GENRE MATTERS

The 39th Annual Annie Awards - Field Trip?

2012-01-26T12:31:00.000-08:00

So I was just given a VIP ticket for the Annie Awards, to be held at Royce Hall, UCLA on February 4th. They are like the academy awards for Animation. Since I'm going to be there anyway, it seems like a good field trip for those interested. Patton Oswalt is hosting. For the animation fans, all of your idols will be there. Details are here.

Please post today and let me know if you would like to attend and I will get tickets.

Studio Ghibli Retrospective

2012-01-26T06:54:00.000-08:00

A very complete retrospective of Ghibli studio films begins this week. It gets a nice write up in the LA Times Hero Complex blog here.
For the full list of films, and ticket info, see here.
I am sort of assuming that all of the animation fans have seem most of these films, but if you haven't then you should start planning your calendar now. These are some of the best animated features ever made.

Top Movie Nominations

2012-01-25T21:29:00.000-08:00

http://www.rollingstone.com/movies/news/the-artist-leads-in-84th-annual-academy-award-nominations-20120124
Hugo and The Artist lead the nominations for best field. It is interestingthat Altman talks about how each generation must use the films of the past tomeet its own needs and the film The Artist went back in time to 1927. The useof black and white in a film in our day and age where technology and specialeffects are thriving in the industry shows how the romantic comedy genre isstill successful to the producers. On the contrary the nomination of Hugo also shows how the advancement intechnology and special effects for animations is improving the popularity ofthe animated film genre.

some LA stuff

2012-01-25T17:35:00.000-08:00

I learned from a friend today that we, as USC students, can get cheaper movie tickets! Just go to the ticket office in the student union and you can major discounts (normal theater prices are over $12, but if you buy a ticket from the usc office, it could be $6.50 or $8).

Also, on Jan 31 @7pm in TCC 450 (hosted by SCBFF), there's an event called "Breaking into the Industry: Pick Their Brains" which is basically a huge panel/networking event with people from Paramount, NBC, etcetc. It's apparently a really popular event every year with more than 200 students showing up so he said to get there early.

Also on Feb 16, some people from the Onion are coming to USC for a panel.

A good way to stay up-to-date on free screenings (for example, they screened Flower of War for free) and such is to get onto the Cinema school listserv via their website.

Patton Oswalt's twitter yesterday

2012-01-25T04:23:00.000-08:00

Funniest thing I read yesterday. Oscars are a strange business. Pixar and Disney both shut out of the animation category. Tintin too?

Spike Lee: Studios "know nothing about black people"

2012-01-23T15:33:00.000-08:00

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/movies/2012/01/sundance-film-festival-spike-lee-red-hook-summer.html

This article reminded me of the discussion we had in Dr. Johnson's class on Friday. When Spike Lee was on stage at the Sundance Film Festival answering questions about his newest film, "Red Hook Summer," Chris Rock asked him how the movie would have looked if it had been produced in a studio. Spike Lee proceeded to go on a "tirade" about the studio world... at one point saying that they "know nothing about black people." I was wondering what other people think of this comment... do you agree or disagree? I feel as though it is true in a lot of ways, but too much of a sweeping generalization to fully agree with.

Also, in terms of genre, how do you think Spike Lee would differentiate between African-American based films made in major studios vs. those made independently like his own? Is there potential for two separate genres to emerge based on how race is handled differently in the varying forms of production?

Here's the clips we Saw in Class

2012-01-22T17:52:00.000-08:00

Scenes from Last Class:
Subversive Side of Musicals --
1). "Too Darn Hot" from Kiss Me Kate (1953)
2). "Bang Bang" from Robin and the 7 Hoods (1964)
3). "White Boys/Black Boys" from Hair (1979)
4). scene from Hedwig and the Angry Inch (2001) -- I didn't see a you tube link for this one. Sorry.

Phases of the Musical:
1. Prototype
A Roy Rogers clip and then Hallelujah I'm a Bum (1933)
2. Classical
"The Deadwood Stage" from Calamity Jane (1953)
"The Barn Dance Number" from Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (1954)
3. Refinement
"A Dime and a Dollar" from Red Garters (1954)
"Best Things in Life Are Dirty" from Paint Your Wagon (1969) -- Apparently too embarrassing to put on You Tube.
4. Self-Reflexive
"Air-otica" from All That Jazz (1979)

The two missing clips from the self-reflexive section were:

1. "The Trapper Song" from Canibal! The Musical (1993)

2. "Montage" from Team America: World Police (2004)

Warner Bros. and Central Perk!

2012-01-21T19:28:00.000-08:00

I must say, we all look mighty fine!

Breakfast before the field trip

2012-01-20T12:29:00.000-08:00

We'll meet at Moore's Deli -- 271 East Orange Grove Avenue, Burbank, CA -- at 10:00 a.m.

The menu is here.

We need to be a Warner's Studio by Noon. The address and parking instructions for that are below:

3400 W. Riverside Dr. Burbank, CA 91505

Enter Through Avon Street Parking on Gate 6 ($7.00 parking fee)

Learning Punk

2012-01-15T23:25:00.000-08:00

http://blogs.laweekly.com/stylecouncil/2012/01/punk_rock_museum_tequila.php#more

The Punk Rock Museum opened this past Saturday. It features art work and events that exemplify and pay tribute to punk rock culture. This I find interesting, as it will exhibit a style of music, dress, behavior, etc. that many would argue is still alive. I suppose not all museums are houses of retrospect, but there is a typical assumption that they are. I can't help but make that assumption on some level. "Punk" is being put on display. The pieces of a movement have been identified and marked so clearly that they can be named. They can be separated and exhibited! According to Altman's suggestion that genre often emerges through failure or the passing of a trend, does this mean that punk is irrefutably dead? Because it can be categorized? Is it now a relic of the past, only to be imitated and revived? Not sure what my thoughts are yet, but either way, it's ironic that the museum was founded in order to fulfill a promise to "keep punk alive"...

POLANSKI

2012-01-15T23:13:00.000-08:00

As I said in class, Roman Polanski, the director of Chinatown, has lived a life worth its own movie. In fact, HBO did an excellent documentary on his legal troubles which I including above. It's called Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired. Clearly Polanski is the most divisive director working today -- a criminal on the lam, a convicted child rapist, but also a Holocaust survivor and a victim of Charles Manson, one of America's most famous mad killers.

His best films, besides Chinatown, include:
Knife in the Water
Repulsion
Rosemary's Baby
Tess
The Pianist

But there are many other very interesting films as well. He played in many different genres -- even a pirate movie -- but his best work is in Hitchcockian style suspense thrillers and horror, obviously informed by his own dark and tragic history.

If you are interested in any of his films, I would gladly loan ones to you.

What was NOIR again?

2012-01-15T22:10:00.000-08:00

We touched briefly on film noir in class and I gave a fairly quick history. For a further relatively brief review, read more here.

Forget it, Jake. It's Zombie Town.

2012-01-15T21:56:00.000-08:00

This picture is from the new blu-ray of our film from last week - Chinatown. It was noted on the Hollywood Elsewhere site that J.G. looked like a zombie detective in the illustration. More importantly, I learned that the new DVD will have a commentary track with the writer, Robert Towne, and David Fincher. I can't wait to hear Fincher's comments on the film.

Until then, the thought of Zombies in Chinatown will have to hold us over.

GW: LA Street Art.

2011-04-11T13:34:00.000-07:00

Article: Three pioneers of L.A. graffiti art scene

Hey peeps, here is a nice little article about "street art." As the article briefly explains, street art is a genre (my words) of art that was predominantly created by three guys: Chaz Bojórquez, Craig Stecyk and RISK. Bojórquez, when he was younger, did a lot of gang graffiti art. Stecyk, on the other hand, had a big stake in the surf/skate/punk graffiti (as opposed to gang, in case you're not paying attention). Finally, RISK was in charge of bringing New York subway graffiti to the freeways of Los Angeles.

The article serves more as an ad to the venues that will be featuring the work of these artists in the LA area, but the information it includes about the influences of street art is interesting. The article includes links to pages where you can see the artist's info and work.

Also, you should check out the dates for the events that will be featuring the artist's work. The dates are all towards the end of our school semester and a bit after the program ends, so you might have time to go check it out. So do it. Gracias.

Great sign of Hollywood!!!!

2011-04-02T14:55:00.000-07:00

http://www.360cities.net/image/hollywood-sign#0.83,5.48,70.0

CHECK OUT THIS MAP OF LA

2011-04-02T12:09:00.001-07:00

http://projects.latimes.com/mapping-la/neighborhoods/

AMC Theaters will unspool genre label - Entertainment News, Film News, Media - Variety

2011-03-31T18:42:00.000-07:00

If this is not the most perfect news related to GENREEEEE, I dont know what is. This is actually a very cool concept--where have all our horror films gone?! Resurrect the genre (hopefully these films will be actually scary....not scary in the way the Devil Wears Prada was scary...more like how SCREAM haunted my dreams (night and day dreams) until i was 13 :)

The article is brief, from Variety, but it basically details a joint venture involving mega-player, AMC Theaters, that will bring horror films to 32 major stateside markets; these films will also be sold on DVD, blue-ray, projection reel, HD, scan disk, whatever the heck else is out there....

