What can be done in a month…or…did 30 Days of Night achieve anything????

The Josh Hartnett thriller 30 Days of Night has been on DVD for less than three weeks, and I’ve already seen it like 7 times. Granted, I saw it like 4 times in the theatres, that’s still a lot right?

I felt that this movie helped advance the horror genre somewhat, with its gore (how often do you see someones head chopped off with zero camera cuts???) I mean, I love vampire films, and was quite pleased to see that they wasted no time with silver crosses, holy water, or stakes. An axe works just fine for Hartnett, as he and a band of survivors are hauled up in an attic as the town of 152 is slaughtered (we see this through an amazing overhead shot.

Ben Foster is another actor who gets me every time. His role as “The Stranger” employs some sort of accent that cannot be helped but be repeated (that cold you feel aint the weather…that’s death approaching). He is top notch, and knocks it out of the park everytime.

As far as the film itself goes, this idea is too good to not be thought of before; a town that has no sun for 30 days + vampires = madness. It probably wont come as a surprise to know that this film was a graphic novel series before its trip to the big screen. The recent fad of adapting graph novels is in full force, as this film displays inhuman violence (I checked the novel to see if Eben “punches” the way he does in the movie…its spot on).

I liked this movie because it treated vampires like zombies. Not like the fake looking ones from “I am Legend” (3/10 stars in my opinion), but like the ones in 28 Days Later (a revolutionary horror film in my humble opinion). fast. strong, and they run alot. That’s up may alley when looking for something to chase people!

All in all, this film was pretty sweet in my opinion. If you are o.k. with the insertion of a slight love story (which is in the graph novel as well), you are gonna love this movie…I mean, they should have names this film “There Will Be Blood (in Alaska)”

Target(s) Practice

So I hope eveyone is feeling good with their first assignment. I have given an inital listen to your interviews, and they sound pretty good!

As far as movies go, Sinc so many people are writing (better) blogs about films to come and films of today, I though  I would occasionally throw back to films that I have discovered from the past, and shed a little light on some classics (classics in my mind).

Peter Bagdonavitch’s 1968 directorial debut, Targets is a film i watched recently for a class, and was quite impressed. The story follos an average man who “loses is” and goes on a shooting spree. At the same time, we learn of the story of a retiring horror actor, and his last public appearance at a drive in theatre.

This film does a great job metatextually (text within a text), using the interior film’s dialoge as a haunting secondary narration for the thrilling events occurring over no underscore.

The use of angles in this film, as well as this clever light trick used when Tim O’Kelly’s character is smoking a ciggarette in a dark room, show that this film took a few chances to tell its story.

 Also, as we have seen as recently as last week, this film comments on the horrors of random violence in society.

If you are looking for an awesome film, aim for Targets!

Tips for Adobe Audition Editing

Hey Everybody!

I hope everyone is moving along with their first audio assignment. It seems like every group has a grasp on what we’re shooting for for this assignment, but I wanted to throw a few tips your way so as to help you along the way.

Put your audio in stereo: when looking at your audio, double click so you highlight the entire file. Press F11, and in the middle of the window, you have the option of putting your audio in stereo.

Play with your levels: when working in edit mode, open the effects tab on the left side of the screen, and click on the Amplitude/Compression link. From here, select the Amplify link that says “(process)” after it. from here, you can universally raise or lower the audio levels of your piece.

In class on Tuesday, I will go over a few more tricks to clean up your interviews. You will have the whole class period on Tuesday to finish Assignment 1.

Also, if you want to work on the assignment on Friday or Monday, someone can let you into the lab, any time before 4:30

Where Is The Blood?

So I viewed the film There Will Be Blood, but chose to talk about Ledger, so this will be a refresher for myself. I saw the film at the Lyric, which is a sweet place. It’s reassuring to know that we can see left-of-center movies right in Fort Collins.

