MYST-The Great Gatsby(2013)

I have been anticipating this movie since I first heard it was being made. Well, I finally saw it and it was AWESOME. Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby is one of my favorite books so I was very critical while watching the movie, but as soon as the movie began, I forgot all about criticizing it and became completely swept up into the movie. 

The Great Gatsby is in 3D, though I did not see it in 3D. It is an adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's 1925 novel of the same name. The film was co-written and directed by Baz Luhrmann, and stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Tobey Maguire, Carey Mulligan, and Joel Edgerton. It follows the life and times of millionaire Jay Gatsby and his neighbor Nick, who recounts his encounter with Gatsby at the height of the Roaring Twenties.





The costumes in the movie were absolutely stunning and the cinematography itself really made the costumes 'pop' on screen. In my opinion, this movie is so much better than the 1974 Great Gatsby. The emotion and drama of the story was captured so much more than in the 1974 one. I also thought that the actors they used fit their roles a lot better than in the 1974 film.

The soundtrack was awesome. I really didn't think that contemporary pop and hip hop were going to help portray the jazz age at all, but it was really cool and really helped bring out the details that Fitzgerald wrote about the parties.

All in all, this is definitely a movie worth seeing!

MYST- Life of Pi (2012)

Life of Pi is a 2012 American adventure drama film based on a novel of the same name. Directed by Ang Lee, the film is based on an adapted screenplay by David Magee, and stars Suraj Sharma, Irrfan Khan, Rafe Spall, Gérard Depardieu, Tabu, and Adil Hussain.

The storyline revolves around a 16-year old Indian boy named Pi, who survives a shipwreck in which his family dies, and is stranded in the Pacific Ocean on a lifeboat with a Bengal tiger named Richard Parker.

This movie is AMAZING. Everything about it is amazing, the acting, the cinematography, everything. I can definitely say this is one of the greatest movies I've ever seen. The special effects really draw the audience in, the director and cinematographer really knew how to bring the novel to life and there are just so many jaw dropping moments.

I think my favorite scene is when he lands on an island that has only meerkats on it. In the day time the island looks like any other regular island with a jungle, but at night the whole island looks like its glow in the dark. It is so beautiful, it's hard to describe. At this point in the movie, Pi has been in the ocean for such a long time, that he is ready to stay on the island with the meerkats for the rest of his life. But while he is looking into a small body of water that is glowing, he sees dead fish and other things. He soon realizes that the island eats the things that live on it when the sun sets, so he leaves the island in the morning. It is definitely one of those scenes in any kind of action/ adventure film where you think that the hero or main character has finally achieved what they have set out to do but then it all goes wrong.

All I can say is, if you haven't seen this movie, you must.

1975- The Road to Revenge

My groups movie is about an officer (Clint Eastwood) in New York City who is told by the government to kill his long term partner because he has been dealing drugs. After not following through with the government's plan, they have his wife, kids and partner killed. In search of revenge out on a cross-country trip to get back at the government officials. Along the way he meets and recruits some young rebels who tag along with him and help him out with his endeavors.My group came up with this type of movie because we thought it had a lot of characteristics of a 70's film We wanted it to be more experimental and more realistic.We wanted to stretch the boundaries just like most of the 70's films did. We wanted to include was the idea of social commentary. This movie questions the government's authority over society and also personal morals and ethics. Clint Eastwood plays the antihero, which was a major 1970's characteristic.

 

We chose Clint Eastwood for this role because he has the experience of playing an antihero in Dirty Harry. Jon Voight was chosen for the role of Clint's partner because in past films such as Midnight Cowboy he did films with social commentary in them and he also was in films dealing with murder. Lastly, we chose Robert Shaw to play the main government official because he can play a mysterious, menacing character quite well. For our studio we chose Malpaso Productions. It was founded by Clint Eastwood in 1967. So we thought it would be smart to go with a studio he would be comfortable with and know well. Also, we chose this because Malpaso was linked with Warner Bros. Studios who is involved with larger movies and also ones that include social commentary. 

Our film is more than one genre, which was very common in 1970's films. We thought it would be mostly action/crime because of Eastwood's main plan to get his revenge against the law, but it can also be considered a drama since it deals with Eastwood's character's struggles and emotions.For our director we chose Ingmar Bergman who was a Swedish director, writer and producer.He made a lot of movies that deal with death, crime and betrayal. During his career, he got caught up in a alleged tax evasion which placed him in a similar criminal investigation as in our film. So he could put some of his own feelings into the movie and make an accurate character development. 

The rating we decided on for this film was M for mature. We chose this rating so we could appeal to a larger scale audience and be able to show more gritty scenes, but still get the audience we wanted.  Our main focus was editing because we wanted there to be jump cuts which showed more of the experimental side of the film that we wanted to show. Don Cambern wass our editor, he worked on Easy Rider in 1969.

I wouldn't change anything about our movie.