Film
Essays

In the Yakin-directed film Fresh, a 12-year-old boy -- "Fresh" -- struggles to balance school and a tumultuous home life with the drug-running activities that allow him to make and save money.

This is a three page paper about a prompt: Art Spiegelman's graphic novel Maus and Ruth Klüger's memoir Still Alive struggle with the issues of how to represent traumatic events that challenge belief on the one hand and are subject to the unreliability of human memory on the other. Both books blur the lines between real and fictional, memory and history, the real and the represented. Likewise, Film Unfinished explores the fine lines between documentary, art, and propaganda. All of these cultural texts experiment with different aesthetic and stylistic strategies to frame their stories of the Holocaust outside of the purview of traditional academic scholarship. What does it mean to frame a photograph, film, comic strip, or memoir?

The film Das Cabinet Des Dr. Caligari or ‘The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari" echoed the German psychological warfare that had been waged against the people by Hitler and throughout the film runs the theme of tyranny over such treatment and psychological maneuvers against the human soul. Over time critical reception of the silent film, ‘The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari' has noticeably experienced shifts in perception and in the reception of critics.

Salman Rushdie is one of the most famous authors of the modern era. In the tradition of Gabriel Marquez, Rushdie sweeps the reader up in his novel, Midnights Children, like the book by Marquez that obviously had a great…

"The Sound of Music" is one of the most famous movie musicals in film history. Released in 1965 and garnering 5 Academy Awards, the film purports to be "based on the true story" of the singing von Trapp family. However, an examination of the plot vs. history shows that the movie is highly inaccurate and nearly a betrayal of the family it supposedly portrays. Fortunately, the outstanding score by Rogers and Hammerstein, plus the breathtaking scenery/cinematography overcome the negatives to make this film an enduring part of American culture.

The paper analyzes elements of the film "How the Grinch Stole Christmas." (2006) The paper examines elements of the film production as a means to evaluate the film's efficacy. Prior versions of the narrative are included as part of the analysis and evaluation. The paper further contends that the Grinch is an archetypal anti-hero, such as the Dickensian, Scrooge.

This paper analyzes Oliver Stone's 2012 film Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps from the perspective of the three act narrative. It answers a series of questions posed in order to help the viewer follow the plot trajectory of the film and see how the main character develops along with the plot according to the standard plot points of film.

Cultural Biases in America Against Individuals of Asian Extraction

Interdisciplinary Studies – Academic Disciplines – Communications and Women's Studies Communications Studies and Women's Studies are wide-ranging globally important disciplines with applications in fields as diverse as education, law, business and nonprofit administration, for a few examples. Arizona State University has excellent programs in both Disciplines. The ASU Hugh Downs School of Human Communication takes a comprehensive approach to the area of "Communications," encompassing both Undergraduate and Graduate Studies. By studying and critiquing human communications, ASU's program seeks to create "knowledge, creativity and understanding" vital to families, workplaces and communities. Stressing foundational knowledge of communication theories, research methods, conceptual knowledge and practical communications skills, the program is focused on creating globally effective professionals in communications-related fields such as law, business, sales, human resources, public relations and management of nonprofit organizations. By preparing undergraduates and graduates for communications-related fields that are relevant worldwide, ASU is addressing the needs of an increasingly complex, shrinking globe. Equally globally relevant is Arizona State's Women's Studies program. ASU offers Women's Studies within the broader context of "Social Transformation," a field that also probes African and African American Studies, Asian Pacific American Studies, Culture, Society and Education, Justice and Social Inquiry. Clearly, ASU's Women's Studies program is not a narrow topic that is merely focused inward; rather, it is an interdisciplinary, diverse, multiple-perspective program seeking to engage students in various majors, minors and other fields of study. The obvious object of such a program is its students' readiness for local and global relevance by tackling such subfields as gender, health, sexuality, science and technology, work, globalization, ecology, social policy, violence prevention, media, film, performance and the arts through specifically named subfields such as: Culture; Economics; Film; History; Literature; Politics; and Science. In sum, though Communications Studies and Women's Studies are treated as distinct Disciplines, their ultimate purpose is the preparation of individuals for worldwide multidisciplinary relevance.

This essay discusses Benjamin's notion of a work's aura, using an image of Benjamin himself as a case study. Benjamin argues that a work's aura is dependent on its particular time and space, and that mechanical reproduction erases this aura by allowing that work to occupy any time and space. While this may or may not be a good thing, understanding how reproduction allows an image to transcend time and space is crucial for understanding how cultural transmission works in the age of digital reproduction.