A new way of looking at films

I recently discovered a new tumblr, which is often dangerous to my productivity, but I've found this one particularly interesting as it offers an interesting new way of looking at films.  It is called moviebarcode, and it posts single images, or barcodes, representing the entire course of a movie.  These images are made up of a number of still frames, evenly distributed throughout the movie, which are then stretched upward so that only the main color information remains.  It offers a very nice, birds-eye view of the art direction and overall color tones and moods of a film.  There is also an index so that you can easily look up movies you are interested in.

O Brother, Where Art Thou (2000)

For example, this is the barcode from the 2000 film "O Brother, Where Art Thou".  This was the first film to be digitally color graded in order to make an artistic choice.  In this case, much of the footage was tweaked to make the landscapes look drier and more golden, to fit the setting of the Dust Bowl in the midwest.  This is easily apparent in the barcode, which is overwhelmingly gold and beige.  You can also see, right at the very beginning, how the film starts out in black and white, before the saturation is added back in to produce the color.

The Matrix (1999)

Here's another example: The Matrix.  Almost every scene in The Matrix has a distinctive green tint to it, which is easily apparent in this image.

Harry Potter: Complete Series (2001-2011)

This is one of my favorite examples, because it shows some of the applications that these images could have.  This is all eight Harry Potter movies, sequentially, which means we can see some interesting trends.  First of all, we can see that the mood of the series gets progressively darker, until the last installment is almost entirely black.  This visual trend clearly follows the tone of the films and the stories themselves.  It also shows the differences in the styles of the directors; for instance, Chris Columbus filmed the first ones primarily inside, which is shown by all the warm tones at the beginning of the image.  When directing the third installment, Alfonso Cuarón made the conscious decision to shift to a more outdoors, location based film, which is shown in the abrupt transition to blues and greens.

By looking at multiple films at once like this, we can observe patterns, similarities, and differences that are both interesting and useful.  Using these images could be an easy way to examine multiple films by broad categories such as genre or time period, which might expose some of the stereotypes or tropes that are used in different types of filmmaking.

A Perfect Blend - Theatre and Film

As I mentioned in class on Wednesday, I am a big theatre dweeb.  So of course, when Les Miserables hit theaters this past December, I had to see it.  As much as I love theater and film, I have never been a fan of when the two are blended together.  For example, I'm not the biggest fan of RENT which hit Broadway in 1996 and movie theaters in 2005.  Why?  Well, I could go on for a while for a lot of different reasons.  But one of the biggest reasons, which I know many will disagree, is that casting Adam Pascal and Anthony Rapp was a mistake.  As we discussed in class, theatre acting and film acting are two very different things.  I think that Pascal and Rapp are phenomenal actors on stage and on film, but being thrown together with the rest of the broadway cast makes the film more "broadway" and not "film"- making the story seem fake and pieced together.

But back to where I was before, I think Les Mis was one of the BEST films I have seen that has been based on a musical.  What stood out to me was the audio.  There was no lip syncing which was impressive for the performer and the audio crew as well.  The sound was crystal clear.  I remember watching a scene where it was raining, and I felt like I could hear every single rain drop hit the ground perfectly.  Not to mention that since there was no lip syncing, it made the story feel that much more real.

Also, I need to talk about Anne Hathaway.  By far- one of the most compelling performances I have ever scene from an actress.  Her dramatic 25 pound weight loss to fit the role was only step one of her commitment to the role of Fantine.  Her emotional portrayal, particularly in "I Dreamed a Dream", was one of the most beautiful performances I have ever seen.  She nailed it.

Needless to say, I saw Les Mis twice, and wish I had time to see it again.