Lekamp's Blog

Tampopo

lekamp — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 10:45:41 +0000

Tampopo is a Japanese film by Juzo Itami about the relationship of food with humans. What seemed to be such a simple topic was presented in such a stylized and interesting way that is enjoyable to the audience. The story revolves around Tampopo and her encounter with Goro and his companion when a fight broke out at the girl’s ramen restaurant. Due to the unsuccessful state of the restaurant, Goro decides to help Tampopo make a successful noodle shop. Other than the main narrative, several other shorts telling different stories of food were inserted into the film. This really brings out the different feelings and moods of what food can really be for different people. For instance, for woman, food means duty. She must cook and serve the family until the day she dies. As for the presentation of that tagline, it portrayed a dead woman rising from the dead to fulfill her chores. What this shows is that the director has taken this movie into a style of his own and turned risk into success. We could have no understand it any better than how the scene was put together. The style of this movie can be compared to Pulp Fiction in how several stories were interlaced together. The characters of this movie also have a certain qualities that are similar. They are unique in their speech and the gangster qualities also gave another dimension to the film. One of the most memorable dialogues was when the rich man was about to die and all he could compare his love to was food. It is truly fresh and original. But what Juzo has done is never abandoning Japanese cinema while doing so. He tells the story while incorporating the Japanese culture. It is also rich with all things Japanese from the wacky sounds affects and its acting styles that sometimes over acted like anime. When speaking of cinemas, these factors can really break a movie because the people lost the ability to take it seriously. But as an audience, I felt it was effective and what it did is only adding more to the distinct style of the film. Another interesting approach to food is how it is involved with sex. One of the most memorable scenes for me was the one where the oyster shell cuts the rich man’s lips. In such a small amount of time, it shows the how a girl is transformed. The simplicity of that scene was a short story of its own. There are several interesting interpretation of food within in this movie such as culture and society. In our everyday life, we eat to satisfy our needs, never really putting a conscious thought to what they really mean to us. Juzo has made food into a character that drives the story. Food was no longer an edible object; it became artistic and filled with background and story. From the journey towards gaining the ultimate recipe to making food a translation of lust and desire, Juzo has the tools to tell such an interesting story. This movie shows that a smart witty film doesn’t have to be so hard and difficult to watch. Tampopo is filled with humor and heart and enjoyable from beginning to the end and definitely shouldn’t be missed.

Syndromes of a Century

lekamp — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 10:44:42 +0000

Syndromes of a century is a one of those subtle films that hypnotizes the audience with all sorts of emotions yet it seems impossible to label and of those feelings. It is one of those stories that keep ringing in your head as you walk out of the theater trying to put the pieces of the puzzle together of the true meaning of the film. Speaking of conscious viewers, this movie has a certain charm to its simplicity. The narrative of Syndromes and other Apitchatpong movies are definitely not what viewers a used to. As we are emerging to feel a fulfillment of the story, it breaks off without obvious warnings and carries on of what seems like a start of a different story. But as we slowly ease into it, the mind starts to reconnect the two parts together. The first half tells a story of the people in a hospital in the suburbs. The way of life is presented with such delight and the casual conversations between the characters are so enjoyable. To have the ability to make such a normal conversation that goes on everyday in our lives so interesting shows one of the skills of Apitchatpong. As we enter the second part of the story, the same characters shifted into a new world; a modern hospital set in an urbanized city of Bangkok. It seems to the viewers as if the first part has been replayed. But as we kept watching, the charm of the first part was never translated onto the second one. The theme of the movie now becomes evident; the life in the suburbs versus the life in the city. There are various symbolism within this movie. For instance the scene where several statues were filmed was shown to us with a feeling of tension. This scene might have been inspired by “Last Year in Marienbad”, and the affect it had on the audience shows its success. From the way the statues are placed high up as if we were smaller, we are empowered by something higher. The director incorporated religion into the film. Like Uncle Boonmee, the Thai monks are shown acting like normal people. This might have shown how humans, regardless of labels, are still human after all. Other topics raise up in this film and several others are Legends, myths, and beliefs. What Apitchatpong has done is picking up the simple things in his culture and life and has given it a new light, which most of the modern directors had abandoned in favor of more Hollywood styles. It was no luck involve for his success in the international world because he presented something different, and contributing towards the world cinema. Above all, the way he was able to make the audience “feel” rather than just be the observer of his films is purely genius. While watching several of his movies, although it seemed to us that it is a mimic of real life at its best, many times the super natural vibe kicks in and we could never really tell which part is real and which part is purely from imagination. Even if by the end of each of his films there were no obvious conclusions or reasoning derived, just the emotions and feelings that he was able to trigger from the audience was just enough reasoning to see his films.