AMC Theaters will unspool genre label - Entertainment News, Film News, Media - Variety

Tim Burton Exhibit at LACMA May 29- Oct 31, 2011

2011-03-31T18:25:00.000-07:00

anyone getting their money's worth and staying at Gateway until the end of May?

this will definitely interest you, as we have all grown up (probably) admiring Tim Burton's work.

Category:: Visual Arts

When:: Sunday, May 29, 2011 10:00 am
Add to Calendar

Where:: Los Angeles County Museum of Art - LACMA
based on 369 reviews
5905 Wilshire Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90036
(323) 857-6000

How:: Official Website

Cost:: $12.00 - $20.00

What/Why:: From Beetlejuice to Batman, from Ed Wood to Willy Wonka, the characters that Tim Burton has brought to movie screens are notable for their dark idiosyncrasies and macabre weirdness.

Burton's goth universe -- at once disturbing and oddly inviting -- will land at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in a major retrospective exhibition featuring artwork tied to his movies as well as original drawings, sculptures and other works created throughout his career.

The show is scheduled to run from May 29 to Oct. 31, 2011.

The show will feature more than 700 individual pieces of art from Burton's own archive, as well as from studio archives and private collections of Burton's collaborators.

punk rock retrospective

2011-03-28T20:13:00.000-07:00

ugh you guys is this topical or what--i don't even remember if maybe someone brought this up in our presentation on friday or if this is new info, but this dudie who photographed a bunch of LA's punk rock scene is having an exhibit at the Subliminal Projects gallery.

check out the article in the LA times: http://www.latimes.com/theguide/art/la-et-guidefeature-20110225,0,5471733.story?tumblr

Genre Watch: Rom Coms- It's all about the stars, we can even use the same plot back to back now!

2011-03-20T23:33:00.000-07:00

Hollywood Romantic Comedies has always been about the stars. They are date night movies, the public wants to see a fairy tale with their favorite actors, no need for complicated plots or characters.

I get it. But the movies just keep getting dumber to the point that we have Just Go with It released earlier this year. I saw the 2:30 trailer and had absolutely no clue what the movie was about. Watched it again and realized it was about Jennifer Aniston & kids co. pretending to be a fam with Adam Sandler, so he could impress another girl. First who would actually do that, where does that logic even come from? I get it's a genre follow up to the actually funny Sandra Bullock rom com, The Break Up. At least, there was a excusable reason why Ryan Reynolds had to pretend to be married to Sandra Bullock. However, Just Go with It made 140 million on a budget of 80 million, so to everyone in Hollywood, it was a success.

So here's an even better way to make money- Let's not wait a year or two to make a movie with somewhat the same plot. Let's just wait two months and make the exact same movie twice. The public will still go see it if we do enough advertising! First let's get A-listers Natalie Portman and Ashton Kutcher to smile and be cutesy in a romcom about friends with benefits who fall in love at the end. Yay, awesome idea because we just made $125 million on $25 million budget for No Strings Attached.

Now, give it a couple of weeks. Since there's basically no plot or thinking necessary for the public in No Strings Attached, they will probably not remember the movie! So let's get A-listers Mila Kunis and Justin Timberlake to smile and be cutesy in a romcom about friends with benefits who fall in love at the end. Let's not even waste the time to think of a clever title, let's just call it Friends with Benefits.

What's creepy is that Mila Kunis and Natalie Portman played the same person in Black Swan. And honestly, you can't look at Mila Kunis without thinking of The 70s Show, which brings up memories of Ashton Kutcher and No Strings Attached.

Watch both trailers here

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ubfcfs98MBw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34xfcoRceeU

You can click on either one link and understand both movies. Here's the best part:

"Screen Gems was given clearance to move forward with the title Friends with Benefits; Paramount Pictures dropped its original protest against the film after their director, Ivan Reitman, re-titled his film No Strings Attached. Friends With Benefits began production in July, 2010 in New York and Los Angeles. Complicating matters is the fact that NBC is planning a Friends With Benefits sitcom. Screen Gems stated that due to its production schedule, they don’t expect an issue to arise."

What's alarming is that the studios weren't fighting about the similarity of the plot of the movies. Sounds like they were fine with that, they were just annoyed at each other because they had the same title in mind. and then NBC is also doing a new pilot called Friends with Benefits, with Emma Stone starring. FOX has the script so I will be sure to read it on Tuesday and see how it compares.

Sorry if I sound bitter. I just wish the public would stop watching these movies so the Hollywood execs would have more motivation to actually take time to think of smarter and more original movies. But.....there's nothing I can do about it. Friends with Benefits is expected to gross its original budget back from opening weekend, according to last week's Variety.

LA Marathon

2011-03-17T16:02:00.000-07:00

Hi I am volunteering with FOX this Sunday morning for the LA Marathon. We will be at the Brentwood/Westwood station, and mainly our job is to cheer the runners on and provide refreshment. Great networking opportunity as there will be many other network/studio employees there helping out as Well. Email me if you want to go.

Thanks,
Kelsey

The Fair.

2011-03-12T13:42:00.000-08:00

When: March 18-20
Where: Harbor City: Corner of PCH and Avalon
What:
LAPD Habor Division Fair
Rides - Games - Food - Fun - Enterntainment
(Helm and Son Amusement)
Fri: 5-11
Sat/Sun: 1 - 11

50% off pre-sale ride tickets sold at police station.

I know a lot of you guys have beef with the cops, but this will be fun. Also, my internship people, IDEPSCA Day Labor Program, will have a table and the workers will be volunteering in order to keep relationships with the community and authorities at a good level. You now how the media likes to mess with these guys.

Anyway, keep it in mind for those here during spring break.

Metro Contest

2011-03-09T01:03:00.001-08:00

for those of you who take the bus/metro to work and would like a free ride for a week, enter to win.

http://www.metro.net/itineraries/

GW: Punk Cowboys.

2011-03-07T14:42:00.001-08:00

So I was reading the LA Times and I came across this article, laughed really loud, then decided to turn it in for credit:

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/music_blog/2011/03/the-majestic-silver-strings-a-fresh-spin-on-old-country.html

The article is about this group's, "The Majestic Silver String," new album, "The Majestic Silver Strings." The group is made up of these 4 acclaimed guitarists: Buddy Miller, Bill Frisell, Marc Ribot, and Greg Loisz. Of these, Miller is the main one being interviewed.

Miller talks a bit about his previous work. He never really knew much about western/cowboy music, but then he got into it and he made a band. One of his old bands in NYC was called Crackers. They played "harmelodic versions of country favorites and original compositions."

Later Buddy moved on and did some work that is not mentioned.

And now he's back with his three new buddies in The Majestic Silver Strings. They take a new turn on the western genre in that their songs sound different and don't follow the general "let's go out into the fields and sing around the campfire" feeling. In fact, Miller talks about how a buddy had let him borrow music sheets called "Cowboy Songs" from the 1930. He misread the signatures in the song, and understood the music to sound "punk." He liked it, so he incorporated it into his new album with his new buddies and, in essence, their work pushed "lighthearted music into darker territory." Miller says it's appropriate because of current events like the wars in the Middle East. Meaning that the Army are the new Cowboys, and the desert is the new prairie.

I'll include this little detail I found on Facebook because I was so confused when I first read the article: The Majestic Silver Strings Album "pushes each song into the new cosmos."

If anyone is interested in checking these homies out, think fast because they'll be at the Grammy Museum (at LA Live, I think) on March 10th.

A very interesting scholarly article

2011-03-06T14:53:00.001-08:00

I was working on my paper today and as I was searching for some articles, I came across "The Intertextual Discourse of South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut and Beavis and Butt-Head Do America". It is pretty funny, and it demonstrates how pretty much anything can be put in an academic framework when a proper language used and a structural analysis is performed. I hope that you enjoy it as much as I do!

click here!

-- Ece

Genre Watch- THR

2011-03-03T10:59:00.000-08:00

I was reading The Hollywood Reporter website this morning and this: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/blogs/live-feed/ginnifer-goodwin-star-abcs-once-163869 caught my attention. I realized that the "fairy tale" genre is making a come-back on both the big-screen and on television. This is the second show that I have seen ordered to pilot about fairy tales, the other, Grimm, is a sort of detective show taking place in the world of fairy tales (it's written by some former Buffy people, so I'm really excited about it). In addition, Beastly and Little Red Riding Hood are both arriving to theaters soon, the first is a take on "Beauty and the Beast." From what I can tell, these are all interpretations or subversions of the fairy tale genre, but still undeniably fairy tales.

Free Stuff. Read all.

2011-02-28T15:32:00.000-08:00

wuts good hoodrats.

here's some stuff im working on at my internship. put down ur party hats for 2 secs and read it through bc unless ur loaded, this affects you.

http://revolutionstreamed.tumblr.com/

HR1, a bill in the House, is going up for votes to cut funds where it hurts most. da underprivileged neighborhoods.

My internship is with an organization called IDEPSCA (http://idepsca.org/). I work in their Day Labor Program. If this HR1 bill goes through, about 50% of the funding that comes from the gov and city to keep the Day Labor Centers (IDEPSCA has 6) running will be gone. We estimate that the money will be enough to pay the rent for the center's but will have no staff or any of the services the centers offer (food, computer classes, esl classes etc).

this doesn't just affect the DLC however; the cuts will happen with family source centers, one source centers and work source centers nationwide.

