Star Wars V

In Bruges - Propp's Narrative Theory

This theory was developed by Vladmir Propp, based on the work of the Russian Formalists. Propp used Russian Folktales as the basis for his theory but it can be applied to all types of fiction as well as many movies. The basic premise is that there are several basic archtypes that appear in alot of films, and that they all play very similar roles.

These characters are:

* The Hero - who is seeking something
* The Villan - who tries to stop the hero from achieving his goal
* The Helper - Who aids the Hero
* The Donor - who gives the Hero an item of power
* The Princess - This could be a person or thing, which acts as an award for the hero
* The Dispatcher - Who sends the hero on his Journey
* The Father - Who rewards the Hero

Reading Propp's theory, I find it hard to transfer it across to the film "In Bruge". The film is very difficult to identify the characters because it portrays 'bad men' who are assassins as the protagonists.
Also, the 'Hero' in the film is very unclear, because during the end of the film, it seemed like an 'each man for himself' situation. However, it's very clear who the protagonist(s) is and who the antagonist is...

1. Which characters in the film correspond to each archetype? Do any of the characters fulfill more than one role? Are any of the roles fulfilled by more than one character?

The Hero
This archetype is hard to place on one character. We can establish two protagonists: Ray and Ken. But Ken doesn't seem to be 'seeking something'. Whereas Ray is seeking something within himself, perhaps forgiveness or redemption.
But if you observe Ken, especially in the end of the film, he goes to extremes when he tries to prevent Harry from killing Ray, which fits the literal term of Hero.
Though if I had to chose one character, it'd have to be Ray because the movie seems to follow him around as if it's his adventure in Bruges and the difficulties that he is facing.
The movie also promotes the idea that Ray is the Hero. In one scene, Ray speaks to Ken on a bench and says "And that's all because of me, he is dead because of me. And I'm trying to get my head around it but I can't. I would've always killed that little boy." So this tries establish the lost connection between Ray and his own forgiveness and faith. This is especially seen in his facial expressions when Chloe begins to laugh at Ray's date proposal and walks away, as if he's about to cry.

The Villain
It is fairly obvious, I'd have to say Harry. But it then brings up the question, "What is the Hero's goal?"
Well, Harry is trying to get Ray killed because Ray killed a child. Harry is a character with very strong principles that he follows, and it shows at the end of the movie. But Ray doesn't know what his goal is, he doesn't know what he is seeking. So this goes back to the idea that Ray is looking for forgiveness in himself, which we notice happening in the playground where Ken acts as...

The Helper
It's undeniable, Ken is the Helper. Let's see how Ken helps Ray:
-In the playground, Ken stops Ray from shooting himself, only to find out, that he was supposed to shoot Ray. Instictively he doesn't and comforts Ray that it wasn't his fault that he shot a child.
-Ken then sends Ray onto a train to a different country in Europe. Instead of lying to Harry that he had killed Ray, he stands up to him and says that Ray got on a train and that he couldn't kill Ray. This shows that Ken is willing to die for Ray.
-At the bell tower, after Ken has been shot in the leg by Harry, he finds out Ray is still in Bruges. He struggles to stop Harry from killing Ray. In a disadvantaged struggle, Ken gets shot in the neck and is left to bleed to death. Rather than lying down and waiting for the grim reaper to turn up, he climbs up the stairs back to the top of the bell tower where he neatly packs his gun in his coat and jumps off the tower, therefore he reachs Ray quicker than Harry does. Ray finds out that Harry is in Bruge because Ken jumped off the bell tower just to tell Ray so he can live.

I think that covers it.

The Donor
The donor is a hard spot to fill in. The possible characters that can fit in here would be Ken or Chloe.
But Chloe seems to dominate this role more than Ken does. Why? Ken is too much of the helper, but could act as a donor for helping Ray figure himself out as well. But Chloe, she is probably the only reason why Ray will stay in Bruges, and the audience is well aware that he hate Bruges.

"Bruges is a fucking shithole" - Ray

And the description of the donor says that it gives the hero an item of power.
In the scene where Ray is confronted by Chloe's brother Eirik, he finds drugs and of course bullets in Chloe's house along with Eiriks gun. So we can also argue that Eirik can act as the donor.
But according to the example given at http://everything2.com/title/Propp%2527s+theory+of+narrative the donor should be 'helping' the hero, which Eirik does not do when he tells Harry that Ray is in Bruges.

