemkin, I felt having to watch these movies without any dialogue was very interesting. The first two being relatively short, I could sit through them and hear a lot of the chords and melody being played throughout out the movie. When it came to The Battleship Potemkin, however, I couldn't really keep up with the music that much because of it being a symphony. It felt that at some point the sequences were all running together, until they had battle scenes because the mode of the music would change from major to minor. Although I felt that I couldn't keep up, in the last scene of the movie, I did recognize Shostakovich's symphony from the Finale and fell in love with the scene because of his use of ominous and triumphant chords.
I thought that Siegfried was a good movie because it had a story plot that would come up on screen to at least help the watcher understand what was going on. In that movie I heard a nice use of dynamics, major & minor mode, and I believe there was a leitmotif going on also.
The Jazz Singer was enticing because of the story plot. In this movie we got to see some diegetic and photographic music when the young boy was singing at the saloon. We saw it yet again when he has made it "big time" and performed for the audience.
2. I found a lot of interesting things in the readings that we've had to do this week. I came into this class not really knowing anything about film music except for the fact that if you listened carefully, you might hear a song that you like. When I read what really happens when the people in Hollywood decide to make a movie, I was actually dumbfounded to learn all of this exciting and somewhat depressing information. Such as what orcherstrators do, how much film composers really make, who they have to pay, and the overall process of making a film. I thought that it was pretty cool that the directors of some films keep the same composer for what seems like forever. That's a pretty strong bond to have between director and composer. It was also interesting to know what a temp track was and how they use it to be able to score the music for the film. For some reason I speculated that classical and film composers could just flip-flop anytime they wanted to...well I know that's NOT the case. I think that the film composers have it way worse than a classical composer because of the amount of time that a film composer has to compose a score. 3-6 weeks to me is not enough time to even get half of some thoughts together! I was amused to see that nickelodeons back then were theatres and not a t.v. network!
3. This past week I have certainly learned a lot about films and the amount of stamina and time that it takes to make these, especially when it's going to have music incorporated in it. Who would've thought that the Lumiere brothers would invent something so wonderful that it still exsists today? I now have a full appreciation for the directors, producers, composers, and musicians and all the other people that are needed to make a movie because without their knowledge and time that goes into making a film or composing music, we wouldn't have what we do today.
Dr. Berry
1/9/09
1. In watching A Trip to the Moon, The Great Train Robbery, and The Battleship Potemkin, I felt having to watch these movies without any dialogue was very interesting. The first two being relatively short, I could sit through them and hear a lot of the chords and melody being played throughout out the movie. When it came to The Battleship Potemkin, however, I couldn't really keep up with the music that much because of it being a symphony. It felt that at some point the sequences were all running together, until they had battle scenes because the mode of the music would change from major to minor. Although I felt that I couldn't keep up, in the last scene of the movie, I did recognize Shostakovich's symphony from the Finale and fell in love with the scene because of his use of ominous and triumphant chords.
I thought that Siegfried was a good movie because it had a story plot that would come up on screen to at least help the watcher understand what was going on. In that movie I heard a nice use of dynamics, major & minor mode, and I believe there was a leitmotif going on also.
The Jazz Singer was enticing because of the story plot. In this movie we got to see some diegetic and photographic music when the young boy was singing at the saloon. We saw it yet again when he has made it "big time" and performed for the audience.
2. I found a lot of interesting things in the readings that we've had to do this week. I came into this class not really knowing anything about film music except for the fact that if you listened carefully, you might hear a song that you like. When I read what really happens when the people in Hollywood decide to make a movie, I was actually dumbfounded to learn all of this exciting and somewhat depressing information. Such as what orcherstrators do, how much film composers really make, who they have to pay, and the overall process of making a film. I thought that it was pretty cool that the directors of some films keep the same composer for what seems like forever. That's a pretty strong bond to have between director and composer. It was also interesting to know what a temp track was and how they use it to be able to score the music for the film. For some reason I speculated that classical and film composers could just flip-flop anytime they wanted to...well I know that's NOT the case. I think that the film composers have it way worse than a classical composer because of the amount of time that a film composer has to compose a score. 3-6 weeks to me is not enough time to even get half of some thoughts together! I was amused to see that nickelodeons back then were theatres and not a t.v. network!
3. This past week I have certainly learned a lot about films and the amount of stamina and time that it takes to make these, especially when it's going to have music incorporated in it. Who would've thought that the Lumiere brothers would invent something so wonderful that it still exsists today? I now have a full appreciation for the directors, producers, composers, and musicians and all the other people that are needed to make a movie because without their knowledge and time that goes into making a film or composing music, we wouldn't have what we do today.
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