IDEPSCA is not allowed to lobby so we currently looking at other ways to get our point across (well probs do something with our web VozMob: http://vozmob.net/).

im not sure what you guys can do or if you even care about doing something. but im letting u kno just in case. peace kids. o yea, no free stuff. my bad.

GW Feb Article on the Oscars [What else is there to report about anyway?]

2011-02-27T22:49:00.000-08:00

http://theenvelope.latimes.com/la-et-oscar-polish-20110225,0,7324788.story

Here is my article for this month's genre watch in the LA Times. Within a couple hours of the Oscars, the whole "movie" subsection of the "Entertainment" section of the LA Times was flooded with 'news' about the event, from red carpets, to behind the scenes, to winners to losers. One of the articles that caught my attention was this one about how Natalie Portman was a dork when she accepted her award for her work in Black Swan.

In an article about the LA Times that I read for my USC course, an old lady being interviewed by the NY Times said that in her opinion, she used to like the paper [LA Times] back in the day because she could open it up and see what her favorite stars were up to. (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/24/business/media/24latimes.html). This may or may not be true of the modern print version as a result of cutbacks dictated by the Chicago Tribune company that now owns the paper. However, this old lady clearly does not read the internet version of the paper, because if she had logged on to the page, she would have known everything and more about what Hollywood was up to tonight.

In this specific article on Portman, the reported argued that the actress ridiculed herself in a way that might later cost her a lot in her career. And what was her crime? She said her fiancee was totally going to want to sleep with her now that she won the Oscar and then she snorted. The approximately 1000-word article, however, kept some level of professionalism by interviewing important people on the incident complete with intro, body and analytical conclusion. This goes to show that the LA Times can be professional when it needs to [Business section, Local Section, Nation Section etc], but it can also be cool, up to date and trustworthy for those professionals that crave the gossip...that is if your not too old to not know how to use the internet. [hint hint, I'm talking abut the 'genre' of the paper.]

Autry Museum field trip

2011-02-26T08:03:00.000-08:00

I will meet everyone there at 11. The link for directions and parking is here.http://theautry.org/plan-your-visit/maps-and-directions

Comic Book and Musical Mash-Up an Epic fail?

2011-02-25T19:14:00.000-08:00

Spider Man: Turn Off the Dark is a new play that has been getting a lot of buzz. Probably because its a Broadway musical about a superhero. But maybe it could be the ridiculously large budget of ...drum roll please...... 65 million dollars. Take some time to lift up your jaw, I was shocked too. With so much bread and publicity backing the project, one would assume this must a sensational show. Well Jason Zinoman of Slate seems to think its some kind of epic... an epic fail.

This article describes Turn off the Dark as a mess. More importantly, it describes how this genre mash-up ends up "a comic book musical that seems to have no affection for comic books or musicals". I originally thought this was a harsh assessment considering the play adheres to the basic form of the original Spider Man story. But there's a twist that doesn't come until the second act - Arachne, the spider woman, a seductress. She selfishly vies for Spider Man's and Peter Parker's affection. And from what I've read, he wants her too. But of course as expected, Peter ends up with his wholesome Mary Jane rather than the sexpot spider lady. Surprised?

It's clear that creator Julie Taymor has no issue with toying with the norms surrounding genre. She allows the Spider Man we know to be seen while throwing in an artistic agenda that was unexpected. The show seems quirky and fun with Spider Man flying over the audience in some Cirque Du Soleil moves. I would be down to see it, but not because it is an eloquent blend of two genres I love. The combination sounds more to me like lamb and tuna fish than peanut butter and Jelly.

Check out the article for a full review. Its not all bad.

http://www.slate.com/id/2284320/

Great article in Entertainment Weekly about genre pilots for upcoming season

2011-02-24T11:51:00.000-08:00

Titled: The coolest, craziest, pilot season ever?

Talks about how the Big Four networks have never developed so many genre pilots, mainly serialized and sci-fi, as this season. ABC is rebooting Charlie's Angels, NBC is doing Wonder Woman and Grimm (retelling of fairy tales in a modern way), FOX is doing Alcatraz (similar to Lost)

The major question is why. Reason is pointing to that broadcasts need big hits and genre shows have a dedicated audience base and can become people's favorites easily (as quoted by FOX president, Kevin Reilly).

Truth.

2011-02-18T01:17:00.001-08:00

Not Quite a Musical

2011-02-17T11:55:00.000-08:00

Who would have thought that the Justin Beiber movie would be such a hit amongst preteens and critics alike? With its recent success, you can bet that Hollywood will follow-up with numerous theatrical releases of behind the scenes clips, concert footage and of course where it all began - the background - of the next hot commodity with the middle schoolers. Perfect marketing in my eyes. Adults are too stingy with money, college students have no money but preteens and teenagers are bringing in the big bucks with after school jobs or an insistent "daddy can I have 20 dollars?" every week. The music industry is always looking for new ways of promotion and to get their music out there now that streaming and illegal downloading has significantly hurt their market. So maybe they'll say no to the special edition CDs with extra footage DVDs attached and go straight to the theatre (how classy of them). We shall see.

http://popwatch.ew.com/2011/02/16/justin-bieber-never-say-never-directors-cut/

Fun Facts About LA

2011-02-14T14:09:00.001-08:00

Guys here are some fun and interesting facts about Los Angeles. Hope you Guys enjoy!!!

The Website is http://discoverlosangeles.com

A Valentine for Lindsay Lohan

2011-02-13T10:55:00.000-08:00

I helped my Funny or Die compadres make this on Friday, check it out! We're trying to get a bunch of people to watch it so it'll get on the front page. Yay!

http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/842bed3dd8/a-valentine-for-lindsay-lohan

MANDATORY FIELD TRIP WEDNESDAY

2011-02-08T22:30:00.000-08:00

MANDATORY field trip to the Margaret Herrick Academy Library is on the afternoon of Wednesday February 9th. We meet there at 1:50. The link is here. Directions, maps, rules, etc are here.
You need to be there for this one, and to be on time. They do us a very big favor by opening their doors to us on a day they are closed to the public and we cannot make them wait. Thanks.

Genre Matters, almost as much as puppies.

2011-02-08T16:36:00.000-08:00

So I was looking at Entertainment Weekly's website in search of something filled with genre. Unfortunately, all I could find was some Lindsay Lohan articles and of course the Oscars. Then I stumbled on this gem. Although only a paragraph long, it brings forth the idea of the animal genre. Since this show is on Animal Planet, that genre is easily identified. But many other movies overlook their furry counterparts in a hope to label their movies action or mystery.

Here's a little something furry.
http://insidetv.ew.com/2011/02/08/puppy-bowl-rating/

P.S. If anything is posted by lyricallies, it's me Deja. Don't mind my lame ass blog name. LOL

Genre Stuff

2011-02-07T10:31:00.000-08:00

here's a quick read related to blueprints and genres :)

avatar v pocahontas:

http://forum.yesbutnobutyes.com/assets_c/2010/01/avatar_cam-10649.html

The U.S. Superhero Shortage

2011-02-02T15:37:00.000-08:00

Here's an interesting piece about the trend of casting foreigners as American superheroes. [link]

Black Swan Editing Process

2011-02-02T09:17:00.001-08:00

WATCH THIS...it's only four minutes of your life

http://www.lookfx.com/assets/works/videos/1_mostrecent/BSW_VFX_BUILDS_V3.mp4

If you ride the red/some orange metro buses to work...

2011-02-02T08:28:00.000-08:00

make sure you pay attention to the tv's on them. they have little trivia and quizzes and brain teasers. if you are able to solve them you can email the answers to them (they give you the email depending on which game you are playing). then if you get the answer right, you get entered into a raffle to win free tickets to stuff (mostly movies, but hey LA theaters are expensive).

Seinfield as a thriller

2011-01-30T16:55:00.001-08:00

Click here

This video made me think of various elements that constitute a genre, and how reversal of the chosen scenes for a trailer can make such a big difference on the perception of genre if they are also coupled with the right kind of music. It made me think about the trailer of Unbreakable and how it did not exactly match the content of the movie, thus creating a disillusionment in the audience.

Cop Rock - a police musical hybrid show

2011-01-29T21:07:00.000-08:00

I mentioned Cop Rock in the last post so in case anyone doesn't know the show, I thought I'd post a clip.

'Buffy' writers sell Grimm's Fairy Tales pilot to NBC | Inside TV | EW.com

2011-01-29T16:55:00.000-08:00

'Buffy' writers sell Grimm's Fairy Tales pilot to NBC | Inside TV | EW.com

Here's a good example of the Genre Watch from Entertainment Weekly, stressing the idea of the genre Hybrid, in this case the fantasy police procedural, of which I can't think of many examples (Life on Mars, I suppose)-- But suddenly there's a rush of such projects. Here's the opening paragraph of the piece but keep reading.

NBC has picked up another pilot mixing fantasy with a crime drama: The network has greenlit Grimm, described as a “dark but fantastical cop drama about a world in which characters inspired by Grimm’s Fairy Tales exist.” (Gotta love mining expired copyrights in the public domain!)....The order comes on top of Battlestar guru Ron Moore’s 17th Precinct, also at NBC, about cops working a town where people have magical powers.

