Orpheus's Inferno

So the film Orpheus seemed to be a little more difficult to get into than the other movies we have watched in class, I would just have to blame that on the storyline because did not completely understand what was happening at the time I was watching it. I guess it my trouble with the film was that I thought it was going to resemble the Greek mythology pretty much as closely as possible, but it really didn't follow it exactly. Also it was in french so there were times that I would fall in and out of attention if I couldn't comprehend what they were saying.

What I did notice and found interesting was the whole aspect of the poet, and how Orpheus is able to travel into this underworld because he is has this certain gift. Now my big question while I was watching this film was that are poets universally looked at to having this power? The reason I ask this is because this story reminded me a lot of Dante's Inferno, which is a story of a man who is led through the nine circles of hell to find a beautiful woman named Beatrice who resides in purgatory. Now in this story we see a man who is also trying to find his "love" and has to cross deep into the depths of the underworld so that he may find her. The interesting thing about this story is that Dante is led through the nine circles of hell by a poet named Virgil. This was the point where I was like why do poets get these special powers to descend between worlds, and is it any poet who is allowed these powers?

In class we touched on why this power to travel into the underworld is possible by poets,and we found out that they have a certain closeness to death throughout having a "career" of being a poet, which is a really cool concept and fits both of these stories. One would have to wonder though if there were other positions one could take to also be granted these powers such as being an artist in general, or a certain type of musician, maybe they can go into other worlds, I don't know. I do know now that Greek mythology and catholic belief kind of have this same conceptual idea of poets having this power, by looking at Dante's Inferno and Orpheus.

Visually this movie was freaking amazing, the whole underworld being made of post world war two ruins just added to there being two different realms. I'm just a big fan of the third man and how it was used in that film, so naturally it looked good to me in this film as well. The other effects used just immersed me even more into the underworld, like the mercury used for the portal and things like that. My favorite effect would have to be the scene where they're not supposed to be in the underworld and we see Orpheus just slide along the wall like he's being pulled away. I know in class we discussed how this may have been done but I still have no idea how they managed to get that effect with there technology back then.

The article Deadly Statuses: Eros in the films of Jean Cocteau was kind of hard to understand the little bits and pieces, but as a whole I feel that it relates to why Jean Cocteau depicted Orpheus in this certain way, and maybe even why he chose to film Orpheus in the first place. What I took away from the article was that homosexuals in the time of this film were taken to be so offensive, and considered to be a disease, that they were imprisoned, and ridiculed against. So from this they were forced to live in this "secret world" of not letting anyone know and basically going against their way of life just to be safe from being locked up. Now I connected this to Orpheus by the two worlds that we see in this movie, one "normal" and the other in ruin. I believe that there is a big use of symbolism in how Cocteau may have used these to worlds in the film to describe the two different worlds that homosexuals at the time had to live in.

Over all Orpheus was a good film , a little hard to understand at times, but still pretty entertaining. The concepts of the film were probably one of the most important aspects of the piece, so make sure you really keep that in mind as you watch.

Hope you enjoyed, See y'all next time!

Laura Fatale?

Now this was a good film, this movie had a good plot I could sink my teeth into, and for once not be disappointed in the ending by not getting the answers I wanted. I really appreciated all of the different characteristics that were present in all of the individuals. I thought that the many personalities worked nicely with the Noir feel, because of the type of mystery that was going on . I really tried throughout the film to find out who the murderer was, and what weapon was used, just like in those many CSI drama series that are out now. I have come to realize that this film is like Citizen Kane in many ways, like finding out about a person through the thoughts and the stories of others, and how others saw that person. However Laura then is rediscovered to be alive,unlike Kane so i also feel like she in a sense is like Herry Lime in the Third Man. A main character that comes back from the dead.

Laura is a very unique type of film, because initially the femme fatale feel to the movie is present...but as the end of the film came along I kinda didn't get that feeling anymore. I mean sure, the scheme of it was there, like the woman being able to control men with her godly like beauty, and grace, but I thought she was supposed to be the type of person that wont settle for any type of man regardless if her life was saved by one them just like it is described in the Article No Place For a Woman. The article gives many great examples of how through many femme fatale films of the audience seeing this tough girl in charge, but I really just didn't get that vibe from Laura the character in the film. When we first meet her yes, she was that hard working woman that didn't need a man, but then when we come to the end she settled down with the detective...whats up with that? I'm guessing it was the whole journey and experience that changed her, but I still thought that wouldn't have mattered, and she would rather be without a man and still in control. A little of myself wanted Laura to not be with anyone in the end, just to completely be a femme fatale film.