Raise the Red Lantern

lekamp — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 10:43:54 +0000

Raise the Red Lantern by the highly acclaimed director Zhang Yimou is a story about marriage without love within its presence. The cinematography invites you in while the story gives a feeling of entering a hidden world. It has become one of those movies that is shamed by its people, but draws interest by the outsiders. The story reveals the actual way of life of China in the 1920s where males are dominant and women are treated as objects of burden and duty. The director, being a Chinese man himself, it seemed as an act against his own people when China banned the movie. But due to the aesthetics and how the story was portrayed, we could only see the respect he has for these women and no traces of an attempt to expose his homeland. The story revolves around the Chen household in the warlord eras where the house strictly follows a concubine system. Four mistresses lives within the household while each trying to win the master for the night. The true color of jealously, lies, and betrayals emerged to reveal the true nature of how woman of that era has to endure in. In this story, marriage was never about love. In the opening scenes, Songlian, the newest of the mistresses, was following her daughterly duties and was married to the Chen family. Being a stubborn girl, she abandoned the celebration parade and walks alone to the house. When she gets there, there were no traces of any kind of celebration and she was greeted by a servant of the house. The husband was no where to be seen and the tour of the house slowly reveals how such a beautiful place can be so similar to a prison house. We are also introduced to the traditions of the red lantern and the foot massages, which was portrayed as a sacred tradition. But the beautifulness of it all only reveals the truth behind traditions. For these mistresses, it wasn’t about love but rather than being a winner. Behind the luxury of having servants and the beautiful gowns, these girls live in tragedy behind closed doors. All signed of emotions are shut down and there was not a moment in time where they can be themselves. Although this film talks about the traditions of China, it does speak a universal language for the conditions of men and women around the world. Through a deeper understanding of the film, the different symbolism hidden in such subtle manners shows us how life under pressure, obligation, and burden works. It portrays how Songlian slowly transforms from a girl who seemed to have a mind of her own to just being one of the mistresses full of jealously and betrayal. We slowly see how one person can drive themselves into their own destruction. It seemed to us that how the world works limits us to live other way else. The story could have taken a different turn only if Songlian decides to run away. But the traditions are well embedded into their blood, as we can see how the punishments of each wrongdoing is beyond cruel. When speaking of culture and traditions, it seems to be something held with great value and a beautiful practice. What this movie provides is another take of it; the world that is hidden and how some traditions can push a human being to its limit and how it can really destroy a person.

Fargo

lekamp — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 10:43:06 +0000

At first glance, Fargo seemed to be another quiet and slow pacing indie style film. But it is within the quirky characters and witty narrative, this movie is instantly made famous by the Coen brothers. The norm of intense murder and investigation has been shattered in Fargo. With its smart way of adding the quirkiness to it’s character to a point of being almost irritating, it was enough to drive the story forward while keeping the audience at the edge of their seats. Since the start of the film when Jerry, who is an ordinary suburbian salesman, decides to get himself involved in a ransom, the audience knew right away that he would not get away with it. What these characters have is a very strong and unique accent. Although it is just a minor touch, it really gives a push towards the dialogue, which is already interesting and truly original. Just within it’s first scene where the wife has been captured, the audience wanted to laugh rather than take the situation seriously. It becomes a perfect mix of comedy while also laying a base for the story to escalate. And because of that rookie element and the character itself, there is something almost unexplainable that keeps you anticipated with Jerry even though the outcome of his actions is already so obvious. But what this film provides to the audience are the dimensions that keep building the story. This makes up for what the audience would have wanted to see; a very skilled villain and a masculine hero shooting gunfire’s in a burning town. To replace these norms with clumsy characters, the story must have a special touch. When the audience is just trying to take in the out of the ordinary villain, another main character is added. Marge is a local police chief who is seven months pregnant. By adding this obstacle of being a woman who is also carrying a child, the difficultly is raised for the capture of the villain. There is absolutely no way the story can move forward if a skilled police man was playing the role of Marge. Not only that the characters are out of the ordinary, the Coen brothers has placed them in the place where they would struggle the most; a town where murder and crime was never near their concern. For instance where the two police chiefs were driving in the snow, it seemed so quiet and impossible to actually find what they are looking for. It really shows what the film is about; at the most quiet and untainted place, it’s the place where its close to impossible for something to be found. As for the narrative, although the audience feels that these characters have no clue what they are doing, the audience themselves are just as clueless because it is not everyday when a twist of a crime movie like Fargo are told. There were no obvious and cliché hints for foreshadowing of what’s to come. And although some might feel they have seen it all, when Marge walks into the villain throwing a man into the woodchipper, it comes to us visually as a surprise. And it didn’t need the extreme close-up or the screeching sound effects to do so. To conclude, the combination of taking risks and breaking every aspects of a crime murder film, the Coen brothers has truly made an original piece that is bound to be added to one of the classics dark comedy of the new century.

