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The Human/Nature Complex
 In my 3rd quater American History Bm, I chose to do a performance to create my own interpretation of the reform in American society that came about from Charles Darwin's ideas of naturalism, through portraying a fictitious Realist writer transitioning into the mindset of Naturalist writer in 1890. I wanted to show what could have possibly been one of the ways that the literary style of Naturalism could have came into existence; branching off from the Realist style. Here is the link to my process paper, which goes into detail of how I went about this project.

Here it is. Enjoy!

Shelby Harcher

Film Review 

Drive 

Drive isn't your typical "cops and robbers" film. The film bases its story around a guy and his car. Ryan Gosling is the driver for a getaway car which is evident in the opening scene. The opening sequence (the first 10 mins of the movie) gives you a first hand view on what it's like to be in "The Driver's" world. Showing close inside shots from the vehicle and no dialogue, you are on the edge of your seat while Gosling goes through obstacles to get away from the police. 

The opening sequence is a very important part of the film. Little to no dialogue shows exactly what kind of person The Driver is. It's clear that he has done this before based on the silence and calmness he creates. This scene gives us a view of Gosling's character without directly telling us who and what he does. Throughout the movie, Gosling's character is referred to "The Driver" showing his separation from the real world. 

Even though the opening scene portrays The Driver as a badass, of course the film creates some sort of love interest for this character. The Driver is asked to be the getaway driver for his neighbor who needs to pay back someone money, which he steals. In this important scene, the neighbor, Oscar Issac, conveniently gets killed during the robbery and conveniently leaves behind a wife. Of course this gives Gosling's character a chance to build a relationship with this woman. What kind of movie would it be if there wasn't a love story involved, especially one where she's in danger? 

The lighting in this movie was always dark and colors were bland and solid, giving you the felling of lack of liveliness and of course, danger. The Driver lives a dangerous life, which gets even more dangerous when he becomes on the bad side of the mob. Gosling's character spends the second half of the movie defending himself from the mob and of course protecting Irene's life, even if it means ruining their relationship from stomping a man's head off in an elevator. 

As the film's main storyline got more dramatic through the second half, so did the music. One particular scene where the musical score fit well was when Gosling goes to meet with the mob but ends up killing one of the members. As Gosling approaches the restaurant, which the gangsters own, a soft kind of creepy musical number plays while a woman softly sings. It gives you the vibe that something bad is going to happen, but without giving away how intense the next scene is. 

The overall story of Drive was a good one; a man, his car and danger. However, the love story was typical and unoriginal if I may say. Gosling's character made no character development and the "love story" seemed to just be there to catch the attention of a more diverse audience. 

Imagine taking the odd mystery and dark filming tone of "Fight Club" and combining it with the fast pace action and dynamic characters of "Transporter", Nicolas Winding Refn's "Drive" is the outcome. Given the two films' reputation, one could infer that a similar combination of the two could result in an action packed, jaw dropping film, which "Drive" certainly provided; but one could also expect an original storyline and in depth characterization within the plot of the film, which it significantly lacked.

Ryan Gosling's "driver" or "the kid" or whoever his name really was, was an over-exaggerated an uncomfortably sporadic character. The opening scene set up what appeared to be a thrilling scene with a getaway driver who was skilled at what he was doing, but slowly faded into a boring conclusion as driver casually parked a car in a packed sports complex and walked out suspiciously, but with no confrontation from the police.

The one piece of positive feedback I will provide for this opening is the use of music and rhythm. The camera angles were very close up  but often focused on the background of the shot as the police helicopter searched for the suspects. The synchronization of the final seconds of the basketball game complimented the urgency of driver to get away from the cops. However, the only table setting that this scene was successful for, was introducing the lack of good dialogue and dull characterization of the protagonist.