(plus who doesn”t want to drink when they’re at the movies)

Daniel Day-Lewis rocked this picture, as everyone expected. His early 20th century sound, and that mustache, can seel any role he tackles. His dialogue is spot on, and an eerie feeling went down my spine as i realized that Daniel Plainview (day-Leis) is not exactly the person we assumed.

 Jonny Greenwood’s sountrack is the perfect match for the dry landscape and growing tension. Keeping those eerie (one of the better words to describe a lot of this film) tones in the backround kept me on edge. The score is quite large, and embodies alot of the actions occuring in the film.

I personally love Paul Dano. I enjoy the roles he plays, and I feel he is developing as an actor. This role was not what I expected, with Sunday (Dano) proving to be as fake as Day-Lewis. I like him as this religious fanatic who may have different motives of his own.

I liked the film, but was surprised at the lack of violence. The title of the film lead me to believe that this film was going to get violent, but violence occurrs in very smal doses…

I suppose that makes the blood more important when you finally see it

The Star, Ledger

For this blog I initially claimed to be reviewing the Daniel Day-Lewis film “There Will Be Blood”, a fiim I saw on Tuesday. This film was quite depthful, enough so to force me to postpone my blog thoughts so I can further process the…depth.

Second, and more importantly, I wanted to talk about Heath Ledger. I didn’t see “A Knight’s Tale”, nor “Lords of Dogtown”. I mean, I havn’t seen very much of Heath Ledger at all. My fondest memory occured when watching a clip of Brokeback Mountain in a class last semester. I was blown away by how old and weatherd his character seemed. His accent was strong, and The film was revolutionary in itself.

 Ledgers big breakthrough as an actor was this Batman Project. Early screenshots, and less than 20 seconds of dialogue (starting tonight, people wil die…i’m a man of my word…[meanacing evil laugh]) was enough to give me goosebumps. With the new approach to the Batman saga with Christopher Nolan’s Batman Begins, I had a renown faith in the superhero film. This picture was dark enough for it to really mesh with the releases of today. This second film looks to take that to the next level.

So what happens now to “The Dark Knight” and th nearly finished film? My prediction is similar to what happened with the film “Quen of the Damned” when Aaliyah passed away prior to its release. Does it matter that Ledger portrays a pshychotic clown with murder on the brain? Do the circumstances of his death disvalidate his stardom in regards to an unreleased film? I’ve heard and read many of these ideas and hypotheses over the past two weeks, and truthfully, I think Ledger is gonna appear in this film…and it may be his best yet.

something has found us…

For this initial blog, I though i’d highlight the very film that inspired me to make a film blog that anticipates the blockbusters of tomorrow…

and now it’s time to talk about CLOVERFIELD!!!

I have been eagerly anticipating this film, and had followed the viral marketing campaign that went along with it. the ability to dig for clues and be interactive with the project was something I havn’t really done in the past, but when inspired, I can get a little crazy.

I followed all of the film’s updates through a a blog over at blogspot (www.cloverfieldclues.com) nearly everyday! This guy Dennis seemed as excited to experience this film as I did, so major shout outs to him for keeping me in the loop!

I finally saw the film on 1-18-08 at 12:01am….and it was amazing. All of the excitement and suspense I expected was there. People who complained about motion sickness were probably the ones concerned witht he notion that they could get motion sickness, therefore, it’s probably psychosomatic…i mean, i was fine.

Overall, the film was original with a good mix of a love.story.line and monster madness (and the monster looked nothing like Godzilla). The notion of this “in-the-moment” filming is nothing like the slow pan style of former blockbusters, that feel so cookie-cutter sometimes. this film felt so real, and it was the mundane details that did it for me. The lack of camera anticipation made you truly feel like you were reacting to your surroundings, rather than a well plotted camera track.

All in all, I put a lot of faith in this film, and it delivered!!!! Goo see it!!!

…next week…There Will Be Blood!!! (or “How Paul Dano secretly took over the world”)