Mother

lekamp — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 10:42:12 +0000

This drama concentrated story, Mother, gives us a different color of Korean film with it’s smart narrative and an interesting characters. The protagonist, a loving mother who would do anything for her son, goes out on an almost hopeless journey to find the true killer. Throughout the movie, it almost seemed that whatever she did never really brought her closer to the truth and at times we feel an offbeat in her behavior somewhat similar to her mentally challenged son. Through half way of the movie, we now question who is really the mentally challenged one, was it the son or the mother herself. When the mother begged the son to recall the killer, he brought up a past of where his mother tried to drug them both. It starts to show the other side of the mother, who at the beginning of the story seemed to be the innocent one. As her journey went on to solve the mystery, she ended up killing the old man and burning down his house. What really shows the true color of the mother was when she said that he was not worthy enough to be touch by her son. At the moment where she delivered the line, she really felt what she said, unaware of the fact that she is killing him. At the moment of realization, it was too late to save the man. Now with blood on her own hands, it really shows the extent of how much she is willing to give up. She resumed her life like she hadn’t killed anyone, but mentally, she was changed forever. When the detective came to her with news that he had caught the real killer, she asked to go see him. When she saw that he was also a mentally challenged boy with no mother to do what she did for her own son, she faced a breakdown of guilt. It is clearly evident to us as viewers and the mother herself that he wasn’t telling a lie about the nosebleed. But because her son is mentally challenged, could he really be blamed for what he has done or should we blame the mother for teaching his son to fight off the mean comments for the others. At this point, the line between moral and love leaving only the audience to reflect and really think of who is responsible. The mix of a mother’s unconditional love and the lies and crimes she is willing to commit raises a question of whether she is to be disapproved by the audience. Just when we are about to make up our mind to blame her, there is always some sort of feeling that keeps us from reasoning. The last scene shows the mother giving herself acupuncture to erase all of her past; this shows that she is the only one with the whole truth yet she is ready to live in denial by deleting it all. Regardless of that needle had worked or not, now the truth is forever abandoned because the only witness is dead and the son himself is not taken seriously. The way she dances in the bus shows us her effort to leave the previous chapter of her life and becoming just another old lady. To watch this film is to really to judge someone else’s actions, and along the way, whatever we had put upon them can really tell us something about ourselves of how we view morals and emotions. This film gives us something different than the commercial drama comedy movies that we are familiar with in Korean cinemas. What this movie has done is provide the audience with something different, yet still maintain that charm of a Korean film.

The Terminator

lekamp — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 10:41:22 +0000

The Terminator is a 1984 sci-fi low budget film directed by the famous James Cameron, which had produced an iconic figure that is still famous in the present time. This film is about a man who time traveled back into the past in order to save the world from the domination of advanced human formed cyborg. By saving Sarah Connor, her child will be born to save the future generations from these machines. In one of the opening scenes, we see the terminator and Kyle who walked the streets naked. It is set since the beginning that the villain and the hero is. We can see that the terminator killed off everyone in his tracks while Kyle never shot a soul even when he had the chance. The phone book shows how both of them, so different in character, are searching for the same ordinary girl named Sarah. At this point, the audience is clueless of why Sarah had such an importance. To establish how dangerous this terminator is, a series of events puts him in action to make it clear that regardless of the reason for why Sarah is hunted, they must be scared for her. It is evident to everyone that it is impossible to destroy the terminator, but we still have hope that Kyle might save her. Even when the arm of the terminator rips off, it is still after Sarah. The road to bringing the terminator down is the key to the audience anticipation. But as if turns out, without them both working together, the robot would had never been destroyed. This gives the woman character a braveness to her, which makes us appreciate the struggle she has to go through to save her unborn son and the future. Within the science, there was an underlying love story between Sarah and Kyle. The twist of Kyle being from the future and has been in love with Sarah creates a obstacle for them and also caving them in to fall in love in a short amount of time and within all the action that has been going on. The theme of this movie is science versus humans. It is evident that science is the villain of this movie and that the creator of it all is the ones who are trying to destroy them. What this movie also did is creating an icon which is the terminator played by Arnold Schwarzenegger. It became a media franchise, which is one of the significant factors for its sequels. After the success of this film, there were several sequels that followed such as The Terminator 2 in 1991 and the most recent in 2009, Terminator Salvation. But the fact remains that the most highly acclaimed Terminator is the original film. The first film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry for its “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significance” in 2008. This goes off to show that the new technologies of computer graphics cannot beat out a good script and story.

