Seven Pounds Essay

An element that composes an empathetic society is the ability of the people to pay it forward. When destruction is brought to a community by an individual, they must compensate to correct their actions. If the individual who caused this damage doesn’t fix what they’ve done, the weight of guilt and self-hatred leads to mental deterioration. The person who has committed unscrupulous deeds against their society will go to drastic measures to find a solution to cleansing themselves, even if what they did was an accident. In the film Seven Pounds, a man named Ben Thomas inadvertently causes the deaths of seven people in a car crash. It becomes obvious that Thomas feels responsible for these people’s lives. He decides to give his life to repay his debt to society and radically change seven other people’s lives. Throughout the film, the full story as well as the struggles the characters endure is represented through mise-en-scene, and cinematography rather than through words. Filming techniques reveal a deeper meaning in the lives of all the characters and provide elements that convey emotions more efficiently to the audience.

Mise-en-scene helps to reveal truths about the character’s lives and qualities. Whenever a shot of Thomas is shown he is surrounded by darkness and “rotten colors”. In one of the first scenes, Thomas is at his beach house which is supposed to be a paradise as pictured in flashbacks with his wife. The darkness surrounding him shows his struggles and depression he faces. After getting off the insulting phone call with Ezra, Thomas lists off the names of the people he killed. “Ken Anderson, Nicole Anderson, Ally Anderson, Ed Rice, Steven Phillips, Monica Freeman, Sarah Jenson” (Seven Pounds). Immediately, Thomas’ remorse is revealed as he stands in a dark room full of boxes showing that the place holds torturing memories and no longer heals him. Later in the movie, Emily Posa, one of the people Thomas is planning to save, is having dinner with Thomas. She gives him clothes to change into because he is always in bland business suits. “Yeah, it’s pink” (Seven Pounds). Thomas isn’t used to wearing colorful clothes. When Posa gives the pink shirt to him it represents how she brings life to him and is the only thing that can heal him since the accident. When Thomas is in his bathroom and remembering the car accident the lighting shadows half of his face. “In seven days, God created the world. And in seven seconds, I shattered mine” (Seven Pounds). Thomas reflects on how he ruined his and seven other people’s world. The shadow covering half his face resembles the guilt and lack of feeling he endures. The light on the other side of his face shows the hope and urge to correct his mistake. Mise-en-scene helps the audience to realize characters feelings, understand symbolism, and mirror emotions felt by characters in the film.

Cinematography is a basic element of filming that can show emotions or thoughts felt by characters, what the audience focuses on, and the overall reception of an image. Many shots of characters are taken close up to draw focus to their emotions. In Seven Pounds, this is very important to the film because of the intensity of the feelings felt by each character. In the shot when Thomas is trying to find out whether Stewart Goodman is a good person or not, the shot focuses on Inez, who is writing down information about Goodman on a paper. “He’s punishing you. How is he punishing you?” (Seven Pounds). After Thomas says this, the shot moves to a medium close-up on Inez to show her pain and sadness. She is so impacted by Goodman’s actions that she can’t even communicate and the focus on her instills a shocking and pitiful feeling in the audience. Later in the film, Thomas and Posa are in a bright, beautiful field with each other. The quality of the long shot captures everything important in the scene and conveys a warm, happy feeling. Posa expresses her feelings to Thomas. “I haven’t felt like this in a really long time” (Posa). The warm quality of the shot shows how two characters that represent death find love and happiness in each other despite their struggles that weigh them down. Also, the long shot captures nature and the tranquility of the space they are in to show peace, healing, and relaxation between Posa and Thomas. In another shot, Thomas remembers the accident and wakes up laying in his bed. The framing of the shot only includes his upper body and head to show his empty emotion. He looks shocked as he remembers the unfortunate day. A figure then rises behind Thomas outside of the depth of field and reaches a hand on to his face. The depth of field shifts to his wife but her face is still a bit blurred. This shows that she is currently a figment of his imagination and that Thomas is remembering his wife and obviously still misses her. The shot then shifts to an aerial shot of the bed and shows that Thomas is alone. This reveals Thomas’ manic depression and how his guilt is mentally deteriorating him. Cinematography is an excellent way to convey information to the audience indirectly and also can help the audience comprehend emotion better than words can.

