A.
- I found that the central idea in the Waltz with Bashir trailer is a soldier who has lost or forgotten his memories about a war and ss trying to remember them through remnants of the war, such as photographs and stories form other people. The central idea of Baraka trailer seemed to be a look into what the meaning of life is and how society works.
- Waltz with Bashir was an animated film. It had an interesting illustration style that reminded me of comics or cartoons. The filmmakers use this to their advantage, illustrating events that they could never recreate in real life, such as war scenes. The trailer used a lot of action sequences to portray the chaos of war. The colors were vivid and the animation was very smooth, which brought it all to life. The music changes many times throughout the trailer, which adds to the story element and gives the visuals different phases and emotions. Baraka mostly uses focused on a single subject, whether that be a human or an animal. There are also a few large-scale shots that capture the environment or large groups of people. The shots are fast and gripping, making for an epic and bold experience. The music also changes a lot in this trailer. All of the music sounds quite large in scale. The final song is paired with fast cuts and it makes for an overwhelming experience, which is what I believe they were going for.
- Three moments in Waltz With Bashir trailer that really stood out to me were the scenes of the tank rolling over cars, when the soldier got shot right next to him, and the guy spinning around shooting his machine gun in the air. These scenes stood out to me because they are all things that your average person will probably never see and never want to see. They grabbed my attention because they were so extreme. The three scenes from the Baraka trailer that stood out to me were the shot of the skulls that preceded the shot of a man’s head from behind, the shot of the tribal men chanting, and the shot of the man in white paint screaming. The nature of this trailer was that it all comes together to give you a feeling, rather than the individual shots having their own meaning. However, these shots stood out to me because they were very bold and attention grabbing.
B.
- Baraka was a very interesting and gripping documentary to watch. The first part of the film is about religion. It covers religions from all around the world, all with different beliefs and practices. The second part is about the urbanization of the world and how society works within it. It shows the busy cities, the class system that is at play, and the mass production of goods. Throughout this section, they use clips of chickens in a factory is contrast to the autonomous like culture and schedules that people in the city follow. The third part then focuses on war. It has shots of soldiers, army vehicles and planes, and oil rigs that were fought over. This part also features shots in a concentration camp to show the horrors of that war. The final section is about death. They return to the religious aspects from before, showcasing burial rituals. This part also focuses on the death of cultures by showing ruined civilizations.
- The transitions between these sections were quite abrupt. They usually didn’t have any sort of transitional period, and if there was some, it was just shots of the environment. Instead of using visuals to transition, the filmmakers used audio. At every transition point, the music abruptly stops and changes to a new sound. The tracks used in the different sections are extremely different and are all used to help convey the message and themes of each section.
- This documentary is non-narrative. Instead of providing the viewer with narration or text to tell them what the visuals mean, the filmmakers give the viewers all of this footage and allow them to figure out themselves.
- The documentary structures the images by their theme. Since all the images are from different parts of the world and all feature different cultures, they do not exactly fit together. But the filmmakers made sure they all had a central them and placed them together based on that.
C.
- This documentary was extremely varied in the style of cinematography used. Some scenes and very fast and use a lot of cuts, while other scenes are slow and only use a few long shots. The shots themselves also varied a lot, using close, long, medium, panning, static, and many more different kinds of shots. Instead of only focusing on a single thing in the shots, they generally didn’t blur the background at all. This lets you take in the whole environment around the subject, instead of just the subject. Most of the shots were during the day and used natural lighting, however there were a few night scenes.
- Almost all the shots in this documentary were under ten seconds. When a shot was longer than ten seconds, I personally felt a little uncomfortable or awkward, which I believe the filmmakers did on purpose. There were no interviews in this documentary.
- The sequences in this film are not straightforward or clear. The documentary is all over the place, constantly changing subjects, locations, and tone. The shots are more arranged to create a central theme or to make a certain point.
D
- Like I said before, I believe that the central idea of Baraka is a look into what the meaning of life is and how society works. The filmmakers gave perspectives from many different parts of the world and many different religions, statuses, and lifestyles. It is hard to determine the goals of the filmmaker because the film leaves so much up to interpretation.
- I would describe the people that made the documentary as observers. They gathered all of these clips of people from all over the world living their everyday life and compiled it into this experience that leaves a lot to be interpreted. Instead of having a narrator tell you what to think, they simply observed, gave you their observations, and let you decide what it all means.
- The decision to leave out commentary or any sort of narration makes it easy audience able to view without bias. You are basically just watching people live their life, so it is very hard to have any sort of bias. I do not think that the filmmakers were unethical in any way. They were very respectful of everybody they took video of, from what I could see.
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