Film/Text and Culture

I like to look these movies up on IMDB after I view them, so of course I did for this one. It perplexed me that Beth was made younger than Amy, and my original theory was that they wanted a younger character to die to make it more “heartwrenching.” After looking at the trivia for the movie however, the rest of the class was right (or Dr. Campbell, I can’t remember who suggested this) and Beth was made younger because of the availability of the actress.

I became interested in why this occured, so I found this nifty page on Wikipedia about the studio system.

It is interesting to note that Margaret O’Brien, who played Beth, was only really known for being a child actress. She wasn’t even named Margaret, her first name was Angela. She took the name Margaret after her first major role, as was expected for a child star. Talk about the movies controlling your life.

Ok. Let’s reveal another interesting fact about me to open this post. My parents named me after Katharine Hepburn. Except they didn’t like how she spelled her name. So they changed the second a to an e. So I’m really not named after Katharine Hepburn. Plus I’ve never seen her in a movie in my life. And let me just tell you, after watching this 1933 version of Little Women, I really do not want to be associated with her. I’m sure she’s probably done some really good movies (unless my parents were just crazy when they named me) but she sucked in this one (In my own opinionated and well chosen words.) I hated how unfeminine and tomboyish she was. I know Jo is supposed to be tomboyish, but Hepburn takes it to the extreme. Very extreme. The book Jo loved to do boy things and talk to boys, but I don’t recall her screaming a lot and acting totally uncivilized. But according to others, her performance was pretty good. The Wikipedia page for the movie says that Hepburn won the 1934 Golden Medal for Best Actress at the Venice Film Festival and also established her roles as strong characters in all other movies she was in.

I’m not a tomboy. I hope I didn’t let my parents down.

Let me start this off by saying I haven’t seen a lot of the movies that I am “supposed” to see, according to pretty much everyone I ever meet. I am constantly hearing, “Wait, you haven’t seen (fill in a popular movie)? Do you live under a rock?”

Miller’s Crossing opened me up to the world of the Coen brothers, and now I fully intend on seeing Fargo now, because it’s one of those movies I apparently missed while living under my rock. Miller’s Crossing was great. My favorite scene? Shockingly, when the house becomes a raging gun battle and goes up in smoke. That scene was pretty awesome. More to come later.

I hate the snobbery that is associated with the word “art.” Art to many people is supposed to be some unique, never before seen work. But honestly, I don’t get a lot of what people call “art.” At an art museum near my house, someone had sawn a table in half and mounted it on the wall and is probably making a lot of money off of it. I just don’t get it. Why would I want to look at that? I think art should be a little more enjoyable than that. Art should not be this exclusive club that only a handful of people “understand.” I think movies are a form of art. It has meaning, and the audience can enjoy it. The amount of work that goes into every scene in a movie and how deliberate everything is done is just as great as any painting in a museum or book on a shelf or song on a record. Sure there are some pointless movies out there, but there sure is a lot of pointless paintings out there in my eyes as well. So art critics just need to cut movies a break.

My favorite aspect of this movie would have to be the comedy laced in.  Being a comedy fan, of course this is what I picked out.  Everything from the little timeteller man shuffling around, to the huge hulking giant carrying a big mallet, to the mama’s boy who mama doesn’t really like, they were my favorite characters.  Who doesn’t love a little humor every now and then?

On to some serious stuff I learned today.  I would like to point out that the scene where Sanjuro is being beaten up is pretty much exactly the same scene in The Glass Keywhere Ned Beaumont is beaten up, including the two cronies sitting playing a game and the main character’s cunning escape.  This must be Heisler’s “tip of the hat,” just like George Lucas’ in Star Wars that we discussed today (which really made me want to see those movies again).

Why do directors copy scenes from other directors’ works? It has two sides to it: some might say that this is an easy way out of making a movie, just put a bunch of scenes together that have worked really really well in the past and make them your own.  But I think it is much more than that.  It’s not like they are copying the whole movie (oh wait that happens all the time…), directors are just using little bits that show that they know what a good scene is made of.  I like it.  It works. It entertains the crowd. So why not?

After today’s class, my view  of the book “The Glass Key” has changed completely.  I have never been able to analyze a book the way we did in class today, and it was interesting to break down the true meaning behind every word that Hammett writes.  The scenes came to life, more than a film ever has done.  I feel that the words Hammett uses in the book are so full of imagery, so full of meaning.  The play between red and white in the room where Janet and Ned Beaumont are talking, their play on words, the furniture descriptions, really got to me.

 The fact that Hammett never lets us as readers get into the character’s thoughts is a great way to tell the story, because the story is pretty much based on what everyone is thinking about everyone else.  We are left on the outside, making us characters in the story, trying to solve the murder.  It is a genius way to write a novel.

After analyzing the book like we did in class today, I have become excited to see what else we are going to be doing during the next three weeks.

Well I didn’t write anything yesterday so today I will talk about the movie “The Glass Key” as a whole, combining the two days.  The title at first confused me.  The original book, written by Dashiell Hammett, is where the movie gets most of its plot lines, with a few exceptions, as what happens with all books-made-into-movies.  I am not really a fan of the whodunit genre (I’m more of a romantic comedy girl) so I was expecting to be bored.  The movie in fact was actually better than I expected.  I really grew attached to Paul Madvig, and throughout the movie I really thought he was the one who killed Taylor.  Well I was wrong, which was a nice way to end the movie.  Of course, Ned gets the girl, as was expected, but not in the way I thought it would happen.  Madvig to just hand her over? It didn’t seem right. Except for him taking the ring back. I loved that.

 I just got finished reading the book.  Some of the dialogue in the book was exactly the same in the movie, and at some points the movie scrambled scenes around from the book.  Overall I liked the book better, because it gave me a chance to reread sections that I didn’t pick up the first time.

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