The Godfather Trilogy

“We get our initial feeling about the characters and what might happen by seeing where they are, what their belongings are, how they are dressed, how they are lit, and how they react. What colors things are mayalso draw our attention to certain objects and people, as well as setting an overallmood. All the things we are looking at in the scene have been carefully chosen andplaced there by the filmmakers to help tell the story to the audience in ways thatdo not require dialogue to explain anything. What we see is called the mise enscène” Goodykoontz, B., & Jacobs, C. P. (2014)

Robert Duvall

Robert Duvall (Character Actor)as Tom Hagen, Don Corleone’s informally adopted son, he is the family lawyer and counselor. Unlike the Corleones, he is of German-Irish descent, not Sicilian.

“Actors are able to fit invisibly into a wide variety of disparate characters, adapting to the needs of each script and director they work with, known as character actors.” Goodykoontz, B., & Jacobs, C. P. (2014)

Marlon Brando

Marlon Brando plays Vito Corleone as the head of the Corleone crime family – the most powerful Mafia family in New York City. He is depicted as an ambitious Sicilian immigrant who moves to the Lower East Side of Manhattan and builds a Mafia empire. Upon his death at the end of the novel, his youngest son, Michael, succeeds him as the head of the Corleone family.

While he oversees a business founded on gambling, bootlegging, and union corruption, he is known as a generous man who lives by a strict moral code of loyalty to friends and, above all, family. At the same time, he is known as a traditionalist who demands respect commensurate with his status; even his closest friends refer to him as “Godfather” or “Don Corleone” rather than “Vito”.

Before and after makeup

Marlon Brando is also a character actor and a method actor. “The Method requires that actors draw on their own memories and experiences to reach the heart of a character, so that they more genuinely feel the emotions they’re portraying instead of just pretending to.” Goodykoontz, B., & Jacobs, C. P. (2014)

Robert De Niro

Robert De Niro  had a pivotal role in the Francis Ford Coppola film The Godfather Part II (1974), playing the young Vito Corleone. De Niro became the first actor to win an Academy Award speaking mainly a foreign language; in this case, multiple Sicilian dialects,[3] although he delivered a few lines in English. He and Marlon Brando, who played the older Vito Corleone in the first film, are the only actors to have won Oscars for portraying the same fictional character.

De Niro’s brand of method acting includes employing whatever extreme tactic he feels is necessary to elicit the best performance from those with whom he is working. He is also known as a interpreter actor “refers to actors who take material and put their own stamp on it. “Goodykoontz, B., & Jacobs, C. P. (2014) 

References:

Goodykoontz, B., & Jacobs, C. P. (2014). Film: From watching to seeing (2nd ed.). San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint Education, Inc.

 

 

Taken 2

Released 2012

Writers:  Luc Besson, Robert Mark Kamen

Director:  Olivier Megaton

Stars:  Liam Neeson, Famke Janssen, Maggie Grace

PG-13

Mise En Scene-

• City scenes
• Family dress in dark clothes when things go bad – mood changer
• expensive cars, guns – typical blockbuster
• Dark rooms of torture
• Glass smashing – chaos
• Dirtier clothes towards the end – to show the grittiness of the film

Two years have passed since Bryan Mills heroically set off to save his daughter from Albanian sex-trafficking kidnappers. And since then, things have evened out for him. His security service business is thriving. His relationships with daughter Kim and ex-wife Lenore have improved considerably.

It’s made very clear (again) that Bryan is a very protective dad who loves his daughter. He’s forced, upon his capture, to put her in harm’s way for a short time. But he immediately runs to the girl’s aid once he’s freed himself.

It’s also evident that Bryan and Lenore still care about each other quite a lot. Bryan comforts her and does everything in his power to protect her. Kim talks of her mother’s past statements of love for Bryan.

Several people are tortured. And while most of the direct injuries are kept offscreen, the painful consequences are plain. For example, we see one man in the midst of being tortured, his face bloodied and his nose smashed. The torturer runs a blade down the man’s torso and then stabs him in the genitals (just below the camera’s view), leaving him screaming in pain. Lenore’s neck is slashed, a burlap bag is jammed down over her head, and she’s suspended upside down to slowly bleed to death. One attacker threatens to cut her into pieces and mail her home. Bryan is chained to an overhead pipe and beaten.

