Before participating in this class I had very little knowledge on writing about film. To be honest I’ve never even written about film until just last year in one of my sociology classes. The assignment was to watch a movie of the professor’s choice and then compare and contrast what we saw in the film to particular sociology aspects. The movie that I chose to watch was called District 9, a sci-fi movie about humans and aliens co-existing and living among each other. As I watched the movie I wasn’t particularly critiquing it as we have been doing in this class, but it was still my first experience in writing about film. Since then I have learned to not only watch movies for enjoyment as I have done in the past, now I have to ability to really pay direct attention to the movie and all the hard work and thought processes that goes into making a quality film.
As the class progressed this quarter on a particular assignment I wrote about the special effects used for the movie Inception. This was by far my most favorite assignment that I participated in. The reason this was my favorite assignment is because Inception is a very complex movie which required a lot of special effects. It was very entertaining to research all of the various techniques that went into designing and implementing the special effects used in this movie. On that same note the most interesting movie for me that I watched in this class was also Inception. The main reasoning behind that is that I have watched Inception one time before class. The first time watching this movie I missed a lot of subtle hints and didn’t give the movie the fullest of my attention. This second time viewing the movie in class gave me the chance to really focus on the movie and gave me a little more insight on what is really happening in the movie. This class gave me the skills to effectively view film and analyze it for future writing assignments.
Writing, discussing, and researching all the movies we watched in this class certainly has changed my opinions and my ideas about these films. Some of the films we viewed in this class I must admit I didn’t think I would enjoy at all like Black Swan for instance. Before watching the movie I truly believed it was going to be flat out terrible. Much to my surprise however, as I began to discuss the movie as well as doing a little bit of research I came to realize that I didn’t hate that movie at all, in fact I actually like it. Given the chance to write an opinion paper on the film I would be compelled to give it a thumbs up. Through discussion, writing, and research this class allowed me to open up my mind and be more willing to indulge in movies that normally I would never consider.
In conclusion the knowledge that I am taking away from this class is the overall power of film critiquing. Before this class I simply watched movies as a form of entertainment and relaxation. After this class however, when I watch a movie now I can really give it my full attention and focus on the shots, the music, and the editing which really brings movies alive for me.
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