Words are not the only way an idea can be expressed to others. In film, devices such as cinematography and mise-en-scene help to convey ideas. In fact, these basic film techniques can sometimes better explain concepts and emotions through visuals that indirectly connect with the viewer. In Seven Pounds, mise-en-scene is used mainly to expose the characters’ life, thoughts, and values. Cinematography is used to reveal emotions or thoughts felt by characters through framing mostly, what the audience focuses on through scaling, lighting, and focus, and the overall reception of an image. When mise-en-scene, cinematography, and editing are combined the artist can manipulate these devices to ultimately convey exactly what they want to. The artist can make the audience mirror feelings, understand a character’s life, and build bonds with characters. Without these film techniques, only words would be left to explain feelings, thoughts, and events. This would make the audience lose its connectivity with the entire film. Filming devices are truly what make a film stylistic and intriguing. The entire structure of a well-developed film relies on devices, such as mise-en-scene and cinematography, which conveys deep messages to the audience to help them connect and understand the character’s lives, thoughts, and emotions.

Mise-en-scene & Cinematography

In AMC's The Walking Dead, many examples of mise-en-scene and cinematography are incorporated into scenes to create a mood or feeling that is conveyed to the audience. The way atmosphere is represented directs the way a film is read. An environment in a film can be altered by decor, lighting, space, costume, and acting. In the The Walking Dead, all of these aspects play into the image of a realistic apocalyptic world. The Decor in the TV series reminds the audience of the values that were cherished in pre-apocalyptic times.

 The dead family that Michonne finds reminds her and the audience of her life before the zombie infections. The girls laying on the bed recall family values and the pink resembles carelessness. These are values that are no longer present in the post-apocalyptic world. Lighting can reveal much about a situation or character and perhaps even foreshadow an event. In this scene, low key lighting reveals much about the Governor.

The shadow caused by the low key lighting reveals the lack of humanity the Governor has. The shadow is on the same side of his face as his eye-patch. When he was stabbed in the eye he snapped and lost his sense of community and humanity. The brightness on the right side of his face brings attention to his wide open eye. This shows his pent up hatred and insanity. Space greatly affects how the audience reads the film. Utilization of space can shove reality right in the audiences face or leave them completely confused depending on the directors intent. Essentially, this ties together moods and relationships between elements in the world the characters must live in. In the beginning of the series a famous shot of Rick riding into Atlanta on his horse reveals the entirety of the situation he missed out on because he was healing in the hospital.

This example of deep space helps show Rick's bravery and how chaotic the outbreak of the invasion was. There are literally no cars entering the city so through reasoning, the city is a terrible situation because of its population density. This shot also projects the new abandoned world and its lack of civilization and order. The costumes in the show also refer to these qualities of the apocalyptic world. Through out the show the characters clothes become more ragged and stained.

For example, Hershel started out as a man on a ranch who held traditional values close and protected "walkers" who he still considered friends and family members. His clothes were completely clean and his beard was shaven. As he realizes that the world is changed and goes through many survival experiences, his clothes become worn out and his beard and hair are unkempt. This shows how the environment changed a very faithful man into a survivor. Much of the show is based off drama through acting. Emotional ties make up the base of the show and eventually lead to the biggest events in the show. Acting also reveals elements about each character and intensifies the audiences feelings about those characters.

Lizzie is a character who is perceived by the audience as a psycho because of the way she acts. She is seen in multiple scenes playing with walkers like they are her friends. She also feeds zombies rats at the jail which attracted more of them. Eventually, she kills her sister because she believes she will come back and will be "ok". Lizzie's acting reveals her as a character and shows how she is an outcast because despite how long she has been in the apocalypse, she still doesn't understand that zombies want to eat her.

Cinematography is the composure of a shot and the elements in it. These change how the film is received by the audience and can create suspense, confusion, awe, and other moods. Aspects of cinematography include quality, framing, scale, and movement. Quality is the balance of light and dark, the focus, relation of foreground and background etc. This helps create an appropriate setting for the film, quality is essential because it creates the feel of a shot.

In the scene where Rick kills Tomas, there are perfect examples of quality that create an image that causes surprise in the audience. The colors in the shot are all bland colors to create less vivid scene.The focus is on the man in the back more than Thomas and Rick to show his surprise at Rick's actions. The lighting is on the characters and is darker on the right side of the screen to show evil vs. good. Framing is the way the camera is positioned to a character or scene and how the camera acts in relation to that object. This can create suspense, chaos, dizziness, confusion, connections to the character's feelings, unawareness, and any other elements the director intends.

