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2011년 3월 29일 화요일

Comparision Of the Movie "If Only"

Naver
http://movie.naver.com/movie/board/review/list.nhn?st=code&od=goodcnt&sword=39440

Yahoo
http://movies.yahoo.com/movie/1808493518/info

MSN



1.Compare and contrast how the classifications affect how we approach that film.

    
 If Only can be classified as fantasy, drama, and romance. Well, I only thought about it as a romance, because I focused only on the tragic between the two couple. However,  if you just change little of your point of view and focus on the "taxi driver" and "the time", it's definitely a fantasy. Those who classified it as a romance could consider it very painfully sad love story, but for the others might think it as a "what-the-heck" movie. Just a person's point of view can change the numbers of "stars"!! 


2.what role does gender play?
     I could see the definite difference reviews and ratings between male and female.
Briefly to say, it was the saddest movie for most of females. However, I think it wasn't at all for majority number of males. I've seen a guy even saying "it was waste of my 96 minutes of my life." In my opinion, because it's a very sensitive love story, the movie's aimed for women!

3.Are there any other ways that film can be classified?
    I saw a website classified this movie as a comedy. I didn't know why they classified this way. However, as I looked up for a dictionary, I found out that it was a matter of meaning! To Koreans, comedy is more like a popular entertainment composed of jokes, satire, or humorous performance. But when you talk about "comedy" in movie field, it's more like a work that is light and often humorous in tone and that usually contains a happy resolution of the thematic conflict. I don't really agree with this classification, but I guess it's one of the answers for the question #3 - the comedy genre was wildly unexpected one for me!! :) 

2011년 3월 17일 목요일

5 from Barthes for the Life is Wonderful

★Enigma Code :
 When I first saw this movie, this movie made me so curious. "What kind of movie is this?" "How am I supposed to react? Can I laugh? or Is it OK to cry?" I remember myself cried with the scene he was caught by a Nazi soldier at last, but ended with laughing. His face was so funny that I couldn't stop laughing eventhough it was so sad story!!! So, I googled it and found out that this movie's genre is called black comedy. And I also couldn't understand when Dora went WITH them even though she wasn't a Jews, but Guido's love of his son gave me a clue. That was because they extremely loved each other that without them, their lives weren't even so worhty!

★Action Code
 When Guido and his son Joshua were caught by the German, Guido tells Joshua that this is a game especially made for them, and whoever gets the 1,000 points of the score, he/she will get a real tank.
This action makes us understand that Guido is trying to save his son doing his best. With his effort, he almost survived. However, when he heard that the U.S. army is coming to save them, he went out to find his wife, but eventually caught by a German soldier. But when even he was about to kill, he pretended like this is not so serious situation to let his son not to be nervous. This kind of action code makes me think a lot. Well, he's very humorous person. With that character, he did his best to protect his son, and that revealed his love of his child and his wife.

★Character Code
 In this movie, Guido is very humorous, positive, and he loves his person with all his heart and life. When he first bumps into his girl, Dora, I couldn't find any surprise on his face. He just kissed on her knees saying "I'm sorry! I think you have pain here, here, and here!." I thought he was a playboy at first, but when he bumped into Dora for the third time, I saw his nervousness in his action - hiding behind his friend and asking him what she's doing with HIM(her fiance). I don't think he's never serious because I somewhat can read his mind. He seems like he doesn't really care about things happening around him, but that's not true. He does his things and he does his duty. The first 20 minutes of this movie shows he came to the village to run a bookstore business and it tells us that he has thoughts!! Therefore, with his not-so-serious, humorous, positive, and giving up-his-life-for-his-son actions tells us that he is very dumb on the outside, but forethoughtful person on the inside.


★Symbolic Code
There were lots of symbolic code in this movie, but I'd like to talk about a "tank". The tank fianlized all the heppenings that made the family seperated. Because Guido told Joshua that all the situation happening here is a GAME, Joshua is eager for the prize - a real tank! When he was hiding inside a box, everyone including his father was killed. However, since he didn't know what was actually going on, he came out from the box and wandered to look for some help! And suddenly a tank of an American army approaches him and takes him to his mother. Tank maybe a symbol of a war, but in this movie, it meant a peace to the audience. And because Guido's white lie that the prize would be a real tank was literally real to Joshua, it made this movie very touching.



 ★Cultural Code
 This movie has somewhat serious cultural back ground - Jewish extermination policy. The Nazi carried out the extermination policy because they wanted to let Aryan have supermacistism.(The majority of high society in German at that time was Jewish. That's why German didn't like Jewish people!) If you look at the inside of Hitler's policy, you will find out that he tried to exterminate the Jews because they were the chief obstacles for the step to German to become the best nation.

Commercial Comparison

I've Compared Mc Donald's snack wrap commercial in three different countries - Korea, America and France


Korea
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mwp8acT5a_A
In this ad, it says every set menu in McDoanld's is only 3,000 won between 11A.M. and 2.P.M which is a lunch time for workers. As you know, we Koreans LOVE  "for free" or "cheaper". This kind of ad certainly irritate Korean workers because they are really really busy and try to save their money as much as possible. I think it's sort of an unconciousness. I'm positive they made good progress with this term "3,000 won!"


America
http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/v/GpwGN1HYXuQ?fs=1&hl=ko_KR

This video is from the U.S. If I were a guy in America and play basketball, I would love to eat a snack wrap when I'm too busy playing basketball and have no time to eat. You should know most of American guys love to play basketball or other sports and you should also know that most of American basketball players are blakc!! However, if I were a guy in Korea, this ad wouldn't move my mind a bit because basketball isn't  really as popular as in the United States.


France
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wI8nPBOZZIU
In the spot, a teenage boy sits in a McDonald's booth, looking at his class picture, when his phone rings. "I was just thinking about you," he says, with obvious affection. "I miss you, too" he replies, and then says that he has to go. His dad is coming to the booth with their food. Father sits across from son and comments that he was "quite the ladies' man" when he was his son's age. Dad then looks at the class picture and remarks that "it's too bad" that his son's class is all boys. The son can only smile.


The point, of course, is that the son is gay. Following that reveal, a tagline reads "Come as You Are" in French. "We wanted to show society the way it is today, without judging. There's obviously no problem with homosexuality in France today," Nathalie Legarlantezec, a McDonald's spokesperson, told French media. The ad airs only in France, but thanks to online video sites, it quickly went viral. It already has well over one million views on YouTube.

This is an explanation below the video on YouTube. I think even though this commercial focused on a society problem - homosexualism, it's also a cultural difference! I'm not sure you can air this kind of commercial in Korea since we are not yet allowed to have relationship with a same sex legally. I'm not saying that airing this social problem is bad. I think it's cool, and nice of them to speak to people that "since it's okay in France, just reveal yourself!"

2011년 3월 8일 화요일

My Expectatioins for Media English Class.

       Since this is my first Media-related class, I've got some expectations.
       First of all,  I'm hoping to get knowledge of media as much as possible. I didn't know what exactly media is, but eversince I took the first day of this calss, I started to get to know it.
       Second of all, I want to get an A!! I love computer, and I love designing something. So I think this is a really good opportunity to get an A from English-related class.
      Last, but not the least, I'm hoping to get close to Prof. Benjamin!! I think he's really wonderful teacher because he smiles at me a looooot - I think. haha. :D

2011년 3월 2일 수요일

my chihuahua

she's very sexy.