Okay, EW didn't do that good a job reporting on the trend. Ain't it Cool news did better, mentioning these other projects:

" ... It also sounds a bit like the ABC project“Fables,” based on Bill Willingham’s DC/Vertigo graphic novels about fairy-tale characters who find themselves exiled to contemporary New York.

And sounds not unlike Fox’s “Georgia and the Seven Associates,” about a young lawyer banished from a top law firm run by her stepmother and forced to team up with seven quirky lawyers at a storefront legal office. One of her cases dealt with three people whose homes were taken away by something called Wolf Corp."

Kudos to AICN for at least mentioning Fables, which is a comic series that is certainly influencing all of these projects. This whole concept reminds me though of the 1990 cop musical show, "Cop Rock." which you have to see to believe how bad it was. Are all genre hybrids possible, or are some incompatible?

The Fighter KOs the sports-movie cliches | Film | The Guardian

2011-01-29T16:43:00.000-08:00

The Fighter KOs the sports-movie cliches | Film | The Guardian

The Guardian has a perfect Genre Watch piece on the fight-movie, sports films and The Fighter. It takes the position that the only way to make a really good sports movie may be to avoid or downplay the conventions of the sports movie. He uses other films to support his argument, but can anyone think of any counter examples?

"The biggest loser in David O Russell's The Fighter is the fight-movie in particular, and the sports-movie genre in general. Usually when a sports movie kicks off, we can anticipate a harrowingly familiar structure defined by the passage of the season, from warm-ups and practice through qualifying heats - or, in this case, bouts - through the quarters and semis and the final itself, with a side-dish of triumph over adversity, moral or familial redemption, getting the girl and saving your soul. It's an iron-clad formula that makes sports movies similar to rock'n'roll biopics like Ray and Walk The Line – they have exactly the same plot and structure, and are often the same movie.

... Russell makes the necessary concessions to the demands of genre, and if you fail to shed a tear then you're made of stone – but they don't dominate his characters or their story, and the result is his best and most soulful movie since Three Kings.The best sports movies are the ones with the smallest amount of actual sport in them: This Sporting Life, where the action is all in pubs and bedrooms, with the rugby field an existential zone of combat; ditto Raging Bull, with its mere 18 minutes of epoch-making fight footage set against a convincing, lovingly detail-packed evocation of Italian-American, working-class family life in the 1940s and 50s. ...

Sporting Life – is what helps The Fighter escape the confines of genre and expectation. Without all that humming, bustling, foul-mouthed, real-life humanity, it might just have been another sports movie – another Gridiron Gang, another Any Given Sunday – instead of a new admission to the Pantheon of Great Sports Movies – for which one needs more than mere sport •

Science fiction teaches governments—and citizens—how to understand the future of technology. - By Robert J. Sawyer - Slate Magazine

2011-01-29T16:05:00.000-08:00

Science fiction teaches governments—and citizens—how to understand the future of technology. - By Robert J. Sawyer - Slate Magazine

I'm going to do some sample posts using some of your assigned genre watch periodicals. Here's one from Slate.
I just mentioned the literary origin of Science Fiction in class, and we were talking about how ideology and Industry might structure Genre, but here's a piece on how genre , science-fiction specifically, might structure ideology and industry instead. Highlights below, but the whole piece is worth reading as are the comments section.I
A debate rages there over whether or not Literary SF is so negative that it actually impedes public acceptance of science innovation. Also of interest to me is that the Slate author seems only willing to give literary SF respect or acknowledge its influence, i.e. Heinlein matters, but not Kubrick. Thoughts?

"Mary Shelley's 1818 novel Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus,is generally considered the first work of science fiction. It explores, in scientific terms, the notion of synthetic life: ...Think about that: Mary Shelley put these questions on the table almost two centuries ago—41 years before Darwin published The Origin of Species and 135 years before Crick and Watson figured out the structure of DNA. Is it any wonder that Alvin Toffler, one of the first futurists, called reading science fiction the only preventive medicine for future shock?

Isaac Asimov, the great American science fiction writer, defined the genre thus: "Science fiction is the branch of literature that deals with the responses of human beings to changes in science and technology." The societal impact of what is being cooked up in labs is always foremost in the science fiction writer's mind. ... What's valuable about this for societies is that science-fiction writers explore these issues in ways that working scientists simply can't. Some years ago, for a documentary for Discovery Channel Canada, I interviewed neurobiologist Joe Tsien, who had created superintelligent mice in his lab at Princeton—something he freely spoke about when the cameras were off. But as soon as we started rolling, and I asked him about the creation of smarter mice, he made a "cut" gesture. "We can talk about the mice having better memories but not about them being smarter. The public will be all over me if they think we're making animals more intelligent." But science-fiction writers do get to talk about the real meaning of research. We're not beholden to skittish funding bodies and so are free to speculate about the full range of impacts that new technologies might have—not just the upsides but the downsides, too.

So this is a good genre find in Slate and it's it wasn't in the "arts" section, rather it was under SCIENCE. Don't limit your reviews to just the entertainment section -- Genre is everywhere.

Movie Blog

2011-01-28T22:59:00.000-08:00

My friend has a blog where she reviews movies (new and old) in a really funny and enlightening way. She has a gift for getting to the heart of the film to figure out what they did right and what they did wrong and I rarely disagree with her analysis. So, if you want to know about a film you've been wanting to see or you want to make a stranger watch a terrible film (she'll watch anything, you just have to request it), the link is: http://criticaloptimist.wordpress.com/.

The Day the Movies Died

2011-01-28T09:34:00.000-08:00

There is a great feature article in the February 2o11 GQ issue about the Hollywood studio system and the audience. It's called "The Day The Movies Died" by Mark Harris. It's an examination of the genres that are popular today and why that is. The author hypothesizes that the genre studio movies area mainly just a response to what the audience wants. His main argument is that Hollywood isn't in any hurry of making any creative or original movie, instead they want something that already has a franchise. He talks about how the studio never thought Inception would succeed the way it did. At first, the studio invested in Inception to appease Chris Nolan so that he would continue making Batman 3. However, Inception 2 or 3 would be a breeze to get funding for, especially if it's 3D, heh.

Overall, relevant extension of what we are discussing in class and extremely interesting to read.

Above is one of the pages of the article. The full article is not online, otherwise I would post the whole thing.

Stahl House aka Case Study House #22

2011-01-25T22:42:00.001-08:00

How many of you are familiar with this iconic LA photo from 1960? The house still exists today and tours are available.

Films referenced in class

2011-01-23T21:29:00.000-08:00

The 3-D Ann Miller dance number was from "Kiss Me Kate" (1953), which is a musical version of "10 Things I Hate About You." (or, technically, Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew, if you want to be picky. That was followed by Sammie Davis Jr. in "Robin and the 7 Hoods"(1964), the black/white boys are delicious number from "Hair" (1979), and finally "Hedwig and the Angry Inch" (2001).

In terms of genre stages, we started with a Roy Rogers film, then under classical stage, we saw scenes from "Calamity Jane" (1953) and "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers" (1954). The there was the weird looking western "Red Garters" (1954) and the airport number from "All that Jazz"(1979).

And if you enjoyed the off beat nature of some of the scenes, critic Jonathan Rosenbaum did a list of off-beat musicals for DVD Beaver, which includes a couple of the above films, as well as some other prizes like Dr. Seuss's one foray into film -- "The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T." You can read the full list here.

USC Event: Project ReMix

2011-01-19T14:11:00.000-08:00

USC Event

Asian Pacific American Student Services/El Centro Chicano/
Center for Black Cultural and Student Affairs

Project ReMix
"Exploring the Mixed Race Generation"

Express Yourself: Opening Night Showcase
Jan 27 2011 6-8pm
Ground Zero

Your identity is your story. Your story is your self expression!
Join us for an evening of inspiration, thought and creativity.
Share your journey at the mic through poetry, spoken word, rap, song, art, dance...Express Yourself!

RSVP to ecc@usc.edu by Wednesday January 26th.
Refreshments provided. Free ReMix t-shirt giveaways!

Paley Fest - a required event

2011-01-19T10:47:00.000-08:00

Okay, I have to order tickets at 9 on Friday. That means I need to know in advance what you are interested in. Each person gets to go once. We can do three events in total. The Freaks and Geeks reunion is going to sell out immediately but we'll try for that one. The ones at the end are during spring break so keep that in mind. In fact, I can't do community or raising hope so cross those off the list. I need to know who wants what before Friday. One Additional thing -- I can only buy four tickets per event under my membership so we can't all go to True Blood (which will also sell out really quickly).

