Kim Robinson - Movie Clips

Movie Clips:
1) The Bunny Short:
To me this clip started off kind of dark where the edges of the shot were almost in black and also the picture moved around a lot at the beginning. This initially gave me a feeling that the shot was meant to be erratic in someway, like that of frustration now that I’ve the entire short. The Bunny was trying to cook a cake but a moth kept being attracted to the light above her head. Naturally she tried to get the moth outside which she did, but it came back like the fear of death does to so many elderly people (or bunnies I guess). At the end she’s baked this moth into the batter but she notices a white light at the end of the tunnel which is so often used to describe death. She grows wings and flied toward the light with the same moth that was bugging her earlier. It was an interesting concept brought up in class about how the moth was her guide to the afterlife and that it could possibly be her late husband. I enjoyed the clip and it makes me wonder if we do get a guide to death who will mine be one day.

2) Northfolk
Since we had just watched Northfolk in class it wasn’t hard to piece together the “descriptive narrative” that we were looking for in other clips. The first clip was that of the little boy angel running with his suitcase in hopes of leaving the town. It was interesting how it was overlaid by a transparent image of the bison being “fenced in” to this one area. While the boy is free to try and leave this town that humans are destroying, the bison are stuck where they are and have always been effected by the decision of man with no freedom of their own. The next clip we watched was when the father and son team were driving out f Northfolk with the coffin on top of their brand new car. To me at least (an I believe we briefly talked about this in class) represent s the constant struggle people, especially Americans, go through in trying to keep their material items new and pristine while also having to care about the old or even dead things in our life. However, at the end of the scene they place the coffin on top of a hill safe from the creation of the new lake, with the mountains in the background. This shot was very serene to me and it showed how no matter items it is we care about, it will only be momentary. Our lives, if lucky, will only last 80 or 90 years so why waster your energy fighting over stupid letting things or being frustrated with little things.

3)Paris Texas
This movie was an interesting spin compared to Wings of Desire that was directed by the same man. This one was about the ways that humans interact and communicate with people. Each of the clips as we went on created a narrative for us to follow. It showed how bad each relationship was in the film whether its between man and wife, father and son, or brother andbrother. None of the characters in the film stayed connected even though I felt they wanted to based on the latent symbols that are shown throughout the film. In basically every scene we viewed there were roads or phone lines or even train tracks that had the possibility of connecting the characters and especially the father was always interacting with these symbols. I have to admit I didn’t follow this movie as much as others and it didn’t stir my emotions like others have. I guess it may be that I have been very fortunate in my family to communicate well with them all so I can’t sympathize with the story.

4) Pink Floyd’s The Wall
I’ve seen this movie a number of times so I knew the plot line and how the scenes played into the greater story. The first scene we saw in class was that of “Goodbye Blue Sky” and when the characterization of war was displayed. The movie is filled with symbols and this was scene was filled with symbols of the war that Pink lived through as a child. When the war bird ripped the house of the ground and there was blood coming out of the bottom, to me it was showing how even if there isn’t human death, war still takes a toll on the lives of people who live through it. The next scene we saw was when Pink was in school and the famous song “Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2)” was playing. In this scene it shows how the school system at this time wasn’t doing anything to help the kidslearn, but was rather turning out duplicates of the “model citizen.” The line “we don’t need no though control” sums up the scene perfectly because the kids were trying to fight back against the school because it wasn’t teaching them to learn, but rather just trying to control what they though about. The final scene we watched was that of “the Trial.” In this world he was living in, people weren’t suppose to have their own feelings, just like how the school was turning out duplicates of the same child. Manifestations of all of those people who have been in Pink’s life and have been part of the reason why Pink has developed these feelings all come back and testify against him. As many people have said this scene is pivotal within the movie. I could go on talking about each symbol in this scene but it would take forever.

5) Cabeza de Baca
This was an odd movie from what we saw. I’m not sure that I truly grasped what the director was trying to portray in the movie. It was interlaced with both Christian religion and the religion of the Shaman and his people. In the first scene there is a battle and the Priest is shot in the back with multiple arrows but still continues on walking. Possibly this along with the other scene in which Alvar gets his cross ripped off, could represent that their religion will continue on with or without symbols of their power. Another theme that emerged from the film I thought was that of displacement and loss. Alvar doesn’t know how long he has been a prisoner or where he is at exactly. He tries to locate himself with the familiar that is around him like air, plants, and the seas. Eventually Alvar creates a new life for himself in this place and receives some sort of power. This is when I lost track of the movie some so it was hard to fit all the pieces together.