In addition, there was a huge overuse of gore in this film. I'm sure that all action movie watchers enjoy seeing some nauseating murder scenes or destructive montages, but there was absolutely no build up to the action in this film. As a viewer, it was difficult for me to appreciate the girl getting her head blown off or  Driver's graphic stomping of the guy's face in the elevator, when there was no set up in the dialogue. The elevator scene could have easily shifted this movie from a forgotten piece of cinema to a work of art, if there were some compelling dialogue prior to it, or at least some deeper description of driver's character. Imagine trying to bring this scene up in a conversation to a friend 20 years from now:

"Hey, remember that bloody scene in the elevator… with that driver kid… yea I don't know his name, and there was no dialogue in the scene for me to jot your memory… oh well".

Cinematically this was a great movie, and a compelling scene. But the writing was horrible. The subplots were non suspensful. The characters had no depth, and worst of all, the protagonist didn't have a name. If your a future film maker, and are looking for examples of character development, plot structure, and diverse scene elements, "Drive" will successfully set you up for failure.

-Jason M. Davis

http://db.tt/yTr1YWV4

By Stephen H, Abe M, Taahir H, and Isabella T. 

One Minute of Emotion

My group and I created a documentary on the reaction and reform of animal abuse and how it was presented to the public throughout the years. 




This is the link to our google doc which contains all of our annotations, the citations in MLA format, and our process paper. Click here to view it.


Below is our documentary.

To view my website, click here.  

This website is about the revolution and reformation that happened during the Renaissance. Everything is included inside the site. I really enjoyed producing this project because I am very interested in this topic. Please enjoy!

Goldie Robins
Jessica Maiorano
Sara Nesbitt

Please click here to enjoy the Spies:The Cold War website that includes: the title page, the bibliography and a fascinating journey through the Cold War. 

The reason I chose this topic is because during the time of choosing the topic we were covering the topic of the Cold War and what was defined as war in class. The topic stuck with me and as I starte doing research I found out there was a lot of things people didn't know or realize about the Cold War, I being one of those people. I thought the representation of spies in Hollywood deserved to be corrected when in fact the actual lives of spies revolved much more about gossip. To begin my research I began searching information about the Cold War, to briefly understand the topic before I started mashing that in with spies, and then, of course, started researching the most famous spies and even autobiographies. I chose a website because I felt as though it could create many more opportunities to present the topic of spies. A webpage aloud the freedom to put different types of media and information in a collective space that was available to everyone. To create this webpage I used a popular website creator, Weebly, and kept the thought "If it interacts like a pamphlet than it's not good enough." in my head. I wanted to really use a lot of the tools the internet has to offer and make the presentation different and unique each time while still being informative. I didn't want the viewer to get bored with the same time type of presentation. I think the best way to describe how my project relates to the NHD topic is to basically summarize, similar to how I did in my actual project. War was viewed as combat, a battle, some type of event where weapons are used or people get. The revolution of war began with spies, it was completely different than how war had been conducted in the past, especially if we look at World War II which ended right around the time that the Cold War began. In reaction the the Soviets we reformed our war tactics to benefit the national security. 

To view Ronald, Alysha, and Rugei's Title Page, Process Paper, and Annotated Bibliography, please click here.

For this project, we compared Child Labor, Slavery, and the Black Panthers in the form of a documentary. We stated information about each topic and explained how they changed the world, for better or worse.

​Our final Product revolves around the Declaration of Independence. The events taking place during this time period involving the separation from Britain were Revolutionary. Therefore we chose this topic to Connect to the NHD theme. The Declaration also needed many revisions and alterations. This Leads to the theme of reformation. Symone and I found these reformations interesting for there must be reasons behing the revisions. We therefore Created this site containing the Analysis of these revisions as well as other key information pertaining the Declaration. 

Click here to view the website. The annotated bibliography, process paper and title page can be found in the "More tab"

To view my title page, process paper, and annotated bibliography, please click here.

My project is about how the atomic weapons revolutionized the world in how we interact. 