This shot's framing helps to focus on two important things. It is zoomed only on the door and on Meryl's face to show Meryl's fear of the situation he is in. He is in pain because he is stuck and trying to escape a zombie horde. Scaling can show the environment a character is in and even instill feelings in the characters. A great example of this is when Michonne enters the Governor's layer.

Multiple shots show Michonne in a room with the Governor's walker daughter. Most of the shots are medium close-ups. There are also many severed heads in tanks and the room itself is very small. This puts Michonne in a claustrophobic environment especially with the Governor right outside the door. The audience feels what Michonne is feeling due to the scaling of the shots in this scene. Movement is another great aspect of filming that often is used in action shots, dynamic shots, or even to suggest a stalker in the premises.

In this scene, the camera movement pans from the sword the Governor is pulling away from Hershel's neck to Rick standing on the other side of the fence. This is a hand held camera scene because it seems to be from the Governor's view. This brings hope to the audience as they see both the sword being pulled away and Rick's reaction.  This hope is then squandered when the Governor executes Hershel. This shows how a simple shot with camera movement can make a scene much more dramatic and unpredictable.

     In Falling slowly from the movie Once, the director tried to capture a day to day experience into one video. The genre of the video is a narrative showing the love story between the two actors. Throughout the film the director uses a good amount of rhythm editing to go along with how simple but powerful the song is. For example, when the two hop onto a motorcycle and drive away, the chorus o the song gets louder and quicker. The rhythm editing is an effective tool for the video and enhances the song. The Diegesis of the video is based on hope. Both actors are in a state of their life's where they sing "take this sinking boat and point it home, we still have time" (Falling Slowly). At this point in the song, both actors are falling for each other and find a sense of hope that it will work out. Mise en scene is all about the setting the lighting and everything in the scene. When they sing "raise your hopeful voice you have a choice you've made it last" (Falling Slowly). At this point the scene shows the guy looking out into the ocean and finding a sense of belonging, with the beautiful ocean, and also shows how distant he is to his love and the beauty of it. This video unfortunately has a sad ending, bu gives the viewer much hope.
     In the video the director shows a focus on the girl to show her vulnerable state. its dangerous for her to fall in love with him because she has a family and a husband prior to meeting the guy she falls in love with. When the guy sings "Falling slowly sing your melody I'll sing a long"(Falling Slowy). The shot of the guy towards the ending of the video wants to spend the rest of his life with the girl, but as the shot shows a close or of the guys face the viewer can infer that the love of his life is gone. The scene at the end of the video shows how the girl stays with her husband and child because she knew that she had to stay with them. "Words fall through me and always fooled me and I can't react"(Falling Slowly). This part of the song shows the conclusion shot and also how they will always love each other even though they will never see each other again. In the video, i could not find any flash back or flash forwards besides the concluding scene, that does jump forward in time. The main idea of the video is that love is a powerful feeling, and hope will make the love grow stronger.  

Week of April 21st

This week we have been presenting our music videos and analyzing them. It is great to see such a variety of genres and the songs deep meaning. For example, while doing research for my song, i wouldn't have expected Last Dance With Mary Jane to be about a guy dancing with a cadaver. Many of the videos have deep meanings that are portrayed by the scenery, sequence of events, and mise-en-scene. The meanings and aura of the songs become so much more powerful when combined with a video created by the artist. It really lets you know exactly what they have been through and the message they want to send to their audience. Some of my favorite music videos were Falling Slowly, and the song by atmosphere. They really show show the struggle that the characters go through in a symbolic and deep way. Now I am much more interested in music videos because they help to put forth what the artist is really trying to say.

