Searching ::. fashion film .:: from Alvaro de la Herran on Vimeo.
Monday, June 27, 2011
Fashion Film research. Continuity in repetition
La Prochaine Fois (The Next Time) from A76 PRODUCTIONS on Vimeo.
This film has a great sense of rhythm. We could emulate this in our film by the journey between restaurants, and gluttony. There is an engaging use of narrative, the protagonist is relatable, and the film is aesthetically beautiful.
Sunday, June 26, 2011
filmmmaking tips
When making video, consider audience. Be bold and simple.
Beginning, middle and end.
Restrcitons of mobile phones. Panning shots and zoom ins don’t work too well. Need to do them slowly, but can use the blur to your advantage to create the mood.
Be inventive. Panning on wheels.
Lighting. Steady.
Handheld. make sure you’re leaning on something. Wall, table. Clamp it. Hardware. With case to protect the phone.
Biggest thing is planning. Concept. Have ideas on Monday.
Storyboard. Show breakdown. Locations. Actors/ models, props. Costume accessories. Special effects. Makeup, backgrounds. Audio. Schedule. Who what when, where.
Continuity. from different angles. Leaps in the air. Eyeline.body direction.
Day 4. Heroes- From matinee idol to rough trade
A Streetcar named desire. One of the first films in the 50s that had a blue collar hero. Marlon Brando. Stanley Kowalski married up. Actors like Brando were actually nice middle class boys projecting blue collar workers. His sexual confidence is emphasised by the contrast of Blanche's insecurity.
American Gigolo. Richard Gere. Scene. Seminal moment in the history of menswear. See him dressing for a date. 80’s. los of gadgets. Bachelor pad. Man showing off his body. This was the first movie that really used the traditional masculine ideal, of a man in a suit, but constructed the man as fashion conscious and self aware. The film did this while retaining his masculine appeal. Gere's torso is tanned, which portrays the use of solariums and grooming as enhancing masculinity, rather than a solely homosexual or feminine representation.
Thelma and Louise. Normally hollywood sex scenes focus on the woman’s body, this is mostly Brad’s body. Lit as if he were a statue in a museum. Exotic southern accent. This film sexualises the 'bad boy.' Pitt is a thief, and a liar, yet his brooding sexuality is clearly emphasised. Although he is presented as enjoying clothes and dressing, the film uses traditional masculine physical appeal to engage to audience. This harks back to the traditional blue collar worker and the way he has been physically sexualised.
The question remains: since the masculine ideal has shifted to include fashion as an element of masculinity, how have male versus female dynamics been changed? Men were previously presented as the brains, women as the aesthetic other. If, now, men are more aesthetically pleasing, could women be presented as the brains?
Brokeback Mountain, proves how far cinema has come, that a film can win Oscars when it is about gay men.
Rambo, rocky, diehard, the terminator. Lethal weapon. Are all examples of a brutish masculinity.
Wild at heart.
Laura Mulvey- visual pleasure and narrative cinema.
Woman are constructed as image, conversely, man were simply seen as bearer of the look.
Masculine: activity, voyeurism, sadism, fetishism, story. Feminine: passivity, exhibitionism, masochism, narcissism, spectacle.
2 types of men- phallic, muscly OR slender fashion boy.
First male cinema pin up Son of the sheik. Young rajah.
Cary Grant. North by northwest. 1959. Very elegant stylish man.
Great male renunciation. Flugel, psychology of dress 1930. Hollander Sex and Suits.
American Psycho. Parody of male grooming.
1950’s. demographic changes, young people!! Youth cultures! Serious questioning of traditional gender roles.
James Dean. Rebel without a cause. Church-Gibson recommended to watch it!! He was in touch with his feminine side, he showed vulnerability. Rebellious romantic masculinity. This links to an early metrosexual identity. East of eden. Giant.
The young lions 1958. Guys and dolls.
‘50s. the age of the chest. Male torso fetishished. Streetcar, From here to eternity. 1953. Burt Lancaster. See more of his body in the ‘sex’ scene. Picnic 1955, William holden. Cat on a hot tin roof. Plaein soleil. 1960. French cinema. Alain Delon.