For this quarter in History, we have been expanding on the NHD papers that we worked on the previous quarter. This was done by creating performances, documentaries, and websites. I chose to do a documentary to display my ideas. Here is the link to my project.

           The movie Drive, starring Ryan Gosling (Driver) and directed by Nicolas Winding Refn, is about a Hollywood stuntman who finds himself in a troubled situation when he tries to help his neighbor’s husband collect some money to pay off dues.

            This was a very interesting movie. I can’t say that I enjoyed the characters, but the camera angles, soundtrack, and use of lighting were absolutely amazing. The use of camera angles is what truly set the tone of this movie. Throughout the film, I noticed that many of the scenes were shot from an upward angle to give Ryan Gosling (Driver) an intimidating feel, and make him a bit of a scary character. A perfect example of this is when Ryan Gosling is walking towards the dressing room with the hammer in his hand, and because this scene was shot in an upward angle, it made him seem very intimidating. Another scene that shows a great example as to why the camera angles were such a key element in this film is when Ryan Gosling enters his apartment for the first time. The camera angle that the director used for this scene allowed for Ryan Gosling’s shadow to block out the light shining through the window and create a perfect outline of himself, which for me, introduced Ryan Gosling’s character; a very mysterious, and creepy person.

            The next most important element was the soundtrack. The entire film was very dark and mysterious, and the songs that the director used did not match the tone of the movie very well because they were more on the “cheerful” side and outgoing, which made the movie even more eerie than it already was. The soundtrack also really added to Ryan Gosling’s character, and made him more threatening, and even scary at times.

            The third most important element was the lighting. Most of the film consisted of scenes that were very dim (disregarding that we watched it on the projector), which also really set the tone of the movie along with the camera angles and soundtrack. The little amount of lighting that was used consistently throughout the film added to the mysterious, and threatening side of Ryan Gosling’s character as well. However, the lighting had the most effectiveness during the elevator scene, when it was dimmed down, to focus in on the kiss between Driver and Irene. The use of lighting during this particular scene showed the importance of it, and that it was not only a turning point in the story, but also a huge turning point for Driver as well.

            There were many amazing scenes in this film, all of which were amazing because of the camera angles, soundtrack, and lighting. As I said before, one of the most important scenes in this film was the elevator scene when Driver kissed Irene for the first and last time. The way the lighting was used in this scene made it one of the most important because it added to the fact that that specific moment in the film was a game changer. Another important scene in this film was when Driver was walking towards the dressing room with the hammer in his hand. The camera angles used in this scene are what made it stand out because it made Driver seem very threatening, and someone that is not to be messed with. The scene that took place right after Driver was walking towards the dressing room is when Driver is on the phone with Nino standing over his henchman. For this particular scene, the camera was low to the ground facing up at Driver’s face with his hand gripped tightly around the hammer, which showed the side of Driver that he was trying to hide from Irene.

            Finally, the most important part of the movie for me was the beginning sequence. This is because all of the scenes that made up the intro of the movie were shot within the car, and made me understand the complexity of the storyline of the movie, and the style and flow of the movie as well. Also, the very little dialogue that Driver had in the beginning of the film made me develop an understanding of his character.

            I would have to say that he most compelling as well as most important storyline of Drive had to be the feelings between Driver and Irene because it developed and set up the start for the second storyline. If Driver and Irene didn’t develop a relationship, there would not have been another storyline within the film.

            It was excellent how the two storylines were woven together, however, the storyline between Driver and Irene was frustrating for me at times because there wasn’t much dialogue exchanged between them, which made it hard for me to connect to that part of the film.

            When it comes to the thematic elements, Drive was an amazing film, a work of art. However, I’m not sure whether or not I liked the characters of the film, especially Driver, because he didn’t have much dialogue, and not much of a personality to me as well. Although the lack of dialogue that Driver had made me very curious as to whom he was, and his background, it was still annoying for me at times. Overall, Driver was an excellent film, and I would definitely recommend it to anyone who is very much into watching movies, and focusing on the thematic elements.