Golden Globes

2011-01-16T23:48:00.001-08:00

So if you guys didn't catch the Golden Globes tonight that happened a couple miles away from us...

here are the winners-

Best Motion Picture - Drama: "The Social Network"

Best Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy: "The Kids Are All Right"
Best Director: David Fincher, "The Social Network"
Best Screenplay: Aaron Sorkin, "The Social Network"
Best Actor - Drama: Colin Firth, "The King's Speech"
Best Actress - Drama: Natalie Portman, "Black Swan"
Best Actor - Musical or Comedy: Paul Giamatti, "Barney's Version"
Best Actress - Musical or Comedy: Annette Bening, "The Kids Are All Right"
Best Supporting Actor: Christian Bale, "The Fighter"
Best Supporting Actress: Melissa Leo, "The Fighter"
Best Foreign Language Film: "In a Better World"
Best Animated Film: "Toy Story 3"
Best Original Score:Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, "The Social Network"
Best Original Song: Diane Warren ("You Haven't Seen The Last of Me"), "Burlesque" p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 18.0px Marker Felt}

Opinions & Thoughts? I thought Colin Firth & Natalie Portman deserved the win. I was rooting for Helena Bonham Carter for supporting, she was so natural in The King's Speech, but I haven't seen The Fighter so can't compare to Melissa Leo. Thought Inception was more well directed than Social Network and Chris Nolan should have won. Aaron Sorkin did have his screenplay in the bag though. Hoped Kevin Spacey would have won supporting, Casino Jack was excellent. Can't believe this is the first time Christian Bale wins a golden globe.

Movies I will see by the end of this month:

The Kids are All Right, Blue Valentine, The Fighter, Rabbit Hole

haha the lifetime award to Deniro...what happened to little fockers?

Helena B Carter's style was awesome. Christian Bale is still bizarre--not in a good way. Angelina Jolie should not wear that green dress again, Tina Fey and Steve Carrell made me laugh.

Genre Matters Assignment

2011-01-15T17:47:00.000-08:00

Just so you all know which source you are covering all semester -- and because Kelsey doesn't know hers by default ,,,
Brent -- Onion AV Club
Uki -- Ain't it Cool News
Andrew -- NY Times
Carrie -- Hollywood Reporter
Ece -- New Yorker
Funmi -- Slate/Salon
Deja -- Entertainment Weekly
Nick -- Variety
Becca -- LA Weekly/Village Voice
Michelle -- LA Times
Kelsey -- The Guardian (British newspaper)

What you are supposed to do is read your source daily, including blogs on the site, and link and analyze interesting stories that deal with genre in an interesting way. I'll provide samples soon, but start reading now to get into the habit.

elvis presley - king creole

2011-01-15T16:51:00.001-08:00

In the preceding post I mentioned that there was an Elvis double feature and that King Creole shows better than most why Elvis was so popular to a certain generation. This is not the fat white jump suit Elvis but a scarily charismatic performer that just exudes sex appeal. Watch the video and tell me I'm wrong. ... And let me know if it inspires interest in venturing out to see it on the big screen.

Elvis' two best movies -- Double Feature a end of month

2011-01-15T16:51:00.000-08:00

The Aero is the west side branch of the American Cinematheque (corresponding to the Egyptian in Hollywood, but not as nice). On Sunday January 30th, there's an Elvis Presley double feature of Jailhouse Rock and King Creole with special guests. These two films, along with Viva Las Vegas, are Elvis' best film work and if you never understood the sexiness/attraction of Elvis, King Creole will have you saying, "Ah, .... I get it now." We'll have just finished talking about musicals in class, so I could be easily talked into making this an official outing if any of you are interested.

Here's details:

"Double Feature: JAILHOUSE ROCK, 1957, Warner Bros., 96 min. Dir. Richard Thorpe. In his third film, Elvis is Vince Everett, a guy in the pen for manslaughter. His cellmate, Hunk Houghton (Mickey Shaughnessy) is a former country star who introduces him to the record business. Once the King is released, he quickly rises to the top as a rock ‘n’ roll singer. But will he remember the folks who got him there? Another of Elvis’ best, it features slambang Leiber-Stoller songs, and the jaw-dropping "Jailhouse Rock" production number. Elvis belts out the title tune as well as "Baby, I Don’t Care" and more! [35mm]TrailerKING CREOLE, 1958, Paramount, 116 min. Director Michael Curtiz (CASABLANCA) directs yet one more of The King’s better films. Although the studio and The Colonel toned things down a bit, this adaptation of Harold Robbins’ bestseller A Stone For Danny Fisher remains surprisingly good. Young New Orleans punk and high school dropout Danny (Elvis) quits his busboy job and wrangles his way into performing a song in front of a club’s duly-stunned patrons. Before long, he is in demand and being pressured by mobster club owner Maxie Fields (Walter Matthau) to sign an exclusive contract. Elvis once again receives grand support from such pros as Carolyn Jones, Dolores Hart (his leading lady in LOVING YOU and a future real-life nun!), Dean Jagger, Vic Morrow and Paul Stewart. Songs include the title ditty as well as "Hard Headed Woman," "Trouble" and more! [35mm] Join us at 6:00 PM across the street at Every Picture Tells a Story, where songwriting greats Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller will be signing their new-in-paperback autobiography, Hound Dog."

Films referenced in class

2011-01-15T11:24:00.000-08:00

We saw a clip from Barton Fink, a 1991 Coen Brothers film. Here's the original trailer.
I mentioned in the context of the conversation about Tarantino's top film list (see below), a film called Battle Royale (2000), which no one had heard of.
I also made a reference to Brick (2005), a neo-noir film set in high school.
And, of course, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, directed by Edgar Wright. Additional mention should be made of the five graphic novels that the film is based on, which are brilliant.
And at lunch I mentioned Spaced, the BBC TV program which Wright worked on before directing Shaun of the Dead. Episode 1, Season 1 is here.

Also I talked about Jim Jarmusch. There's a nice essay on him here. The films I discussed briefly of his were Dead Man (1995) and Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai (1999).

Let me know if I missed anything. I linked you tube trailers where underlined. I can give you access to any films I reference -- just ask.

Tarantino's Top 20 Movies Since 1992

2011-01-15T10:27:00.000-08:00

I mentioned this in class. Tarantino's talks about Unbreakable at the end of his list and what he says is relevant to our discussion. He also talks about several other films, like Battle Royale, that are brilliant.
Well worth listening to.

Polanski Retro

2011-01-14T17:24:00.000-08:00

There's a Roman Polanski retrospective at the end of the month at the Egyptian. There are several great double feature bills, and Polanski did some great films like Cul-de-sac, Knife in the Water, the Tenant, Fearless Vampire Killers, etc. but this particular bill, screening in a couple of weeks, is horror/suspense at a level only a few like Hitchcock could ever reach. Forget all the underage scandal/con on the run stuff for a moment and go see why Polanski is so revered as a director. (Unless you don't know about the scandals in the first place, or who Sharon Tate was, etc, in which case you should read up on Polanski or netflix Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired (you tube clip summing up the tragedies can be seen here)

Saturday, January 29 – 7:30 PM

Double Feature:

REPULSION, 1965, Sony Repertory, 104 min.
Director Roman Polanski’s second film was his first shot in English and certifiable proof that he was the new wunderkind of the psychological suspense thriller, favoring a warped psychology and metaphysical anguish, as well as dark Bunuelian humor. Here, beautician Catherine Deneuve, pathologically revolted by men, goes off the deep end when her loving but worldly sister (Yvonne Furneaux) leaves for the weekend with her boyfriend (Ian Hendry). The men that interact with Deneuve over the ensuing hours - smitten young John Fraser and lecherous landlord Patrick Wymark - don’t have any idea what they’re in for. Still retains an astonishing wallop and remains one of Polanski’s most intense portraits of irrational fears triumphing in a climax of abject terror. [35mm]

New 35mm Print!

ROSEMARY’S BABY, 1968, Paramount, 136 min. Dir. Roman Polanski.
A young New York couple (Mia Farrow and John Cassavetes) move into a new apartment building, where they’re quickly befriended by lovable Ruth Gordon and husband Sidney Blackmer. All is not as it seems, though, and Farrow soon comes to suspect that her neighbors have truly sinister plans in store for her and her unborn baby. This eerie supernatural thriller builds shivery atmosphere through each successive scene, right up until the shattering climax. [35mm]

Dining Tip

2011-01-11T23:25:00.000-08:00

There's a great breakfast place in downtown LA called The Nickel Diner. It would be worth mentioned for the bacon donuts alone. Yes ... I said bacon donuts.

Foodie Info

2011-01-11T04:57:00.000-08:00

There was lots of talk of food the other day so I thought I should give out the link to the 99 essential restaurants of LA, as provided by Jonathan Gold, food critic for LA Weekly. If you look to the top of that page, the hidden links under Restaurants will take you to other useful reviews and guides by Gold, who is the city's best food critic in my opinion.

Edgar Wright takes over the New Beverly all next week

2011-01-10T22:38:00.000-08:00

Director Edgar Wright (Shawn of the Dead, Hot Fuzz, Scott Pilgrim and the TV show Spaced) is the guest programmer next week for the New Beverly (Archival movie House -- cheap tickets for double features that change every two weeks -- paradise for LA film fans). Wright will be there each night to introduce the films. There will be other guests as well.
Here's some highlights:

Sunday and Monday:

Brazil
Sun / Mon: 7:30
- 1985, UK, 142 minutes
- Edgar Wright will appear IN PERSON with filmmaker and fellow 'Brazil' fan Richard Kelly, schedules permitting, Sunday the 16th to introduce!
- directed by Terry Gilliam, written by Terry Gilliam, Tom Stoppard & Charles McKeown, starring Jonathan Pryce, Robert De Niro, Katherine Helmond, Ian Holm, Bob Hoskins

Delicatessen
Sun / Mon: 10:05
- 1991, France, 99 minutes
- directed by Marc Caro & Jean-Pierre Jeunet; starring Marie-Laure Dougnac, Dominique Pinon, Pascal Benezech, Jean-Claude Dreyfus

Check out the whole schedule for the 2 weeks here There's some great double features, ranging from Animal House and American Graffiti to Wild at Heart and True Romance. Special guests besides Wright will be there.