The Princess
"A person or thing, which acts as an award for the hero."
As it is explained above, there are only two things that can act as the princess:
Chloe & Forgiveness

Chloe and Ray have a sexual interest in each other, as shown in the scene when Chloe's brother tries to rob Ray. But by the end of the film, there is no further detail that Ray gets his reward.
However, at the park scene, Ray didn't shoot himself, thanks to Ken, and later says "I don't want to die". If he hadn't forgiven himself, Ray would have let Harry kill him, so... wouldn't that show forgiveness?

The Dispatcher
Harry, right?
After all, he does send Ken and Ray to Bruges.
But that's too literal. I believe that it's Ray.
Ray chose his job as an assassin.
He then confronts Harry.
Also, he is easily provoked when nothing has happened. Take a look at the scene with the overweight American tourists and the dining scene with the Canadian. After all, it did lead him back to Bruges because he Ray punched the Canadian.

The Father
The person who awards the hero.
Well, it really depends on who the princess is. If it were Chloe, then Chloe would be the father too. But I believe that forgiveness was the real princess, so then the father could really be Ray, Ken, Harry or even the child.


Looking at Propp's theory, I do believe it works. But there are some loopholes. It definitely can't be used in certain films and especially genres such as comedy and romance, but it can definitely reflect on action films. Especially the sterotypical action film.
It's very easy to notice who the hero and the villain is because you can base it on who the protagonist and antagonist is. However, some roles can have more than one person acting as it. Perhaps two helpers, but never two heroes. It would work as the hero and his sidekick.
But I think that Propp's theory can backfire itself if there are a lot of subplots in the movie too, because the donor in the main plot may act as the father in the subplot (or any other combination, that was just an example).

Michael Bay - Pyrotechnic

I watched Transformers 2 this week. Good movie. And I expected everything that would happen in a Michael Bay movie. Explosions. Seriously, this movie expands from the Witwicky residence in the first scene all the way to the pyramids of Egypt and I don't remember one scene in the entire movie that DIDN'T have an explosion. It's almost as if Michael Bay has OCD, he needs explosion.
If Michael Bay directed "Teletubbies: The Movie", he would replace the antene with rocket launchers and they'd probably be firing it at Sun Baby because it's an evil dictator that controls a undead S.A. army.

Here's your evil dictator.

I think the only problem with the movie is the amount of attention Michael Bay puts into the Transformers - especially when they transform. I remember watching the cartoons when I was young, and they transformed really quickly. With Michael Bay, he focuses so much on the transformation that it becomes so recurring in the movie. To make it worse, he does an annoying tracking shot around the transformer. Personally this made me dizzy because I was trying to pay attention to detail but everything was moving to fast.

I know this sounds like I'm bashing on the Transformers 2 movie, but in reality, I loved it. Just some minor flaws, cause it's much easier to point out the negative parts in movies because... I dunno, it's just much easier for me, but the explosions do make the movie a lot better. Michael Bay is perfect for the job.

Final Film Project - Planning

I've chosen to work with Tim and Jay on my final film project. This is good I guess... Morrisby Test does say I'm very concious about who I chose to work with. I suppose I chose a creative team, though I don't believe any of us are that skilled with any of the technical aspects. I'm absolute crap when it comes to editting.

We've come up with two ideas for a film, just incase our "plan A" screws up.

"Plan A"
This story is inspired by the movie 'In the Mood for Love'. I've not seen it, but according to Tim and Jay, they say it's good, so I'm sticking to their word. Apparently it's about two lovers who are desperate to be affectionate and in love with each other physically where as mentally, they connect really well.
At first thought, I believe this could work really well, especially because we weren't making a feature film and I think that this could be perfect for a short story. Also, I could see a strong narrative in this story and I've already got it pictured inside my head how successful this can turn out to be.
Using a Super 8 camera for this would be awesome though. Yeah. Awesome.
All it just needs now is some water and it will bloom - into a pretty flower. Yay.