Week of April 14th

      Empathy is the main theme through out all three videos. Sir Ken Robinson discusses changing paradigms and how institutions like schools are not adjusting to the needs of the digital era. He believes "we should be waking them up to what is inside themselves"(Changing Paradigms Robinson). Thousands of students are medicated today to help them calm down and focus on one thing at a time. But he believes that society should be waking them up to their full potential to be in present and changing the curriculum to fit each students needs. Roman Krznaric has a very interesting lecture on the power of outrospection, the new age of the twenty-first century. I though it was revolutionary how he came up with empathy museums where " its not about dusty exhibits, but an experiential and conversational public space where there is a human library where you can pick out people for conversations" (The Power of Outrospection Krznaric). Ideas like this really allow the viewer to experience sweat shops and appreciate everything one has like family, clothes, shoes, all the necessity's and luxuries and to hopefully realize that there is more to the world than just myself. This is the idea to empathy, learning everything about the struggles and lifestyles of others and appreciate the love of life.
     Jeremy Rifkin talks about an empathetic civilization and looks into the nuero science of how our brain works and shows how it is wired to be a nice people. In his lecture he go's on about how the human race is not wired to be basically what a lot of people are today. Rather be "compassionate, affectionate, attachment, sociability, and companionship" (Empathetic Civilization Rifkin). Its awesome to see how society is wired to act this way, but it seems like things like envy and lies change our natural adjectives to be selfish, rude, and false. Rifkin then discusses how our society can become empathetic. He says "can we connect our empathy to a single race writ large in a single biosphere" (Empathetic Civilization Rifkin). If society can connect in family like matter with people of the same religion and people in the same nation state, then why, with the help of technology, can't the world connect global? He believes that technology is the key to connecting the globe together and have a world where every single person is empathetic to the everyone. The only way that there will be successful future is if every single person can empathize with every one.      

Culture & Communication Essay

            The relevance of technology has grown throughout the ages and is now an inseparable part of society. As it evolves, so does surrounding culture and communication. What once started as an entrepreneurial idea has become the base of the lifestyles of many people. The public now has access to almost any information in a matter of seconds, can achieve an online diploma, and can communicate with each other through many methods such as pictures, social media, and texts. One can even live off the connections technology makes to the community. Advancements in technology create a world where about anything can be made easier, perhaps too easy. The uprising of a new era holds great developments for the future, but leaves behind in pile of rubble many values our evolving society may never again experience.

            Early technology thrust the world into a state rapid change to satisfy the urge to make a more efficient and better connected society. Before the 19^th century technology had little to no impact on the world’s communication. In fact, mass communication wasn’t even existent until Johannes Gutenberg invented the printing press. “The rotary press was just on tiny part of the great technological explosion known as the Industrial Revolution, which would irreversibly change Western culture and lifestyles” (Culture and Communication Part 1 25). This brought with it the first form of mass communication. Information could be sent out to numerous people. These messages were interpreted by civilians who could then respond the message by starting trends, contemplating a topic, or taking action to support or deny what they had read. People could now become part of a mass culture, however, some might call mass culture “conformity”. Mass culture would help to eventually break down the barriers between upper class and lower class citizens as a sense of community began to form. With a sense of community, empathy becomes more relevant as seen on Joe’s journey around the U.S.A. “It was truly inspiring, you know, just on humanity…to know that we can take care of each other” (Craigslist Joe). The evolution of technology had brought a new sense of community with it. Jeremy Rifkin argues that in order for the human race to come together as an extended family, we must learn to communicate better with each other in which technology can come in handy. “There was no such thing as Germany. There was no such thing as France. These are fictions. But they allow us to extend our family so that we can have loyalties and identities based on the new complex energy communication revolutions we have that annihilate time and space” (Rifkin The Empathic Civilization). Rifkin may be correct in this case. Identities like religions, sports teams, or nationality may help us become closer as a human race. As technology advances and becomes a part of popular culture, our society finds it easier to communicate, yet, ironically loses its sense of community which creates a pretentious culture.

Technology has many obvious effects on communication and lifestyle in modern society. At first glance, most of these effects seem beneficial to society, however, some technological advances have hindered the fluidity of our cultures connectedness. New technology such as online socializing, banking, education, interviews, and conferences are just a few ways technology makes life easier and perhaps saves time. The fact that we rely on such technologies makes us a self-centered, introspective, and perhaps less empathetic culture. Roman Krznaric explains the key to a revolutionary and successful society. “…empathy is the way to revolutionize our own philosophies of lives, to become more outrospective, and to create the revolution of human relationships that I think we so desperately need” (Krznaric The Power of Outrospection). Technology is a form of communication without human elements. Therefore, human confrontation in “real life” is almost alien to a judgmental culture. Users of technology don’t truly experience people's stories and gain perspective on others’ lives which creates a barrier between subcultures and cultures. Connections become severed from these limited forms of communication. Communication isn’t just limited by technology, but it is also limited by mass media. Mass media, some suggest, has too much power when the opinion of the people is at hand. “In mass communication, professional communicators use technological devices known as mass media to communicate over great distances to influence large audiences” (Culture and Communication Part 1 7). Mass communicators carry out a single message that is usually biased towards their opinion so the audience is more likely to be influenced by them. This is corruptive in a way because people that don’t see past this ruse fall into the lure of having an opinion they didn’t create. Mass media becomes part of our life by discussing popular culture, advertising, and discussing national and international problems. Our culture is so familiar with the mass media around them that they can easily filter out all the advertising put up. “For many years America has been exporting its popular culture, first as images in motion pictures, magazines, music, and television and finally commercial enterprises” (Culture and Communication Part 2 36). Our society has adapted to mass communication and can simply thrive off of it without realizing it. Technology and mass media have contorted the trustfulness and communication efficiency of modern society.