Colin gets his Star

2011-01-10T22:19:00.000-08:00

Colin Firth to be honored with Walk of Fame Star

For anyone who can't wait to see their first star, you could always go straight to Hollywood this week to see Colin Firth get his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

WHAT: 2,429th Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in the Category of Motion Pictures
WHERE: 6714 Hollywood Boulevard in front of the Pig n’ Whistle British Pub
WHEN: Thursday, January 13, at 11:30 a.m.

Better get there early.

Heat (1995) -- LA Film Pick

2010-09-27T10:19:00.000-07:00

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Michael Mann is another film maker that has done more than one strong LA film, but it's hard to top Heat (1995) as the perfect contemporary LA crime film. The only one that beats it, in my opinion, is John Boorman's Point Blank (1967). Honorable Mentions go to The Onion Field (1979) and ..

Obviously there is a modern master of the LA crime film -- no one does it like Quentin Tarentino, director of Reservoir Dogs (1992), Pulp Fiction (1994) and Jackie Brown (1997).

Falling Down -- LA Film Pick

2010-09-26T22:40:00.000-07:00

Films tell us that living in Los Angeles can lead to you going crazy. Falling Down (1993) is a good example. An even more bizarre example would by Todd Haynes' brilliant Safe (1995). These are not movies to make you happy.

I am showcasing Falling Down instead of Safe because Falling Down also exemplifies another kind of LA Movie, one wherein it serves as a kind of mapping of the city, one which seems like a mythical journey.

Michael Mann's under-rated Collateral (2004) is another example.

Zoot Suit (1981) - LA Film Pick

2010-09-26T17:13:00.000-07:00

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So I was going to just list Zoot Suit as an alternative choice under a musical category, but then I started thinking about Edward James Olmos, and realized that he had been in several important LA films, often exploring the neglected area of East LA. His other LA films include Stand and Deliver (1988), American Me (1992) and My Family (1995).

Freeway (1993) -- LA Film Pick

2010-09-26T12:48:00.000-07:00

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There is a whole sub-genre of the L.A. Teen in trouble, with the most famous obviously being Nicholas Ray's Rebel Without a Cause (1955). However I'm going with this Little Red Riding Hood in the Hood parody, Matthew Bright's Freeway (1993) as my pick in this category. Other choices in this genre are Catherine Hardwicke's Thirteen (2003) and Greg Araki's Doom Generation (1995).

The Player (1992) -- LA Film Pick

2010-09-25T23:05:00.000-07:00

We can label this selection under Altman's L.A., or as a Hollywood satire.

Robert Altman is one of those directors that kept making LA movies, and several of his could be on any best ten list. For this list, I'm going with The Player, but my personal favorite of his LA films is The Long Goodbye (1973). I also love his ode to Raymond Carver's short stories Short Cuts (1993)

Now if you're interested in contemporary "industry" satires like The Player, I'd also recommend Swimming with Sharks (1994) starring Kevin Spacey, Get Shorty (1995) and Robert Townsend's Hollywood Shuffle (1987). Contemporary at its time, and one of the all time greats: Preston Sturges' Sullivan's Travels (1941)

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Chinatown (1974) - LA Film Pick

2010-09-21T22:35:00.000-07:00

On the top films you should see about Los Angeles, Roman Polanski's Chinatown (1974) is one of the most obvious, but if you have never seen this, it's required viewing. Best quote:"Can you believe it? We're in the middle of a drought, and the water commissioner drowns. Only in L.A.

The runner ups for this kind of period piece crime LA film goes to Devil in a Blue Dress (1995) and LA Confidential (1997)

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Sunset Boulevard (1950) -- LA Film Pick

2010-09-20T07:46:00.000-07:00

Billy Wilder's Sunset Boulevard (1950) -- Perhaps the greatest film about classic Hollywood and one of the best noirs ever. If you see this film and want more noir/Hollywood films of the 50s, try Nicholas Ray's In a Lonely Place (Bogart as screenwriter), Vincente Minnelli's The Bad and the Beautiful, and Robert Aldrich's The Big Knife.

Stepping out of the classic noir era, but on the subject of the dark aspect of Hollywood, there is also John Schlesinger's The Day of the Locust (1975) and David Lynch's Mulholland Drive (2001).

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Blade Runner -- LA Film Pick

2010-09-19T21:49:00.000-07:00

The best science-fiction film ever done that takes place in LA. This film is so rich in content that whole courses are taught just on it. Other interesting science fiction LA films are John Carpenter's Escape from L.A. and They Live, plus Gordon Douglas' Them! (good LA landscapes) and The Terminator series.

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Barfly - LA Film Pick

2010-09-18T07:52:00.000-07:00

Okay, this slot should be taken up by the Coen Brother's the big lebowski. However, my guess is that every one of you has seen that film and Barfly reflects the notion of literary LA (It's about Charles Bukowski) so I'm substituting this one. Sorry, Dude.

I'm also going to give an honorable mention to Tim Burton's Ed Wood, another LA misfit movie.

Repo Man (1984) -- LA Film Pick

2010-09-17T12:19:00.000-07:00

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Lots of teen comedies -- Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982), Clueless (1995) and Valley Girl (1983) stand out, but Repo Man puts a little more edge in its humor.

There's also the teen/sci-fi hybrid aspect. If that's appealing, check out Night of the Comet (1984) or Greg Araki's Nowhere (1997).

Meaning through Imagery: Pixar's "Up"

2009-05-20T02:25:00.001-07:00

Purportedly one of Pixar's darker films, "Up" is also the company's first venture into the realm of 3-D. Disney led the charge to bring back 3-D into theaters by announcing it plans to release all its films in the 3-D format within a few years, and Pixar is evidently not exempt from that requirement. From their excited comments about the film, though, it seems the group has embraced the challenge of creating a picture in three dimensions. Instead of using it for gimmicks in a film that really doesn't need 3-D (My Bloody Valentine), animators explained that they're using depth to enhance the emotional experience of the film. "At Pixar, story is king," says Josh Hollander, director of 3-D production, and all of the studio's technology is implemented to further the storytelling. The example they use is a shot of Carl and Russell, the film's human duo, near a cliff. They use a boom up shot over the characters that reveals the entirely of the abyss. In three dimensions, the audience can get a more intense feeling of doom, explains Bob Whitehill, a 3-D supervisor. A similarly intense feeling of wonder is created in POV shots of Carl and Russell from their house up in the clouds. In low-emotion scenes, however, the space is compressed so as to allow for a contrast with other scenes.

To some degree, the above is achievable in live action film. However, over-exaggerating shapes in the human form is not. Carl, a curmudgeonly septuagenarian, is given a very "square" look so as to evoke a feeling of a man who is very set in his ways. All of the set dressing complements the angularity of his personality as well. Russell, on the other hand, as a very jubilant, excited young explorer, has an extremely round body to complement his bubbly personality. Through these clever uses of animation technology (like Maya! It's my paper all over again!!), Pixar can enhance the viewing experience for their audiences in a way that regular films cannot.

NYT Article on Shape

Interview on use of 3-D

Meaning through Form: Pixar

2009-05-20T02:25:00.000-07:00

Fox's New Experiment: Glee

2009-05-20T00:59:00.000-07:00

It sounds like a sure success; audiences are looking for more of this show's namesake in their daily lives. But Fox is giving this show an unconventional release that was already turning heads before its debut last night. Billing it as "the world's largest grassroots screening," Fox showed the pilot episode last night... but they won't be following it up next week. Instead, the show will pick up where it left off in August or September. Fox execs are counting on their assumption that "the show sells itself better than any [campaign] can." They will be marketing the show heavily on Hulu and through other media outlets, including a possible mass DVD distribution of the pilot. The show's cost, at over $3 million per episode, is already soaring, but Fox is willing to bite the bullet for their new smash hit hopeful.

Back in March, I was walking around the Paramount lot, and we saw a film shoot going on in one of the parking lots. A security guard told us they were shooting an episode of Glee. Without giving away any of the as-of-yet unknown story line, let's just say we weren't impressed by the gaggles of cheerleaders prancing around the lot with posters. Those same friends have now seen the pilot (I haven't), and they're already raving about the show... maybe Fox's methods are working. I know I want to see it now, even though it does sound like somewhat of a High School Musical derivative.

Also, in a somewhat related Slate article, Troy Patterson reveals that Eliza Dushku was at the Fox upfronts in New York, signaling the show is on for another season. Hooray.

INTERNSHIP PAPER

2009-05-12T13:09:00.001-07:00

hey hey!

there's been some confusion about the due date of the internship paper, but we have an answer! i spoke to jim and it is officially due this thursday at midnight. i hope everyone had/is having safe travels or if you still have finals/other papers, good luck!

Can genre be defined by Exhibition?

