Monday, February 25, 2013

Nausicaa, A Separation, Amour, and/or Castaway to the Moon

We will watch / have watched most of these movies during the last week of International Cinema but you are not required to write about them. If you do choose to write about any of them then do so as a comment to this post and answer two of the following questions and you receive extra credit. Be sure to write which of these films you are responding to:

  • What is the theme of the film? Explain.
  • How was color used in the film? What did it symbolize?
  • How did the film help you understand another culture better?
  • Name something you've learned in this class that helped you appreciate the film more. Explain.
  • Imagine that a friend of yours was going to watch this film. What would you tell him or her ahead of time to prepare him or her to appreciate the film more?
  • How would this film be different if it were made in Hollywood?

13 comments:

  1. Tommy Kiter
    Castaway on the moon.

    The theme of this movie to is even though life gets hard and knocks you down your instinct is to get back up. Dont take your life for granted.

    It helped me understand to respect them more in filmaking because i like these kind of movies where you have to find your own way for food, nurtrition etc.

    How he was stranded on the deserted island and had to find a way to make food on his own. I would tell them yeah the starting is dull but as it goes on it gets better so don't stop at the begging to middle of the film.

    If this film was made in hollywood i think the person would actually get stranded on a island far away from shore, and watched the persons struggles to live life a way he could only make if this makes sense.

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  2. Tommy Kiter
    Nausicaa

    I dont really know what the theme of this movie would be.I think the color of this film was used quite well in my opinion.

    Well it helped me better understand the type of film making they do and what they have to do to make it like itself if this makes sense.

    I've learned about different countries their similarities and non similarities so i think it helped me appreciate how simliar and unsimilar their filmaking is compared to the u.s filmaking.

    I would warn them that it is nothing like our films but is anime so they might as well watch it because me and my friends like anime films.

    it would be alot different if it was made in hollywood the characters would be different just alot of things would change in this film. i really enjoyed this film and would recomend it to anyone.

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  3. Cast Away To the Moon

    Its really hard to think of a theme for this movie, at least for me. I kind of want to say its like even if you dont have a bunch of riches in your life it doesnt mean you cant be happy.. Because when the guy gets stuck on the island he realizes that his life is better there than it ever was in the city. He even had a friend. And the girl who hadnt left her room in 3 years found joy in a person she had never met.
    Or the theme could even be, if its meant to be love will find a way. I think of that because like i said, dude was stranded on an island by himself. Not many chicks and he doesnt exactly have any way to communicate with anyone. And the girl, even though she had an extensive social life (on the internet) she never left her room so its not like she was dating. But yet they both found each other.

    Seriously, this movie is so FREAKING cute. I didnt even get to watch the ending in class, i was absent on wednesday when we were supposed to finish it. So you know what i did? I got on netflix and watched it all the way through! THATS RARE. But i really really reallllllly liked this movie. I kinda think Will deserves a hug for suggesting it. :) *virtual hugs to Will*

    I doubt i would like this movie as much if it were made in Hollywood. The girls whole story wouldnt make sense because ( and im not saying americans arent on the internet a lot, because we definitely are ) but the whole asian culture thrives off of their blogs and other things. So thats important. And where the hell would we find a good enough island that you could spot messages on and then reply in america? Yeah no. But over all their messages wouldnt make sense. I mean they would, but the fact that this whole movie was filmed in whatever language they were speaking.. (Korean? I dont know i should look that up..) And only their messages were in English was awesome. Because English is like the universal language and their conversation was so to the point it left a lot of room for emotion towards the characters and their situations.

    Yeah so um, i dunno if that makes sense but i really really enjoyed this movie. :) I think im gonna find a copy i can buy just so i have it.<3