Steve McQueen, was actually a working class boy.
1977 sat night fever. Hairy ideal.
Top gun 1986. About a love affair between men.
Gangster film and the suit. If suits were too spiffy, they were usually bad guys. Casino. Good fellas. Pulp Fiction.
homospectatorial gaze. Men can look at other men.
80s. menswear revlolution. Mens shops, more design. Men went shopping. Grooming products. Men in ads, billboards stemmed from Calvin Klein ads.
The new man. Levis 501 ad 1985. The most successful ad campaign ever. Increased sales 200%. John Hegerty.
80s/90s. new lad.
Then rise of metrosexual. men became aware that they were being judged in the same way women were. This a very important point in tracking the development of the masculine ideal.
Oceans Eleven. Pitt always eating junk food, spiking up his hair. Out of sight. Only movie George Clooney has ever gotten naked in. 300 2007. Spartans. Persians presented as the ‘other’
Couples retreat. Forgetting sarah marshall. Juno. No longer have to live up to these expectations. This is related to the current lifestyles of men. More computer jobs, so a more sedentary lifestyle equals a less sculpted body. Could this mean that our contemporary masculine ideal will shift to accommodate the lifestyle shift. Is there any chance a fat man will be fetishised, in a throwback to pre industrial times?
Reading: Brad Pitt and George Clooney, the rough and the smooth: Male costuming in contemporary Hollywood. Church-Gibson.
Valorised masculinity is young and white, slim and trim. e.g. Brad Pitt.
Clooney, alternatively is the suited hero. Never appearing bare chested. Today’s standards of male beauty are pumped up pecs. Clooney harks back to an earlier era. His sexuality comes across in his mystery.
Fight club. Is an important film in the study of masculine ideals.
Oceans eleven. Contrast between Danny as together, old school sophisticated Hollywood type, respectable, and Rusty; ruffled, vulnerable, a little trashy. However, Rusty is seen as without artifice. He is somewhat safer and more approachable in this sense.
The Gangster style dress is too perfect. Suits represent menace, not like suave promise of the pleasure of hidden physicality. Oceans was very popular with 18-24 year old male. Used by fashion mags to attract young male consumer.
The suit- sheaths and conceals. Renders the body inaccessible. But since ‘60s, womens bodies have been ‘accessible.’ No protective undergarments+ a lot of flesh exposure.
Post ‘80s, male body available. Buff male torso Calvin Klein. Object of commodification and emulation. Makes men consume things which will make them buff- gym. Rough image, like Pitt in oceans, makes male body accessible. Tousled hair, stubble. Jeans- buttocks, shirt-biceps, pecs. Shirt- chest. Tousled hair hints at body hair beneath. Rough star gets naked, but suited star shows physicality through hands, arms, sometimes topless. Rough seems more blue collar.
Suits used to represent a man of leisure or wealth. Pop culture and entertainment media shape leisure wear, more than class differences.
1950s opposition to classic Hollywood man was Marlon Brando, James Dean, Montgomery Clift. Adopted working class dress. Agricultural influence.
Flugel’s great male renunciation. End of 18th C men relinquished fashionable dress, to women.
Because the suit is so contolled, it is sexy.
Youth Cultures. 1960s changed male representation. More macho and cool than Dean, less sulky and antagonistic than Brando. New man: Steve mcqueen.
The Thomas crown affair. 1968. Exchanges chic clothes for sports clothes.
Brad in Thelma and Lousie- homospectorial gaze.
A river runs through it. 1992.
Se7en. 1995. Fight club. Pro anticonsumerism yet thrift shop chic spectacle. Mutilated body, yet still attractive. Snatch 2000.
Clooney. one fine day 1996. The peacemaker, the thin red line. Three kings, out of sight. Parodies: O brother where art thou? Intolerable cruelty. Old fashioned charm and sexuality. Tried to do blue collar roles, including Welcome to Collinwood, The perfect storm.
Suave V rugged in media. Two archetypes. Why?
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