2009-05-07T14:43:00.001-07:00

So according to the LA TIMES, there are going to be 70mm showings of classics such as The Wild Bunch, Lawrence of Arabia, 2001 Space Odyssey and Vertigo this week at the EGYPTIAN THEATER. (Anyone want to go? :D)

Because genre is about semantics as much as syntax, the style and form of a movie plays a large part in audience identification. We've talked a lot about producer perception of genre, but what about exhibitors? Some movie theaters exhibit only "indie films" while others go for the tentpole movies, and yet others only exhibit documentaries (like science centers). I know, as a movie-viewer, I will go to specific movie theaters depending on the kind of movie I am looking for.

In the article, the author describes these movies that are being shown at the Egyptian as EPICS. SO I'm thinking maybe 70 mm film is a FORM reserved for that genre. Can we group these pictures as the "70 mm genre?" If you are thinking a flat NO in your head then what about 3-D movies? Don't we talk about these as a genre already?

Not Another Vampire Movie

2009-05-07T12:59:00.000-07:00

A Priest? A botched science experiment? Korea? Lots of sex/nudity? An affair? Vampires?
I was reading about the upcoming Cannes lineup and came across this new film Thirst by Korean filmmaker Park Chan-wook, famous for The Vengeance Trilogy released between 2002 and 2005. According to Variety, it beat Wolverine at the Korean box office this past weekend. Given our class' interest in vampire movies, and partiularly vampire hybrids, I thought this was worth a mention for those who haven't heard of it. It's supposed to open in the U.S mid-July. I'm intrigued.

GENRE MATTERS

2009-05-06T09:23:00.000-07:00

I picked up the posters last night -- they look really fantastic. Kudos to Ash and Andrew! And to those who made an effort on your section of the poster, it certainly shows. Good work -- your poster looks like no other. That's a good thing to say.

GENRE MATTERS x important advise

2009-05-06T09:18:00.000-07:00

Two things -- Anne sent me a copy of her short paper and I reviewed it and made some changes. While time is tight, I can try to do that for those who aren't fully satisfied with where you are at, or just want a second opinion. If I get nine of them tomorrow, I won't be able to do much, and I make no promises, but I was able to get comments back to Anne pretty quickly.

Secondly, we all misjudge our paper length and sometimes tech difficulties eat into our presentation time as well. A smart strategy is to have whole paragraphs in the last third of your paper circled as expendable if necessary. That way if you have five minutes left and are only one-half way done, you won't panic. You know which section to omit to regain time.

An International Relations Genre?!

2009-05-05T21:19:00.000-07:00

On 4/27, Stephen Walt compiled a theoretical list of films that could be shown at a Foreign Policy film festival (if such a festival existed, that is). This caught my eye because #1 on the list is Casablanca! Also included in his list is Independence Day (shout out to Anne and Tina at Overbrook!)

http://walt.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2009/04/27/foreign_policy_film_festival

On 4/28, Daniel Drezner wrote a critique of Walt's International Relation's list by compiling a list of his own, also found on foreign policy.com. While he did not disagree with Walt's list, he included many films in his own that Walt did not mention. asdf

http://drezner.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2009/04/28/foreign_policy_film_festival_part_ii

Slate's Fred Kaplan wrote a critique/ analysis of both of these lists, while adding his own suggestions to the list. Among these additions includes High Noon (YAY WESTERNS!) and claims that it is a "more succinct metaphor about U.S. than Casasblanca".

http://www.slate.com/id/2217345/pagenum/all/#p2

What do you think Jim? What's your list?

More GENRE MATTERS X

2009-05-05T09:33:00.000-07:00

Panel 3 --

We will have a hook up for computers with a mid size screen. I will have to bring some speakers for the laptop(s) I suggest you all get together and consolidate your clips on to one computer for the afternoon. There may be internet access BUT do not rely on this. The best thing is to have your dvd clip or youtube video saved as a file on your zip drive or on the computer you'll be using.

THERE WILL NOT BE A SEPARATE DVD PLAYER IN THE ROOM.

And do not show up looking thru your dvd, or trying to find your video on youtube. The way most of you managed your video on punk day will not be acceptable for the conference. We have to be much more practiced and organized -- This time I am not the audience!

So many of the responses I've received from people who I invited are saying "Of course I'll come -- your students are always so smart and the papers are so good."

There is a legacy here -- I need all of you to bring your best game on Friday -- not the tired, let's just get it over with mentality on display by some of you on Sunday. (And that was tiring and long, and I know all of you are working hard on this -- but people are taking off from their jobs to see what you got -- so you've got to deliver.

Get in there and win this one for the Gipper! (old movie quote shorn of all actual context at this point, and therefore postmodern. )

Genre Matters X

2009-05-04T14:41:00.000-07:00

IMPORTANT
Let's talk dress!

We definitely want to dress it up a bit -- this is a professional event and should be approached that way, i.e. no t-shirts, short pants or ultra casual clothes. Dress like it's an interview.

Speaking of Punk...

2009-05-02T22:40:00.000-07:00

I was looking around Rollingstone.com for work and came across an article about Creed's "come back".

http://www.rollingstone.com/rockdaily/index.php/2009/04/29/creed-reunite-fans-react-the-response-to-stapps-rebirth/

I personally had forgotten about Creed and have a feeling that they were particularly missed by many others...but the article linked to a photo album entitled, "The Return of the '90s: Creed, Limp Bizkit, Blink-182 and More".

http://www.rollingstone.com/photos/gallery/27809564/the_return_of_the_90s_creed_lim

Creed, No Doubt, Blink-182, Faith No More, Blur, Alice In Chains, Jane's Addiction, Limp Bizkit, Third Eye Bllind, and Sugar Ray are all planning to reunite and reemerge into the music scene in 2009. While I realize that bands come and go (and come again) all the time, this caught my eye because the majority of these bands are tied to the punk movement and produce music in some subgenre of punk. To be more specific, Creed and Alice in Chains are grunge bands, Third Eye Blind is associated with the post-grunge movement. Other genres in this group include post-punk, pop-punk, and more. The grunge movement was greatly influenced by punk and has roots in the punk movement. I guess we're back to our days of punk and 90's punk/grunge rock. Get excited!

run=thru

2009-05-02T17:27:00.000-07:00

How about we start at 1:30 tomorrow at my office. Let me know.

No Time Traveling Nazi Zombies...

2009-05-01T18:26:00.000-07:00

According to this article at entertainmentweekly.com, there were rumors that Peter Jackson was starting a project called The Christ Must Die, where Nazi zombies traveled back in time in an effort to kill Jesus as he is being born.

To me, that sounds absolutely awesome for a movie. I mean, seriously? Nazi zombies on a mission to kill Christ?

Hell freakin' yeah. This would completely redefine the zombie genre. George Romero would shit himself for that opportunity. Millions would line up to see it, or at least protest it. It would be huge.

But, alas, it is not to be. Peter Jackson's manager dispelled any rumors concerning Nazi zombies and time travel. Instead, he's hard at work on...The Hobbit.

Legal Outlaw of a Punk Subculture? Hey, It's Russia.

2009-04-27T21:14:00.000-07:00

Our focus on punk the last couple of weeks reminded me of a really strange article I read while in St. Petersburg this summer. There's a strong punk movement in Russia and now the emo subculture has become quite popular among teenagers there. I know many American parents disapprove of the whole emo look and find it kind of creepy, but in Russia they find it outright dangerous and have begun to try to suppress the culture altogether. It's amazing how generally the proposed bill typifies the emo population. I think my favorite quote is "the dream of every emo is to die in a warm bath from the blood of cutting their wrists." Hm.

Exam Review

2009-04-27T11:54:00.000-07:00

The full review for the final exam is now posted on blackboard. Feel free to send me questions via email, but I think I covered everything important. Good luck -- last year the students thought the exam was very fair, as I recall --

( but that may have just been relief that there was no nudity, blasphemy or lesbian agendas on the test)

Anyway, best of luck -- you guys will do great. And here's one last joke-- this one at Michael's expense.

Genre Evolution

2009-04-24T19:24:00.000-07:00

So we’ve had video game movies (shit), we’ve had anime movies (no-comment), and now we have a live-action anime movie that looks like a video game movie. Dragonball: Evolution. Evolution is appropriate since this is somewhat of a hybrid genre, evolving out of several different genres. I believe we’ll be seeing more movies like this, but how come these films always seem to do poorly? (besides a semi-reputable special-effects wire company and a hot girl or two). I haven’t seen the film myself so I can’t pass judgment (although I totally can), but the reviewers have slammed this film as being completely generic. Are these films made with the idea that only fans will go see them, therefore the fan base is strong enough to make the movie enough money?

LA Festival of Books

2009-04-24T17:58:00.000-07:00

Find the schedule here.
Let's meet for breakfast and plan our strategies for tackling the events, parking etc.
9:00 a.m. at Junior's. It's on Westwood between Olympic and Pico. Let me know before tomorrow morning if you're coming so I know how big a table to get.

Another Sexy Lawyer Chic Film?

2009-04-23T12:26:00.000-07:00

Before reading this article, I hadn't heard of a sexy lawyer chic film project in ages. I mean, it's not exactly an expansive genre, or even sub genre within the greater realm of lawyer films; I really can only think of Erin Brockovich, truth be told- but there's a new Cameron Diaz film coming out in which she plays a "ballsy" lawyer in a sexist environment to tackle a sexual discrimination case.

