Citizenfour (2014)

Directed by  Dr Laura Poitras

featuring Edward Snowden, Julian Assange, and political journalist Glenn Greenwald

Winner – Best Documentary, Gotham

Winner – Best Non-fiction Film, New York Film Critics Circle Awards 2014

Nominated for Best Feature Documentary Academy Award 2015

Audience award, Palm Springs Film Festival Jan 2015

playing now at the Hot Docs Bloor Street Cinema – Jan 16-22nd – www.hotdocs.ca

and at TIFF Bell Lightbox

What happens when you receive encrypted emails from someone with the code name “citizen four” claiming to have huge incriminating evidence against the National Security Administration (NSA)?  How do you decide to pursue an incredible story of illegal surveillance and abuses of national security in post 9/11 America?  Is this a hoax or an authentic modern day thriller?  What are the implications of documenting evidence of widespread abuses of power by the NSA and other intelligence agencies?  Filmmaker Dr Laura Poitras hoped this could be infinitely bigger than the risk to help show the public that their emails, debit transactions, Web searches and phone records are collected, kept, analyzed by agencies that we trust to protect us.  This could be a chance to let her investigative journalism shine? But was her source authentic?

Dr Poitras ultimately agrees to meet the secret contact when he confirms she has been “selected” by the government for special monitoring.  Poitras believes she was on a government watch list for her two previous post-9/11 documentaries, My Country, My Country (2006) and The Oath (2010).  This turns out to be the reason she has been chosen as the perfect accomplice for this film.

Dr Poitras goes out on a limb and travels to Hong Kong with Brazilian-based political journalist Glenn Greenwald from the Guardian in June 2013.  Her wager pays off when she comes face to face with the surprisingly young and very articulate CIA Officer Edward Snowden . After hearing his story and understanding the precariousness of filming it, Laura bravely forges ahead and records Mr Snowden as he slowly leaks the thousands of stolen classified documents to the press while holed up in a Hong Kong hotel room for eight days.  As they gradually expose these explosive revelations the global press coverage is unprecedented.  They sit tight and watch and anticipate Snowden’s arrest as a possible outcome. Snowden is of course stoically willing to be punished for being a whistleblower in order to deliver this warning of the West’s fading freedoms.  As they wait for the global scandal to hit the press and unfold, their nervousness turns into paranoia.   Strange phone calls and fire alarms make them jumpy.   He is ultimately chased by the U.S. government and decides to vaporise.  With the help of a Hong Kong lawyer Snowden is able to fly to Moscow on June 23rd to seek asylum.  He lives for forty days in limbo at the airport after his US passport is cancelled but is eventually helped by another master whistleblower, Julian Assange.

He becomes an international man of mystery, living with his girlfriend in Russia.  Meanwhile Laura’s footage shows NSA Director Keith Alexander lying to Congress about the breadth of government surveillance that same summer.

Some, like those who are suing him and the film company who told his story, may think Snowden is a traitor and some may think he is a hero.  The Snowden revelations are already old news but this first-person retelling of the hotel room encounter is expertly crafted and we develop a clear and chilling understanding of how citizens’ rights and freedoms are being eroded bit by bit.  The film is also a masterful character study of Snowden.

It is of course a frontrunner in a strong list of nominated feature film documentaries for this year’s Academy Awards.   As Snowden says “we are building the biggest weapon for oppression in the history of mankind.”  As a firm believer in privacy rights, I think this compelling and alarming film should have been nominated for best picture.  And you may want to pause and reconsider the next time you travel, pay, click or call!

The Internet’s Own Boy: The Story of Aaron Swartz (2014) Directed by Brian Knappenberger

This chilling documentary shown at last year’s Hot Docs in Toronto and shortlisted for the Oscars chronicles and lays tribute to the life of Aaron Swartz from childhood computer geek to martyred cyber maven.  His affinity for computing as a child prodigy turned him into an inventive computer programmer, then hacker and then activist by his early 20’s.  He was innovative and forward thinking and Swartz became an infamous name in the history of information technology.  But this evolution led to his eventual downfall due to his tenacity.

He was only fourteen when Aaron was part of the team that developed RSS technology used today by websites to combine their data and was subsequently involved in the creation of Reddit, a social news aggregator.  Because of these innovations, we don’t have to visit many sites to read new content.  Instead, we can view information from these sites all in one place.  This was game-changing and put Swartz into the limelight as a genius and a new young millionaire.