"Plan B"
Hmm... so incase plan A fails, plan B is based on a mockumentary. I'm a person who loves comedies and action film, all I need to do it combined the two and it would be perfect.
What I like about comedies is the way they have a play with words, especially British humor. And action movies? How can you exit an action movie saying "Whoa, I just wasted $50 on a movie ticket..."
Where does the mockumentary come in? Simple, 'The Office'. And the fact that it contains great comedic dialog, PERFECT!
Well then where's the action?
Plan B revolves around the idea like 'The Office', a mockumentary about simple people doing simple things. But swapping it with a person who is egar to make his name big in the movie industry is also a great idea. So basically, we will be filming as the 'Behind the Scenes' crew who looks at the journey of an aspiring film director who attempts to make an action movie using simple objects to create outstanding techniques.

Psycho: The parlor scene

The parlor scene has the two characters Marion Crane and Norman Bates. While we have been watching Psycho for a couple of weeks, we've been focusing on gender and dominance of characters.

In this scene there is a man and a woman. No, their not getting frisky. In this scene, the dominant character is already established: Norman. He invites Marion to her parlor and questions her. His dominance shows again when he gets angry at Marion:

Marion Crane: Wouldn't it be better if you put her... someplace.
Norman Bates: You mean an institution? A madhouse?
Marion Crane: No, I didn't mean it like...
Norman Bates: [suddenly angry] People always call a madhouse "someplace", don't they? "Put her in someplace."

The dominance in this scene definately suggests that the male character is more dominant than the female throughout the movie. Throughout this scene, Marion doesn't speak much either. She looks very worried as she observes the room.


However, the room isn't empty. As the audience, you notice that the room has a lot of stuffed birds.

Norman Bates: My hobby is stuffing things. You know - taxidermy.

These birds can be described as "birds of pray", which causes the audience to believe that Norman is a twisted mind going for the kill. In one frame of the scene, the camera looks up at Norman, this shows how his dominance over Marion, making the audience feel that Marion is looking up at Norman. In the same frame, you see a bird with it's wings spread out diving towards it pray.
Staying on the same frame, the lighting is only used on one side of Norman's face, keeping one side bright, and the other dark. The camera focuses on the darker side and at the same time, Norman is angry with Marion. This shows Norman's "darker side".

Hitchcock puts in a lot of sexual jokes in the movie, and using the word "bird" we can understand the deeper meaning behind these lines. As we already know, Norman likes to "stuff" things, this suggests Norman's interesting for having sexual intercourse with Marion. Also, "bird" is used to describe a woman, therefore, Norman likes to have sex with women.
What is also ironic in this scene is that Marion's surname is "Crane", a breed of bird.


Lighting needs to be emphisized in this movie, because it's a black and white movie, so lighting is used to symbolise meanings. For instance, a character with a lot of lighting on them suggests the purity of the character. In this scene, Marion has a lot of lighting on her suggesting that between the two characters, Marion is pure and true. This is very ironic because she just stole $40,000 from a customer in a previous scene.
I've noticed that a lot of movies and television series make the "bad guys" seem good. For instance "Prison Break" & "Oceans 11".

Character Analysis of Rocky Balboa

This is a diagram that follows the path of the character Rocky Balboa in the film "Rocky Balboa" using "Todorov's Theory of Narrative".

The Godfather

My class was set another task; identify visual parallels and contrasts from the scene of “The Godfather” where Michael Corleone is at his son’s baptizing and his family kills the Dons’ of the other families.

If you are not familiar with this movie, there are five families who are at rivalry with each other. The heads of each family is called a Don. Michael Corleone is head of the Corleone family, after the death of his father.

This scene shows two stories at the same time, but spotlights the same “people” (The Corleone family). This scene uses montage, throughout the scene, the audience is presented with the baptizing of Michael Corleone’s son and his mobsters. There is a basic contrast between these stories, the Holy setting of the church and the murderous killing that the mobsters perform.

During this specific scene, there was a lot of focus especially on the hands and also handkerchiefs. For example, when the father of the church whips his hand and places water onto Michael’s baby and then cuts to several mobsters who whips their head with a handkerchief as if they are sweating.

The scene is very fascinating because of it’s editing. The father of the church recites his words while Michael replies, at the same time, the mobsters of the Corleone family are preparing and killing the Dons’ of the other families.
One of the best editing of montage in this scene is where Michael is asked, “Do you renounce Satan?” and Michael replies, “Yes”. Then, the audience sees the Dons’ of the other families getting shot and killed. This shows great contrast and a parallel because of his innocence in the way he replies while the audience knowingly sees his family kill the other Dons’. This effect shows how much power Michael Corleone has that even if he lies in the house of God, he is a Holy man and is protected because he has organized the killings of the other Dons’.