Joe Pascale - Aesthetics in Film

-Bunny
The short film of the Bunny comes across as somewhat humorous, childish cartoon. Yet, it is much deeper than that. In the beginning the filming is hectic and a little chaotic. This chaos is provided by the moth that is drawn to the light in the grumpy old rabbit's kitchen. The moth itself is symbolic. People who have near-death or out-of-body experiences claim to see a bright light that they were drawn to, much like the moth to a light. The moth is relentless, after being chased outside it returns through a window. In a fit of anger the rabbit swats at the moth and hits it. Unfortunately for the rabbit it falls in the cake, with even more anger the old rabbit bakes the cake with the moth anyway. A short while later the oven begins to shake and it looks as if lightening is striking inside of it. The intensity of this scene not only terrifies the rabbit, but draws the audience in. Up until now there did not seem to be much of a point to the story, but now we wonder what is going on inside the oven. The oven is a passageway to heaven, much like the proverbial ladder or staircase to heaven. No longer angry, the terrified and trembling rabbit (symbolic of being afraid of death) is drawn into the oven by a light. As the rabbit moves further and further in the speckles of paint on the oven wall become stars and the rabbit floats on towards the light, no longer afraid, but in awe.

- Northfork scene 1
The opening of the first scene is a powerful and informative one. The car with Walter and Willis drives the a crossroads. This is symbolic of the crossroad they must face in life, with determining what to do about moving the casket of Walter's wife, Willis' mother. Next the scene cuts to a boy running across an open meadow with a suitcase, while a herd of bison mingle in the foreground. The bison are unphased by the boy, continuing in their daily lives. But in the background looms the mountains of Northfork, always witnesses.
-Northfork scene 2
This scene is in some ways an extension of the crossroads scene. At the crossroads Walter and Willis knew they had a cross to bear, but could not bring themselves to do what they needed to do. Finally they did, the casket on top of the car as they drove down the curving road was their cross, their burden. While the sad music is played and Willis looked dismayed, Walter smiled a small grin, because despite this burden that was placed upon him weighs so heavy on their hearts, taking care of his wife brings a bit of closure and peace to him. The cross he no longer has to bear.

-Paris, Texas
The first few scenes are of a man drifting over the landscape. He is in the desert, with no maked route or trail but in his searching eyes you can tell he has a destination. The close up of his searching eyes and wary face are very powerful. Next scene we find that he has found a bit more order in his life, his search is more organized than an open desert. The landscape is green and he is following roads and telephone lines. Early in the shot he crosses from one side of the road to the other, symbolic that he is at a crossroads in his life and something is on his mind. His brother catches up to him on the road and tries to persuade him into the car. He does not speak of react. As they stand there, a mountain with gentle green slopes rises in the distance behind him. Behind the drifter rises a rugged mountain much closer. I think this is not only symbolic of thier physical apperance at the time (the drifter looking much rougher than the brother) but also of obstacles they must overcome. The drifter's obstacle, as symbolized in his mountain, is much more complex and difficult and it is looming large in his life.

The scenes continue, always focused on cars, airplanes, freeways, back roads, telephone lines, railroad tracks and bridges. All are forms of communication and transportation. They connect people is some way or another. The scenes and the man are lonesome. The rail lines and the lonesome roads are symbolic of this. Eventually we find out that the man is searching for his wife. When he finds her their conversation makes sense out of all the scenes before. The scenes were symbolic of communication and connecting two people, communication was the problem between the wife and drifter. The conversation reveals that they never communicated in marriage. Then when the wife left she found herself talking to her husband though no one was there. Even after he found her communication was difficult. They were forced to talk to each other over a phone, separated by class in a Texas style brothel. The man could not look at her while she spoke, it was not until she sat and faced the other way that he could turn and face forward. The notion that they had to talk over a phone line while separated by glass shows they are attempting to communicate yet still find themselves distant from each other.

-Pink Floyd's The Wall
This was probably the best documentation of the descent into insanity as portrayed in art. The scenes were dark and full of doom (animation of war). While the education scene was full of disturbing images. The kids looked like they had melted faces. I think this was meant to show the lack of individuality allowed in the schools, they wanted to make robots. They were faceless in a school that looked like a prison. They they rioted and burned the school. Fire was used as a force of chaos and destruction. The backs against the wall scene was very phallic and sexual in nature. A loving flower morphs into a vagina that again morphs into a bat. You can imagine Pink has woman issues. The judgment scene seems to have a bit of all the scenes before. Sexual and phallic symbols, destructions and chaos, demons and devils and even scenes of his mother coddling him, which is symbolic of his over-protective mother.

-Cabeza de Vaca
What this film lacks in dialogue it makes up for in imagery and symbolism. In the opening scene as the spanish expidetion is being attacked, the priest staggers through the battle zone riddled with arrows and holding a cross. He is shown in the mist walking into the light (like the Bunny short film) and he just disappears. It reminds me of the scene at the end of "High Plains Drifter." Through out the movie there are small and subtle hints that Clint Eastwood is a ghost or the reincarnation of a man that was murdered in this small western town. After killing the men that murdered the man that he is believed to be the reincarnation of, he rides off into the desert and disappears, furthering the belief that he is either ghost or some divine entity. It is very similar to the priest as he vanishes, presumably ascending to heaven. The most powerful scene is that when Cabeza de Vaca (Alvar) tries to escape his imprisonment by a shaman. When the escape fails, he is angry and rants and raves. The camera movement is hectic as it follows him around while he stomps in the sand. As his anger turns to sadness, the camera slowly pans in for a close up and becomes less chaotic. In the close up Alvar is curled up in the fetal position. This is symbolic of birth or rebirth. Fittingly, it is at this time that Alvar goes through a transformation of his own. In the following scenes Alvar reveals himself to be a shaman, or healer. This is a huge shock to the shaman that kept him in bondage. His surprise is revealed in a close up of his face. Close up are used often in this film. The shaman returns Alvar's cross and sends him on his way. In the end Alvar and three other Spanish make it back to the Spanish fort. As Alvar moves across the desert towards the Spanish the scenery is symbolic of the changing of worlds that Alvar is experiencing. In the scene of escape Alvar describes the world and says that he is of another world than that of the shaman. Now at the end he meets the boundary of the two worlds. The native american world that he has come to know is shown as the mountains and deserts of the background. Then Alvar enters the world of the Spanish, marked by a mysterious trench in the ground. The background of the Spanish is chaotic, full of destruction as a fire burns a structure to the ground.