Making money didn’t interest him however.  Copyright was his genuine passion.  Since he believed strongly that the Internet should remain open to the world instead of being guarded by corporations, he focussed on gaining public access to information.  In an era of increasing resistance to regulation of the internet and privatization of data Swartz was politically motivated to try to protect people’s rights in a digital world.  He opposed university and governmental sites that charged fees for access to public record information.  He pushed the envelope when he developed a script that would automatically download scholarly papers and journals from MIT’s JSTOR.  Although the university did not press charges, the FBI and the Secret Service soon investigated him. When he was charged by the Obama administration’s justice department and was facing prison for the next 35 years, he chose suicide as his only way out.  Swartz tragically took his own life at age 26 leaving this film to present the case for the defense.

The Imitation Game (2014)

Directed by Morten Tyldum

Starring Benedict Cumberbatch, Keira Knightley

This historical drama, a portrait of the insane life of Alan Turing, opens on December 12th.  Knowing that this biopic involved secret war stories, my curiosity drew me to it at the Toronto International Film Festival in September.

Enigma was a cryptographic coding machine invented by the Nazis during World War ll that sent out scrambled messages instructing the German stations on how and when to attack the Allies.  Great Britain realized that if they could crack the code, they could avoid any upcoming raids.  It might just help turn the war around in their favour.

They took the smartest mathematicians out of jobs and universities and hid them away at Bletchley Park outside London in secrecy where they worked for months in a warehouse to crack the code.  Because the codes were changed at midnight every day, this was no small feat.

Alan Turing (Benedict Cumberbatch), a brilliant yet socially awkward mathematician was chosen to join the team, even though he would have preferred to work on his own.  He was convinced he could get the job done but no one else believed in or liked him.  Turing didn’t care that he was alienated.  He was only curious to know if a machine could think.  He became increasingly obsessed with creating an algorithm that could process the millions of code possibilities that were created every day by Enigma.  Tensions run high as we remember what is at stake.  It is a well-known historical fact that Hitler was conquered so it is not a plot-spoiler to tell you that the prodigy achieved the impossible and cracked the code.

Turing was tormented by working on a secret project but also leading a double life as a homosexual.  This secret eventually ruined his life.  The scrutiny of his sexuality by the filmmaker is minimal, limited to flashbacks from boyhood days.

I was mesmerized by the incredible reality of the story.  I was both amazed and infuriated at this true story.  Winston Churchill admitted that Turing had made “the most important achievement of anyone during the war” and he no doubt saved thousands of lives by shortening the war by a few years.  Turing’s accomplishments helped the war effort immensely yet instead of being a British hero of World War ll that school kids read about today, he was punished for being gay by the British government after the war.  It was still a crime to be a homosexual in the 1950‘s in Britain.  Instead of going to prison for indecency with another man, he chose chemical castration as the best of two evils.  An official apology was made by Prime Minister Gordon Brown in 2009 for the “appalling way he (Turing) was treated” and just last year, Queen Elizabeth ll issued a royal pardon of Turing.

The performance by Cumberbatch will most assuredly garner an Oscar nomination.  He portrayed the most likely autistic Turing with natural talent.  He was able to capture the off-putting behavior, disagreeable demeanor and deep loneliness perfectly while portraying Turing’s prickly and complex personality with sensitivity.  It took me a while to really enjoy the film due to Turing’s abrupt and ego-centric personality and the overly melodramatic subplots.

Even though told in flashback form and we visit three parts of Turing’s life, the film is easy to follow and flows coherently.  I went to this film thinking it was focussed on the near-impossible task of cracking the Enigma code. I expected a good detective story even though I knew the outcome from the beginning.  But in fact, it’s power comes from being a national apology to a British genius destroyed by ignorance.  It’s certainly not a King’s Speech but the story is powerful and inspiring.  Even without my vote, The Imitation Game nabbed the People’s Choice Award at TIFF.

Last Days of Vietnam (2014)

director: Rory Kennedy

playing at the Hot Docs Bloor Cinema

 

The Paris Peace Accords in 1973 guaranteed ceasefire between North and South Vietnam.  The U.S. had promised quick aid if the accord’s terms were violated by the North.  But when Nixon resigned in 1974, the communists were inspired to once again pick up their arms and march towards Saigon.  The U.S. Ambassador, Graham Martin, was sure the U.S. would come to their aid before it was too late.  Mostly because he had already lost his only son to the fighting, he was determined not to retreat too early.  He ignored the imminent threat.

 

During the chaotic final weeks of this war, the North Vietnamese Army quickly closes in on Saigon as the panicked South Vietnamese people desperately attempt to escape, knowing for certain that they’d be tortured or killed if left behind. The communists goal was to overtake the city before Ho Chi Minh’s May 19th birthday.  American fatigue with the conflict meant that the south was left unprotected.