After that, Bryan makes it clear his internal mission has changed. He shifts from protecting his loved ones to making sure “these people never bother us again.” And so the film takes on a tone of extinction over extrication as Bryan becomes a one-man militia, eliminating dozens of enemies with fists, feet, knives, guns and anything else he can lay his hands on. Men are shot point-blank, hit with cars, and catapulted from high staircases and walls to a crunching death below. They’re battered to a bruised and bloody pulp.

A car filled with thugs is hit by a train and bursts into flames. A car chase has careful-dad Bryan pushing Kim to drive like a maniac through the streets of Istanbul—smashing into cars, barricades and shop fronts while scattering pedestrians.

American Hustle

1. 

    

   December 13, 2013 (USA)

   American Hustle, Release date

   Director: David O. Russell

   Writers: Eric Warren Singer, David O. Russell

   Actors: Christian Bale, Amy Adams, Bradley Cooper

    

   Story: Christian Bale, Bradley Cooper, and Amy Adams star in director David O. Russels  fictional period crime drama about a reckless FBI agent who recruits a con man and his alluring partner into a scheme to ensnare corrupt politicians and gangsters. Smooth-talking Irving Rosenfeld  is a hustler of the highest order. No mark is off limits for Rosenfeld, especially when his crafty partner Sydney Prosser  is by his side. When renegade FBI agent Richie DiMaso  thrusts the deceptive duo into the treacherous world of New Jersey power players and underworld heavies, the thrill of the hunt grows too strong to resist. Meanwhile, New Jersey politician Carmine Polito  gets caught in the middle, and Rosenfeld’s capricious wife Rosalyn holds more power than anyone could imagine.

   Plot: When Irving Rosenfeld and Sydney Prosser meet, there is an instant emotional connection since they can see in the other someone like him/herself in what each wants in life. Both come from humble backgrounds, but are striving for a better life. They embark on a sexual relationship, despite Irving already being married to the brash and uncultured Rosalyn Rosenfeld, who he probably will not divorce for not wanting to leave her son, Danny Rosenfeld, who he has adopted and who he would not want to leave alone with his largely unfit mother. When Irving tells her, Sydney, to his surprise, is not repulsed but rather attracted to the fact that besides his legitimate businesses, he is also a con artist, specifically in loan scams which net him $5,000 per mark. Sydney believes she can help his scams by pretending to be British Lady Edith Greensley who has London banking connections. In doing so, she does indeed vastly improve the scams and their take. However, one of their marks ends up being Richie DiMaso, a low level FBI agent trying to make his mark in the agency, he and his team who pulled a sting on them. Richie knows that Sydney is not a Lady and does not have London banking connections but does believe she is a Brit named Edith Greensley. Richie makes a deal for them to help him nab four additional white collar criminals for their ultimate release without charges. Ultimately, Richie talks them into bigger fish than was originally intended in nabbing politicians and mobsters as the opportunity arises. Their initial target is Camden, New Jersey Mayor Carmine Polito, who is trying to revitalize Atlantic City as a gambling mecca, which requires an influx of investments in the millions. But in getting these offshore investments (which in reality don’t exist), the bigger fish include congressmen and senators, who may be taking bribes in this revitalization, and a mobster named Victor Tellegio, the right hand man of Meyer Lansky. Beyond their marks finding out what they’re doing which could be especially deadly in Tellegio’s case, their collective problems include: Stoddard Thorsen, Richie’s immediate supervisor, who denies Richie’s expensive requests one after another in completing the sting convincingly; Rosalyn, who has her own self-interest as her primary focus even at the possible expense of Irving’s life; and Sydney’s relationship with Richie, who she initially seduces to keep him close “just in case”, but with who she may really be falling in love.

   References

   http://www.dose.ca/2013/12/23/american-hustle-secret-life-walter-mitty-and-wolf-wall-street-are-our-must-see-movies-week

   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ST7a1aK_lG0