The new age of communication effects modern and future society which will always function differently because of its impact. Left behind are many human values which civilization may never see again. Some think they truly help the community through buying into consumer items that support charities and that creates a false sense of community and satisfaction because you know you helped someone. Even though it does help, there is much more that could be done. Slajov Zizek compares this to buying organic apples to prove his point. “I don’t think you believe…that they are really any better…We are cynics they’re sceptics but you know, it makes you feel warm…I’m doing something” (Zizec First as Tragedy, Then as Farce). Our society is slowly losing its sense of community as ethical duties seemingly become easier to “satisfy”. People who suffer who we think we are helping aren’t actually being helped permanently. Their suffering is only prolonged. The only feasible way to correct this problem would be to create a society where poverty is impossible. Many other changes should be made in modern society to further benefit future generations and quicken societal evolution. Sir Ken Robinson gives an example of an element of society that should be changed. “Schools are still pretty much organized on factory lines” (Robinson Changing Paradigms). Education pumps out kids in batches, treating them like a product. They are all taught the same methods instead of focusing on what each individual child needs to blossom intellectually time-wise and learning-wise. If this isn’t changed, future generations may lose the individuality and boldness to thrust into the next revolutions. In fact, much more is at stake. Even the uniqueness and power of individuals (such as artists) are slowly fading. Technology has made sharing personal information, art, or work extremely easy. Keen argues against the ease of sharing of art through the internet.   "Slap up their early stuff on Facebook. On YouTube. It would get lost. It would get lost in the ocean of garbage" (Keen PressPausePlay). So many people can share their information and art that it becomes lost. There is so much other information on the internet that the chances of your message being heard by the community is very slim. Many more components of traditional society fade as technology and communication methods evolve.

The path to a better community lies through keeping traditional values while letting technology advance. Technology will create a better connected society but empathy must be kept intact through human elements such as sense of community. Society must find a way to use technology and maintain outrospective properties without becoming self-centered. The human bond will be strengthened if all these goals are achieved. A utopic society will never be achieved if the natural human characteristics cannot be maintained as a result of communicative suppression, but future generations will thrive if our culture learns how to better connect itself.

            

Week of March 31st Blog

This week we reviewed how mass communication and mass production influence our society (mass culture) today.
Media most likely has the greatest impact on our culture today through communication. Many don'd realize how much it engulfs our life, however, it is everywhere. The news channel, billboards, newspapers, ads on the internet, and social networking are just a few examples of parts of the media that form our opinions and raise questions. Some complain that the media has too much power and can filter their content so they can convince the general public to agree with their biased opinions. "Were the media guilty of emphasizing violence and downplaying moral value?" (Culture and Mass Communication 1).  Mass communication became relevant wen the typewriter was first invented. It became realized that now one message could be sent to multiple people. This sparked industrializtion and thus the printing press and other mechanisms that could bust out more messages to the public were created. This had great effects on society at that time. "...the weakening of bonds of kinship, and the declining social significance of the family, the disappearance of the neighborhood, and the undermining of the traditional basis of social solidarity" (Culture and Mass Communication 25). Many forms of mass communication would come that would forever change our society such as radio, television, and telephones. These have become part of our popular culture and broadcast interesting information such as sports games. Some might think that this was purely to entertain the public, but it was really all just about the money. "...timeouts for commercials had extended the average length of a professional baseball game from 2 hours, 57 minutes in 1978, to 3 hours, 11 minutes" (Culture and Mass Communication 30). These commercials could advertise a variety of goods to consumers and try to get them to buy what they were selling. "Coca-Cola and its logo and Levi's jeans have long been popular around the world" (Culture and Mass Communication 36). This all shows how our world has become lost in consumerism and now we don't even realize it happening around us.