Category: Article Type: Zoom
-
The Handmaiden. Dir. Park Chanwook. 2016. CJ Entertainment. South Korea.
Content Warning: This post contains images of a sexual nature including artistic depictions of bestiality.
-
Lady Macbeth. Dir. William Oldroyd. Altitude Film Distribution. 2016.
Lady Macbeth depicts the journey of Katherine, pursuing her desire after she meets a black servant Sebastian, during her life under patriarchal oppression from her husband Alexander and his father Boris. Although the film is based on Nikolai Leskov’snovel, it has been altered, projecting the unequal act of power, encompassing race, gender, and social-class status…
-
Red River. Dir. Howard Hawks. Monterey Productions. 1948.
American expansionism and the frontier myth – the romanticisation of prosperity found in claiming the ‘wilderness’ and the forceful expansion of the American border – pillars of the Western genre [1]. From Jan Troell’s The New Land (1982), John Ford’s Wagon Master (1950) to Charlie Chaplin’s Gold Rush (1925); Western cinema has constantly glorified the rich…
-
The Water Horse: Legend of the Deep, Dir.Jay Russell, Sony Pictures Releasing, 2007, U.S.
The filmmakers of The Water Horse: Legend of the Deep present audiences with the idea that a wild, Scottish mythological creature can (a) exist, (b) be a pet, and (c) a friend, to a young boy. Angus and the water horse’s friendship makes the point that not only can dogs be ‘man’s best friend’, but…
-
Shrek 2. Dir. Andrew Adamson, Kelly Asbury, Conrad Vernon. DreamWorks Pictures. 2004.
DreamWorks Pictures reintroduces us to some familiar faces from fairy tales – with a comedic twist! The world of Far Far Away parodies and subverts traditional ideas of what a ‘happily ever after’ means. In this universe, the monsters of the story are now the good guys, and our frightening but lovable ogre protagonist must fight…
-
Babe (1995) directed by Chris Noonan
The 1995 edition of Babe directed by Chris Noonan presents Babe the pig to be defined by the type of relationship he has with humans. The relationship in this film that is concentrated on is the shift from working animal to food animal. This film is enough to turn anyone vegetarian, in fact James Cromwell…
-
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Dir. Michel Gondry. Focus Features. 2004.
Figure 1 Memories are the foundations for the complexity of individuals. We are created by the experiences we face, and to delve into the past is to delve into the system of our personal construction. According to Bowman (2004, p. 85), themes of memory in film generate emotion because, instinctively, to lose our memory equates…
-
Blade Runner 2049. Dir. Denis Villeneuve. Alcon Entertainment. 2017.
Denis Villeneuve’s Blade Runner 2049 (2017) transports us to a dystopian earth, where humans and replicants, bio-engineered humans used for slave labour, live side by side. There is a clear dichotomy within the dystopia since replicants’ entire existence is based on the premise that they are genetically coded to obey orders, rendering them docile slaves,…
-
Ferdinand. Dir. Carlos Saldanha. 20th Century Studios. 2017.
Part of the core ethics depicted within Saldanha’s Ferdinand (2017) is that the exploitation of animals, whether bullfighting or meat production, is unacceptable. However, the opening scene of this film depicts the bulls as having the agency to use their power to choose to fight and vie for the attention of the matador. By representing…