Week5: Respond to content

FILM… and its power.

Jeremy (2007) poses the question, is film “…magic, simple entertainment or clever propaganda?”. He then continues with, “In my humble opinion, it is all three” (Jeremy 2007, p.g 1). I would have to agree with this statement. Film has the ability to educate, entertain, and persuade simultaneously, but does so through the disguise of telling a story. Magic or a smart use of screenplay conventions? Perhaps both….

“Rubber” is a fascinating movie. The concept of a killing tyre is truly original. The introduction scene and where the viewer first meets the star of the film – Tyre – is a long shot, over the desert. This allows for the audience to determine where and who. The next scene, focusing on the ‘who’, is of a close shot of the tyre, resembling its birth into the world. The close shot of the tyre enables the viewer to understand the tyre’s emotion, and to reinforce its ‘coming’ into the world, through shaking itself loose from the ground. The introduction to “Rubber” perfectly sets up the film, by defining where the film is based (through the use of a long camera shot), and who the film is based upon (through the use of a close camera shot).

"Rubber", is the perfect example of a movie utilising the conventions of a typical film, to depict a not-so-typical story; both magic and a smart use of film techniques.

REFERENCE LIST:

Jeremy 2007, The Power of Film, viewed 26 August 2011, http://www.filmindustry.com/2007/07/the-power-of-film/