ZooScope

Tag: HAR: Enviromental Hygiene

  • Ponyo. Dir. Hayao Miyazaki. Toho. 2008.

    ‘What? She is captured by a boy? This is very bad. Is it already dead?’ yells Ponyo’s father Fujimoto when realising his precious daughter is being kept as a pet fish. The line raises an interesting question, does cinema represent animal domestication as kidnapping or an addition of family member? Hayao Miyazaki’s animated fantasy film Ponyo retells…

  • Ratatouille. Dir. Brad Bird. Buena Vista Pictures Distribution. 2007.

    Brad Bird’s Ratatouille is a film in which the human community collides with that of the rats, through Remy the rat’s aspiration to be a cook for humans despite his status as animal vermin (assigned to him by those he wishes to cook for). Remy the rat’s first encounter with a compassionate, caring ‘human’ arises from an…

  • American Beauty. Dir. Sam Mendes. DreamWorks Pictures. 1999.

    Despite its iconic lusty red petals, Sam Mendes’ American Beauty is abundant with other striking images – one of which is a dead bird, lying on the grass of the school grounds, under the lens of Ricky Fitts’ camera. The bird becomes part of a vision of freedom and liberation, in a film where most of the…

  • Ratatouille. Dir. Brad Bird. Buena Vista Pictures. 2007.

    In the Ratatouille scene where Remy and Emile enter an old woman’s house, questions of animal invasion into human spaces are raised. The woman’s reaction is to kill the trespassing rats; a reaction which, in reality, we would be unlikely to query.                                                             Fig. 1 As uncaged rats they represent pests, undesirable to find in one’s home. The…

  • Ratatouille. Dir. Brad Bird . Walt Disney Pictures . 2007.

    Ratatouille’s exploration of human cruelty towards rats is encapsulated in the scene where an old lady discovers that her home is infested by rats.   The old lady is introduced through a static frame that captures her sleeping peacefully whilst highlighting her pink garments, both of which depict her as a stereotypical gentle grandma figure. …

  • Ratatouille. Dir. Brad Bird . Walt Disney Pictures . 2007.

    Ratatouille’s exploration of human cruelty towards rats is encapsulated in the scene where an old lady discovers that her home is infested by rats.   The old lady is introduced through a static frame that captures her sleeping peacefully whilst highlighting her pink garments, both of which depict her as a stereotypical gentle grandma figure. …

  • Pom Poko. Dir. Isao Takahata. Studio Ghibli. 1994.

    Pom Poko. Dir. Isao Takahata. Studio Ghibli. 1994 Pom Poko (Heisei Tanuki Gassen Ponpoko) is written and directed by Isao Takahata, a co-founder of Studio Ghibli which animated and published the movie in 1994. The story takes place during the late 1960s at the edge of the Tokyo sprawl. A housing project, aimed at expanding…

  • Ratatouille. Dir. Brad Bird and Jan Pinkava. Buena Vista Pictures Distribution. 2007.

    Brad Bird and Jan Pinkava’s 2007 animated family film Ratatouille follows the journey of a rat named Remy who has a dream of becoming a chef.[1] Like most family films, Ratatouille has an underlying moral message it aims to teach its audience. Ratatouille wants its audience to go away from the film with the idea that individuality is a good…

  • Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind. Dir. Hayao Miyazaki. Studio Ghibli. 1984.

    Hayao Miyazaki’s 1984 film ‘Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind’ follows the adventures of a young princess named Nausicaä who is part of one of the last tribes of humans remaining on Earth. A toxic forest has taken over most of the world as a result of mankind’s pollution; Nausicaä seeks to save the…

  • Stalker. Dir. Andrei Tarkovsky. Mosfilm. 1979.

    Andrei Tarkovsky’s science-fiction film, Stalker (1979), is marked by depression, desolation and barren wastelands.[1] The film’s loose narrative follows three men into The Zone, a disturbingly conscious and supernatural area of nuclear disaster. Whilst there, the eponymous Stalker encounters a black dog at various points on the journey. As the Stalker waits for his wife in the bar,…