You Can't Take It with You

You Can't Take It with You (1938, Frank Capra) is a romantic comedy masterpiece. Capra's enthusiasm towards American idealism and democratic values is present in the film. His criticism of American high-class society and his hope of reconciliation between the low and high classes can be detected and followed throughout the entire structure of his oeuvre. You can even find his desire and curiosity towards the Russian Communist revolution throughout the dialogue and comedic situations happening in the storyline and narrative. 

Capra puts the madness of the family in front of the logic of capitalism and narrates the story of a normal couple who wants to live beyond this conflict and this social gap. For Capra, this funny madness is a revolutionary movement against the principles of a capitalistic society. Beyond this madness, there is a wisdom that brings the two different social classes together at the end of the film, and the reconciliation between low and high social classes becomes true based on Capra's American idealistic values.

The young couple represents the younger generation and the future of America and its democratic values. They want to live in the society that there is no gap and conflict between high and low social classes. They don't want to be the victims of this gap and conflict.

A note: by Morad Sadeghi 

It Happened One Night

 

It Happened One Night

The 1930s was the best years of America. It was the golden age of Hollywood. Capra directed It Happened One Night in 1934. Is it a road movie? Is it a screwball comedy? Is it a romantic comedy? What is so unique about this film? Clark Gabel and Claudette Colbert are at their own best. The film represents all aspects of America that Capra is in love with. He is standing somewhere between conservative and radical American policies. Is the film criticizing the American high-class style of life or is it the film that admires all aspects of American capitalism? Is there a reconciliation between America's low and high classes in the movie? Is the film celebrating American idealism and democratic values? The film is full of moments and dialogue that have the reason to provoke the American audience to ask themselves Who they are as American citizens. While Capra's American idealism with democratic values can be traced and detected throughout the film, the question remains: can these values establish a better way of life?  

The film was made before the Hays Code but the marriage between the couple is the moralistic resolution of the narrative. Gable and Colbert are two different creatures from two crucial social classes. While Gable is an extroverted character, Colbert is an introverted one. The romantic relationship between the characters solves the social gap between them. 

In terms of sexual representation in cinema in the pre-code era, the film can be deciphered and interpreted in many ways. The famous scenes of hitchhiking, the night scenes in the rented rooms, and the final scenes of the film are the reasons why the film is so important as the artistic work of the pre-code era. The feministic reading of the film also emphasizes that Colbert has no choice between her father, her fiancé, and the man she loves.

A note: by Morad Sadeghi

 

  

 

Oscar Ceremony 2015

Oscar Ceremony 2015

Contrast is always important but sometimes creates misunderstanding. In any Oscar ceremony, the jury is often selected from a broad spectrum of people who are mostly cinephiles and their professionalism revolves around film criticism and industry. By contrast, one can quickly make it clear that the differences can be as important as the similarities. In the Oscar Ceremony in 2015, the jury's concerns recur and can be detected in all their choices and decisions. Their concerns were related to those 'contrasts' between the nominations that determine the quality of their evaluations and the prosperity of their conceptualizations. Birdman (2014, Alejandro González Iñárritu) and The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014, Wes Anderson) were selected among the group of films that were extraordinary and unique in satisfying the audiences' tastes for audiovisual structures. Both films encompass collections of innovative and creative achievements that strengthen the values of Oscar considerations. An Oscar for foreign film Ida (2013, Pawel Pawlikowski) was another surprising moment that astonished us with the rational and satisfactory result decided by the jury. It seems to me that the Oscar ceremony tries to catch up with the best film festivals such as Cannes, Venice, and Berlin. How the Oscar ceremony succeeds in satisfying professionally trained viewers around the world is an unanswerable question, but we should not forget that these kinds of ceremonies integrate the professional film industries into pop culture and provide the required launching platform for film artisans and innovators.

By: Morad Sadeghi

Please leave your comments and explain in detail the points and the failures that you find in the texts.

Quattro Mosche di Velluto Grigio

Quattro Mosche di Velluto Grigio (Four Flies on Grey Velvet) (1971, Dario Argento)


Dario Argento's giallo genre (mystery, crime) established his reputation throughout his career and helped him to demonstrate an interest in horror films with psychoanalytic and sexual thematic structures. The nightmarish qualities of his films provide the audience with intellectual support and attitudes the audience arrives at on the screening. I think that Freud and Jung provided Argento with a belief system to draw on. Not only is the female protagonist in Four Flies on Grey Velvet schizophrenic and sexually abused character, but she represents the dark and mysterious sides of life. Her husband is more stable and sexually healthy. Argento's film narrative seems to suggest that psychoanalytic ideas give him intellectual credibility to create. The visual style of the film guarantees a psychoanalytical reading of the film. The lighting, the point-of-view shots, the murderous gazes, and the dream sequences all reveal the potentiality for the psychological deciphering of the film. In the film, the unconscious represents supernatural power and the monstrousness of the human mind.

Sunshine

Sunshine (2007, Danny Boyle)

Sunshine is a film with all its conventional possibilities of a closed plot in which the scenes tend to give a sense of completeness to the narrative. Somewhat surprisingly, however, the conventional ending of the film is haunting but optimistic. The science fictional and apocalyptic motifs of the film show us how every character achieves quieter maturity towards the end of the narrative. The human sacrificial theme is iterated periodically, and the confrontation of scientific and religious standpoints reveals the triumph of the scientific endeavor that is impossible without human interference. The symbolic scene of the ending that connects the character's later nightmare to the beauty and the peacefulness of state of his mind now intensifies the necessity of the Sun's existence for the survival of humanity. The final moment of the character revelation coincides with his message that is reviewed by his wife on Earth and is not with any sense of ambiguity and bizarreness. Review By Morad Sadeghi

Les Deux Anglaises et Le Continent

Les Deux Anglaises et Le Continent(Two English Girls) (1971, François Truffaut)

One of Truffaut's aims in Two English Girls is to underline the differences between English and French cultures in terms of dealing with romantic and sexual subject matters. The tone and the narrative strategy of the film shift when the characters move from British land to French soil and vice versa. The sexual repression scenes and the sexual liberation ones balance each other. Muriel’s' character (Stacey Tendeter) reveals a certain capacity for traditionalism and morality while Ann's character is more adventurous and a risk-taker. Ann may be less innocent but more sage. Muriel's destiny is to suffer. She is the victim of the social tradition that hovers over her romantic and sexual desires. Her loss of virginity at the end of the film is poignant, frightening, and violent. If the frame of reference for Muriel's love is 19th-century romanticism, Ann's love represents a modern 20th-century passion for liberation and freedom. The possibilities for the romantic encounters in the love triangle have prompted Truffaut to consider his love affairs with Catherine Deneuve & Françoise Dorléac as the self-reflexive source for the narrative. Review By Morad Sadeghi