Our Backyard Neighbor Preproduction

lekamp — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 15:35:27 +0000

….:::CHARACTER BACKSTORY:::…

Jocelyn

JOCELYN is a beautiful innocent 12-year-old girl, with a presence of mystery and loneliness to her. She doesn’t have many friends, not because she wanted to, but because she feels that no one really could understand her world. For this reason, she rather is with her imagination. Her dad has a good “suit” job and comes home to dinner every night. Her mother is a well-educated housewife. Jocelyn lives in an almost perfect home. Although everything seemed perfect from the outside, her world has caused her to be out of touch with her parents who always wanted what’s best for Jocelyn. Her mother hopes one day she would have a relationship just as perfect as her parents. Although she is too young to understand the adult life, she knew that she would never grow up to have a relationship like her parents. Her parent’s still views her as the perfect daughter, not being aware of the other side of Jocelyn’s world. She never asked for anything, but secretly hopes that one day, those mystical creatures and stories will one day come alive and take her away.

Pip

PIP is a thirteen-year-old stray boy who is constantly moving from place to place. After many attempts of running away from the families that the orphanage has placed Pip in, he found that he was free, whether he liked it or not. All he knew was that he wished he had found some place, or someone who he really can be comfortable with. Pip has a fascination for nature, many times when he ran away from the adopted families, he found himself seeking comfort from the forest. For this reason, he decided to settle in and call it home. What seemed to be a child’s emotional cry for attention had turned into days and months. Without realizing it, he found himself comfortable in his new home. Pip has lost touch with his old ways; he was only left with vague memories with the world outside the forest. Pip became a part of nature, in a way that was almost mystical and cannot be understood by anyone outside of his world.

….:::CASTING:::….

Jocelyn

Jade Gandy

Pip

(Casting in process)

….:::REFERENCE: MOOD & TONE:::….

LIGHTING : soft light + light leaks + natural.

COLOR PALETTE : Pastels/Earth Tones/Whites depending on scenes. But all in soft, desaturated tones.

….:::REFERENCE: CHARACTERS:::….

Jocelyn : Sultry, Dreamy, Innocent, Natural, Whimsical

PIP: Mysterious, Mystic, Independent, Lonesome

Mood & Tone for Boy Cast

….:::COSTUMES:::….

Jocelyn : Lace, Soft, Pink to White PASTELS, white stockings.

Ribbons, Bows, Beads, Lace

Pip : Loose old tank tops, knee length shorts, desert shoes.

Bone Accessories, Fur, Feathers, Hints of Tribal + Red Indians+ Hunter .

….:::REFERENCE FOR PROPS:::….

Jocelyn’s Room & Tent

Sweets : Cupcakes & Macaroons

Jocelyn’s Picnic

Pip’s Tent

….:::LINE SCRIPT:::….

….:::STORYBOARD:::….

….:::SHOTLIST:::….

OUR BACKYARD NEIGHBOR FINAL SHOTLIST

FINAL PROJECT

lekamp — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 18:58:33 +0000

Scene reference

Girl Reference

Relationship between the character

Color Tone

Yasujirō Ozu

lekamp — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 12:09:49 +0000

Yasujirō Ozu, born in December1903, was a Japanese film director and screenwriter. He is best for his one of a kind techinical style. He first started in the film industry as an assistant to the director of photography. In just three years time, he made his film debut, “Zange no Yaiba”. He continued to produce film throughout his career, even though the most active years were the first five. He produced a total of 53 films and among those movies were “”Kagami Shishi”, “The Neighbor’s Wife”, and “Chichi Ariki”. These movies are rich in style which was innovative and unconventional. For instance, he abandoned the 180 rule and direct cuts were used often. This goes to show his ability to produce out of the ordinary film, which are full of grace and elegance in a minimalist atmosphere.

Mira Nair

lekamp — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 11:51:39 +0000

Mira Nair was born in 1957 and is an Indian filmmaker. She first started of as a documentary filmmaker and produced successful work such as “So Far from India” and “India Cabaret”. Years later, Nair made a decision to cross over to film production and with her first work “Salaam Bombay”, she was already gaining attention by receiving nominations for best foreign film in award programs such Academy Awards and the Golden Globes. This film, in total claimed 25 international awards. She went on to make other award winning films such as “Mississippi Masala” and “Monsoon Wedding”. Her films are jam packed with culture, especially the indian culture. Not only that her stories are original and strong, the fact that it is told from a woman’s perspective really sets her apart from other filmmakers. Mira Nair should be a role model and inspiration for all aspiring young women filmmakers.

“Truth is more peculiar than fiction. Life is really a startling place.” – Mira Nair