Hmm, the whole first half of that statement sounds familiar, but maybe enough time has passed for Hollywood to recycle that material and give women everywhere a recycled tough ball bustin (but still endearingly feminine) hero.

I'm surprised that it's Cameron Diaz in the talks though. Can she follow in Julia Roberts' footsteps. A part of me finds that a little far-fetched. I mean this is Julia Roberts we're talking about here and....Cameron Diaz? Really? In my experience Diaz is at her finest playing ditzy blondes, but who am I to say?

I'm not the most avid follower of these types of films, but when's the last time a bigt movie came out driven by a strong female character not played by Angelina Jolie? If this movie comes out, will it start a trend? Since Julia Roberts semi-retired, there has been a lack of these type of films...can Cameron Diaz replace Julia Roberts as the face of that trend?

tuesday night

2009-04-12T21:13:00.000-07:00

The Duke Event Tuesday begins at 6:30 and runs to 8:30.
It's at Fox Studios, 10201 W. Pico blvd., Beverly Hills. Enter at the main gate at Pico and Motor. The Gate will have instructions on where to park and how to find us. They have your names -- you should bring an ID.

meeting today

2009-04-11T10:26:00.000-07:00

The address is 12100 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 1940, Los Angeles, CA 90025
SW corner of Wilshire and Bundy.

NEXT TUESDAY EVENT

2009-04-06T08:25:00.000-07:00

All those not in class should go with me to this. Please RSVP to me now. Thanks.
TV...Film...Music...Video Gaming...Art...Duke is there!

Join your fellow alumni and friends to learn more about the university's exciting new ventures and get a sneak preview of DEMAN – a new entertainment, media, and arts network – from Duke leaders Michael Schoenfeld '84, Vice President for Public Affairs and Government Relations; Scott Lindroth, Vice Provost for the Arts; and Sterly L. Wilder '83, Executive Director, Alumni Affairs.

Get the inside scoop from an alumni panel of high-profile figures in the industry.

Tuesday, April 14, 6:30 p.m. – 8:30 p.m.

The Endeavor Agency
9601 Wilshire Blvd.
Beverly Hills, California 90210

Program and panel discussion with Duke alums begins promptly at 7:15 p.m.

office hours

2009-04-04T11:10:00.000-07:00

I am meeting with you all at Fromin's Deli. It is in Santa Monica on the corner of Wilshire and 19th Street in the strip mall where Rite-Aid is. Please note that when I say Santa Monica, that means near the ocean, not near downtown. (Some people get mixed up because Wilshire runs the length of the city)

Genre Watch

2009-03-30T21:11:00.000-07:00

I came across this New York Magazine "Guide to Fanboys" which breaks every compulsive fan group down. I thought it might pertain to the recent discussion of graphic novels. http://nymag.com/movies/features/53786

More Political Commentary in Comics

2009-03-30T11:17:00.000-07:00

I came across this article in the Wall Street Journal today about a comic called "Air". The first issue of "Air" came out August 2008 and it is a comic series by G. Willow Wilson which follows a flight attendant who meets a secret agent while caught in an in-air terrorist hijacking. "Air" is partly Wilson's way of dealing with her status as a white convert to Islam in the wake of 9/11. After having read the graphic novel "Exit Wounds" (which I pitched on Friday) and the other politically based comic I was given to read: "Palestine", I found this topic for a comic narrative particularly intriguing. Ms. Wilson is previously known for her comic "Cairo", a surrealistic jaunt through the city which has been her part-time home. She has also written many political and religious articles for New York Magazine. The writer draws parallels from her creative and non-fiction work saying that "I'd just like to complicate people's existing assumptions about religion and its role in politics. Not necessarily change, but complicate. That's really what art should do, I think--make suggestions, not absolutes. Dealing in absolutes is propaganda. You have to leave people with enough room to make their own legitimate judgments."

Wilson believes that the reality of the situation in the Middle East gets so filtered through its transmission by the media that it becomes biased and skewed and thus looks different to Americans than it does in real life. Thus her comic, much like "Exit Wounds" allows these highly publicized international crises to be experienced and processed from a human level, restoring compassion to the detached headline stories that dominate our daily news.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123810368876651867.html

Summer Plans

2009-03-24T13:52:00.000-07:00

Who is staying in LA for all or part of the summer?

Rustlers' Rhapsody

2009-03-24T00:56:00.001-07:00

Before Spring Break, one of my USC professors was lecturing on aspect ratios, and he showed us a clip from Rustlers’ Rhapsody to show the change between the Academy ratio and modern-day wide screen. In the clip he showed us, the ratio changed, the film when from black and white to color, and the mechanics of the scene changed a bit. With the narrator’s line, “I wondered what a B Western would be like today,” the bad guys became more confident and our hero became more clumsy. So, I borrowed the movie from my professor and watched the rest of it. It was basically a very self-aware postmodern Western in which the protagonist, Rex, knew everything that was coming. He said he knew the future because all Western towns were alike, a thin veil for the parody of the classic Western film structure. Rex knew when he would be attacked and how to deal with them. He knew his sidekick would get shot, so he didn’t want one, even though he knew he would have to accept one in the end. In knowing these things, he knew how to protect himself. Rex gave his sidekick a bulletproof vest that protected him from the inevitable shots to the chest. He danced around his opponents to confuse them.

But, one of the colonels in charge of the bad guys realizes how to throw him off. He introduces a new opponent: another good guy. Bob points out Rex’s iniquities, including the fact that Rex is not a confident heterosexual. Rex leaves without a fight. Rex almost cedes to the villains, but when they try to kill his sidekick, he goes back to action. Realizing that Bob is a lawyer and cannot possibly be good, Rex shoots Bob in the head. At the end Rex rides off into the sunset, calling it a “perfect” ending. Then, his sidekick decides to go along and follows him, as the waving villains say they knew that was coming. The movie is actually pretty entertaining, especially since we know the conventions of Westerns so well, not to mention postmodernism.

GENRE MATTERS

The 39th Annual Annie Awards - Field Trip?

Studio Ghibli Retrospective

Top Movie Nominations

some LA stuff

Patton Oswalt's twitter yesterday

Spike Lee: Studios "know nothing about black people"

Here's the clips we Saw in Class

Warner Bros. and Central Perk!

Breakfast before the field trip

3400 W. Riverside Dr. Burbank, CA 91505

Enter Through Avon Street Parking on Gate 6 ($7.00 parking fee)

Learning Punk

POLANSKI

What was NOIR again?

Forget it, Jake. It's Zombie Town.

GW: LA Street Art.

Great sign of Hollywood!!!!

CHECK OUT THIS MAP OF LA

AMC Theaters will unspool genre label - Entertainment News, Film News, Media - Variety

Tim Burton Exhibit at LACMA May 29- Oct 31, 2011

Los Angeles County Museum of Art - LACMA

punk rock retrospective

Genre Watch: Rom Coms- It's all about the stars, we can even use the same plot back to back now!

LA Marathon

The Fair.

Metro Contest

GW: Punk Cowboys.

A very interesting scholarly article

Genre Watch- THR

Free Stuff. Read all.

GW Feb Article on the Oscars [What else is there to report about anyway?]

Autry Museum field trip

Comic Book and Musical Mash-Up an Epic fail?

Great article in Entertainment Weekly about genre pilots for upcoming season

Truth.

Not Quite a Musical

Fun Facts About LA

A Valentine for Lindsay Lohan

MANDATORY FIELD TRIP WEDNESDAY

Genre Matters, almost as much as puppies.

Genre Stuff

The U.S. Superhero Shortage

Black Swan Editing Process

If you ride the red/some orange metro buses to work...

Seinfield as a thriller

Cop Rock - a police musical hybrid show

'Buffy' writers sell Grimm's Fairy Tales pilot to NBC | Inside TV | EW.com

The Fighter KOs the sports-movie cliches | Film | The Guardian

Science fiction teaches governments—and citizens—how to understand the future of technology. - By Robert J. Sawyer - Slate Magazine

Movie Blog

The Day the Movies Died

Stahl House aka Case Study House #22

Films referenced in class

USC Event: Project ReMix

Paley Fest - a required event

Golden Globes

Genre Matters Assignment

elvis presley - king creole

Elvis' two best movies -- Double Feature a end of month

Films referenced in class

Tarantino's Top 20 Movies Since 1992

Polanski Retro

Dining Tip

Foodie Info

Edgar Wright takes over the New Beverly all next week

Colin gets his Star

Colin Firth to be honored with Walk of Fame Star

For anyone who can't wait to see their first star, you could always go straight to Hollywood this week to see Colin Firth get his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Heat (1995) -- LA Film Pick

Falling Down -- LA Film Pick

Zoot Suit (1981) - LA Film Pick

Freeway (1993) -- LA Film Pick

The Player (1992) -- LA Film Pick

Chinatown (1974) - LA Film Pick

Sunset Boulevard (1950) -- LA Film Pick

Blade Runner -- LA Film Pick

Barfly - LA Film Pick

Repo Man (1984) -- LA Film Pick

Meaning through Imagery: Pixar's "Up"