The femme fatale scene that impressed me the most would have to be the scene that McPherson is walking around Laura's apartment digging in all of her unmentionables. At the moment the camera gazes at the portrait of Laura you just get that feeling of...woah, you know this portait, and how we or the characters see it is going to be important. At that exact time McPherson gets that exact feeling that comes across yourself , and that is where I respect femme fatale the most in the film. McPherson was able to fall in love with not the person Laura, but with the image of her...now that's some powerful attraction right there. In our class discussion we also talked about how this way of seeing Laura as an image rather than an actual human is how her character actually is to the other male characters. I would have to agree completely, just with the way Lydecker and Shelby treated her as if she was a toy, or a possession. Shelby treated all women like this , but Lydecker wouldn't let anyone else have her, like a kid not wanting to share with others. I even thought it was funny at times when he acted like a child, like when he was in Laura's apartment and he wanted his stuff back. All i heard was a child going MINE MINE MINE!

I found that the discussion in class sparked a interesting question regarding the items used on the set and certain characters. For example I believed that we linked the lamp to a be a symbol as Laura, because it doesn't really fit in, and it is very frilly and pretty. A question that I have is that are there other items that can be linked to the other characters?... I would have to assume so, somehow. Like the clock could be link to Lydecker in my opinion, because he always mentions it, is seen with it in Laura's house, also the murder weapon is in it, and he shoots it in the end of the movie. However the real trouble I am having now is connecting Shelby to an item as well as McPherson. I thought that somehow McPherson could be connected to his toy game that he messes around with from time to time, mostly when people are talking to him. The reason I say this is that it is a game that needs to be solved, and he is a detective that needs to solve cases, so I guess on one level or another that the game is the symbol of McPerson. I have no idea for Shelby though, i was thinking at times that it could have been items of some sort in the country house or something like that, but its really hard to place him with a certain one. In the end I can really see why this film is in the middle of being a true femme fatale film and not being one.

Orson the Shadow

Now this is the first time I have ever seen the movie The Third Man , and on top of that, this is actually the second movie that I have ever seen Orson Wells in. Now when I compare his role in this movie to his role in Citizen Kane , I believe that I enjoyed the role he played in The Third man a bit more. The reason I say this is because I think that I basically obtained the absolute truth about most of the characters by the end of the film rather than be left in question like I was at the end of Citizen Kane.

Alright well first off I loved the character of Harry Lime and how Orson wells Played him so well. I felt like as soon as he entered the movie and we saw his face uncovered from the shadows , the film just took off from there. I do like that the film presents Harry lime as this type of anti hero rather than a straight up villain , because a villain you see, you analyze, and you know there evil and you can hate him or her right off the bat. However in the case of Harry lime, I'm sure that most of the audience including myself, found themselves rooting for him to succeed I, and get away from the dangers headed his way. I believe that in the case of the this film, camera work had a lot to do with how we saw each of the characters. For Harry, I seemed to notice that there were subtle tracking techniques going on, which in for me made things eventually get a bit up close and personal to really see our characters.


I mean really, look at that face, could that really be the face of some evil master mind that killed children and planned to kill more for his own personal gain? Okay, that was his plan all along but its just so hard to hate a character that just seems so... devilishly charming. I still can't get over that he shot the nicest character in the whole film. i was just completely shocked.

I found that the camera was also very tilted throughout the majority of this film, and I believe it is because we closely followed the character Holly Martins. The world he was entering, and the messed up, dark story behind it allowed for the Dutch angle to be appropriate. I found myself tilting my head for a while just to get used to this shot and the askew world.

The over all look of the film was just amazing to me. I loved all of the grungy, broken down parts of the city. I thought filming in the actual city of Post WWII Vienna helped give heft to the dark shadows that seemed to be a main theme in the film.I learned that this film has a great amount of german expressionism in it focusing mostly around shadows, and a type of dark world created from them, and this ruined setting fit perfectly. The shadows in this film just seem to devour everything. Even the character Harry Lime seems to be a part of them at different points. He is introduced by imerging from them, also later we see him come from the shadows to look over the city. Another thing is that we always see him in this long black coat and hat. With this look I couldn't help but compare him to the character of the Shadow.

These shadows are a nice element to play around with, and I found it rather interesting how this shadow world in The Third Man is compared to the shadow world in Bram Stroker's Dracula in the article The Revenant of Vienna. The setting that is described in both of these stories is actually pretty interesting and rather unsettling for me to see character's wander through it. I loved how the article described the world of Dracula by saying "Harker's description of his journey through this 'weird' atmosphere culminates in his arrival at Dracula's 'vast ruined castle,' whose 'broken battlements' cut 'a jagged line against the moonlit sky' (39). Harker's words, in short, describe a world 'closing down' upon him both literally and figuratively." I find this to fit perfectly in the description of the world that we also see Holly go through.

All in all good story, great characters, and an amazing setting. All of these elements are key ingredients to creating a film that impresses even the toughest of crowds. I would have to say... I was quite satisfied in how everything turned out, and I am looking forward to seeing more films that Orson Wells is cast in.