After the Supertramp, eats the magic mushrooms he becomes extremely sick and Sean Penn uses the dutch angle to show this to his viewers. I know they weren't mushrooms but that is same thing Penn would have done if they were. Had a director with any real talent got a hold of this movie first it would have swept the Oscars. Emile Hirsch was incredible, and the ultra thorough Jay Cassidy who edited the film managed to place all the mistakes in places where they don't draw attention. Jay Cassidy is also the person responsible for Al Gore getting a Nobel Prize, weaving all those lies together so that it seemed soooo inconveniently true. But even a genius couldn't edited out that beautiful watch McCandless still had on way too late into the movie.
Well instead of an Oscar winner what we have is cinematography for dummies. I do give Penn credit for shooting on location, which was an obvious choice for this film. The beautiful North American landscapes go on full display in the long shots. My favorite of which is after he is dropped off in the Alaskan wilderness speaking to another human for the last time, walking away from us (society and viewers) as the camera moves out to show the wild in all it's snow white glory. I just wish he didn't have that watch on this late into his journey. The use of the close up may have been the one thing that wasn't always basic in the shooting of the film. As McCandless was burying his things his sister's narration plays over the close up of the digging and burying of his books, speaking of how their home life had hit rock bottom but still seemed to get worse as he digs. Then when he goes back and digs up these things, again the sister is narrating digging up more of the family's dirty truths. All in all the movies is beautiful, but the camera work just didn't take enough risk for me to be impressed by anything more than where they were shooting, and maybe that's the point. When you have these types of locations maybe you let that speak for the film. On a personal note, if you are reading this Mr. Penn, don't put 1996 model cars in your movie when you are claiming it took place between 1990 and 1992 some of us are actually watching.
Kevin Washington
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Kevin, regardless of your "scientific" view of the world, global climate change is taking place and our ice caps and glaciers are melting at a rapid pace. Now on the the RELEVANT topics of this journal entry.
ReplyDeleteI appreciate that you thought the cinematography was over-simplistic, but honestly I feel that your judgment got in the way of you being able to interpret what was actually there. For example, how to extreme long shots place Chris very small in nature, bringing home the point that it is vast, that he is small and insignificant, alone. Yes, they accentuate the beauty but that is not all. Also, there are times when the camera is angled up or down to make Chris seem insignificant or even powerful at times, was this not worth mentioning? Also, how about the "magic bus"? Did you notice the hand-held camera work here and also the dutch angles? How about how the visual strategy changed from all those long shots to mostly medium close-ups and close-ups here? Particularly in the shots after he had eaten the poison berries? How does it feel claustrophobic, intimate, and even panicky here? Instead of paying attention to continuity errors in the future (although that's fun too :) just try and focus on the topic specifically, even if you discount the choices of the director, the fact that this was "cinematography for dummies" is the point. We are learning how cinematography is used, here, therefore try and focus on the different shots and what they mean...
Oh, I also wanted to point out that just because a film is not an Oscar nominee or winner does not mean it doesn't have merit. Many amazing movies are ignored by the Oscars, mostly because the Oscars are decided on by a specific set of old, white men, with money, who represent a particular point of view, and take a political role when nominating and choosing winners. The Oscars are not democratic, and therefore do not represent the American sensibility in its entirety, and film is art and therefore very subjective......just something to remember.....
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