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  4. -Randi Michelle :)
    I'm going to write about both Castaway to the Moon and Nausicaa in this blogpost...so just so none of you will get confused. For Castaway to the Moon, I think theme is even though life is hard, we all have to deal with it one way or any other. Here's how I think of it, it's kind of a weird conclusion, but at the same time it sort of makes sense. I think life's "fate" system kind of went all crazy on Kim Seong-Geun, and as punishment for trying to kill himself by jumping off the bridge, was to be left on the island to show him how crappy life REALLY is without civilization. But joke's on life, that's all he wanted, was to be as far away from all the stressful people as possible. Which is why all that bad weather started happening, to try to get him to realize how hard it was to live there. And eventually, since he wouldn't give up, fate's bull crap system took it all away from him when it realized that it was his only happiness. Either that, OR fate decided it wasn't his time to die, because he was meant to meet that girl in the end. It's kind of a weird thought, but that's just how I see it, hahaha!
    Now, I fell asleep in the very beginning of Nausicaa, because I SUCK AT LIFE. So, I don't really know what happened in the first 15-30 minutes or so. BUT I'll try my best to describe my point of view to what I THINK happened. I think the theme of this movie was to not judge a book by it's cover. The humans automatically assumed that the bugs were evil, just because of the pollution that covered the bug's land. When really, the human's were the cause of it. The people in each group kind of had a good and bad side to them too, like the group that Absel was in, they didn't really know any better than to try and blow up the bugs because they thought it was the only way to stop them and the pollution. That's why they locked up Nausicaa, not really for being evil so her people would be killed, but so the pollution would be destroyed and good would restore to the land. They didn't know that the humans were the one's causing all the mess.
    I think Castaway to the Moon would've been kind of lame if it was made in Hollywood for a few reasons. I think that once he got stuck on the island, instead of an obsessive internet girl keeping track of him, it'd be the military being all up in his business. There's be helicopters trying to capture him, and he'd be running away and becoming a fugitive. He'd have to dodge land mines and other insane traps that were laid out by like crazy hooligans or something. Either that or the military would force him to stay on that island, and wouldn't let him leave, as an experiment to see how humans would live without others for like a zombie apocalypse or something. OH, and there'd be explosions of course. Lots and lots of explosions.
    Something that I learned to appreciate Nausicaa more was that Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli is really into nature and spiritual/buddhist themes. I really like how they also focus a lot on telling the viewers that the hero doesn't always have to be prince charming saving the damsel in distress. In a lot of their movies, especially in this one, they show this a lot. I also like how they show that everyone in this world, no matter what kind of person you are, has a good and bad side. I think this is why I enjoyed these movies so much as a kid, they were just so unique and amazing in their own way, and were different than the average cliche cartoon movie. I loved both of these films, and would definitely recommend them to someone who was interested in these kinds of movies.

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  5. Nausicaa:

    I think the theme of this film is to respect your surroundings. Everyone was so afraid when they found out Nausicaa had gone into the forest because they said it was dangerous. But I think, since she respected the forest and its creatures, no harm came to her. She had a way with animals as well, so that may have helped a bit... but I still think it's mainly because she knows how to respect her surroundings.

    I've noticed that Hayao Miyazaki films are always really bright, but really dark. For the protagonist and all of the people he/she (usually she) associates with are all dressed in bright colors, they have bright eyes, bright hair, and their surroundings are all very bright. Then later on in the movie when the conflict arises, it goes darker every time there's a scene with the antagonist. There's a lot of explosions and a lot of darkness I've noticed in his movies. Howl's Moving Castle and Nausicaa would both be really good examples of that.

    If someone I knew was going to watch Nausicaa, I would let them know that it's really amazing and that the creatures in the film are both really creepy and weird, but can also be cute! I mean, come on... you cannot tell me the Ohmus aren't cute. Let's get real here, they're adorable... when they're not ragin'. And Teto is sooooo cute. But he was kinda freaky when you first saw him and when he bit Nausicaa. And I would warn them to maybe turn their sound down because there's a lot of yelling and explosions (planes, mostly). But I definitely would recommend this movie to anyone I know. Any of Hayao Miyazaki's movies. He's brilliant. I loved all of his movies.

    I don't even want to imagine how Hollywood would ruin this movie.

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  6. Ashton Bowers:
    Castaway on the moon
    The theme to film film i think would be Hope. because they talk about hope a lot in the movie, and the man turns away a bunch of black bean noodles because not having them gave him the hope needed to make his own and to try and make living down there easier himself. At first i thought the movie was going to be a kind of boring and depressing movie but it got interesting after a bit. i liked how this guy seemed to have more of a life on a small island under a bridge than in the city, and how he got a girl who only left her room to use the bathroom outside to do things.

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