 

At the 11th hour, after all hope was lost and the airport was bombed, on April 29, 1975 the signal was given to the many Americans still living in Saigon.  As arranged, Bing Crosby’s “White Christmas” was playing on their radio station and they knew it was time to go to the embassy to await further instructions.  Due to Martin’s delay in evacuation, this last day was chaotic.  Three thousand vietnamese talk or climb their way through the embassy gates.  Cash is burned, secret documents are destroyed and people are physically removed. Tension builds throughout the day as a last-minute scramble to mobilize helicopters is arranged. What follows is a close to 24 hour airlift from the embassy courtyard and rooftop using 75 helicopters each making the two hour return trip again and again to Navy ships out at sea.

 

Told mostly through first-hand interviews with participants, the story of the evacuation is both amazing and disgraceful.  We hear from refugees, Secretary of State Kissinger, U.S. Embassy guards and Marine pilots and see remarkable newsreel footage.  There are stories of courage and heroism but it is hard to understand why more lives are not saved.

 

Many American soldiers and diplomats face a moral dilemma.  Everyone wants to save those Vietnamese whom they had loved, married, worked with or simply bought meat from down the street. Some ignore orders to only evacuate Americans and some follow their instincts while they are tormented by thoughts of “who stays and who is left behind”.  

 

Presumably partly out of guilt, Martin refuses to board the first helicopter meant for him until after he’d sent hundreds of Vietnamese out of harms way.  Whatever his reasons, it is an act of courage.

 

The most astounding part of the day is the action around the small destroyer ship, the USS Kirk.  The Kirk is accepting small helicopters carrying refugees onto its mini helipad.  After each helicopter lands and unloads, it is physically rolled into the ocean to make room for the next.  Amazingly, one Vietnamese child has to jump out of a larger hovering chinook that is too large to land into the open arms of US soldiers.  Actual footage provides the evidence and confirms the truth in these hard to believe stories.  

 

I was mesmerized by this series of gripping human stories and the maps and visual effects that supplement the provocative interviews and news clips.  The interviews are skillfully woven together with the footage and shocking images of the desperate residents of Saigon.  I left knowing that although thousands were saved through this effort, thousands more could have been saved had the mission been more organized and implemented sooner.  It is a poignant story of America’s less-than-graceful final bow in Vietnam.  

St. Vincent (2014)

 

Bill Murray, Melissa McCarthy, Naomi Watts and Chris O’Dowd

Writer/ Director Theodore Melfi

Tiff 2014

In theatres now

St. Vincent (2014) premiered on “Bill Murray Day” at TIFF 2014.  Bill Murray, the much-loved comedian and actor spent a very rainy day, umbrella-free, shaking hands with fans while wearing a crown and sash that read “Happy Bill Murray Day”.   He took a chance on this film, written and directed by first time director, Theodore Melfi.  In this role, he did not disappoint and will definitely be a best actor Oscar contender.

Maggie, played by Melissa McCarthy, moves into a new house with her son Oliver when she gets divorced.  When the movers back into the neighbour’s fence and tree, which then damages his car, the neighbour Vincent (Bill Murray) comes out barking.  His bitterness and foul mouth are not surprising when we learn that he is a broke, alcoholic gambler whose only companion is a pregnant Russan prostitute (Naomi Watts).  When Maggie is asked to work long hours, she has no choice but to ask Vincent to allow her son to stay with him until she gets home.  With reluctance, Vincent takes on the role of after school babysitter.  The cheeky but cute little boy and the grumpy but likable old man slowly start to get along.  It is clear that Vincent knows very little about kids when he takes Oliver to a bar and the race track and then teaches him how to fight against some troublesome bullies.  He shows no shame when he withdraws Oliver’s winnings to  pay a debt. Predictably, during all these hijinks, Vincent slowly emerges from his bad mood, spending more and more time with his adorable new friend.  The timid young Oliver gets to know himself and begins to emerge as an adventurer with better self-esteem.  The sentimental  end of the movie has Oliver presenting the grumpy old man to his school as “St Vincent” saying he is the kindest man he’s ever met.

It’s a simple and familiar story of two unlikely characters becoming close.  We almost know the lesson from the beginning – don’t judge a book by it’s cover.  It’s predictable and the ending is inevitable but the plot is not what makes this film great.  It’s the complex, layered characters, each on a journey, and the heart-warming emotion that ultimately makes this film a crowd pleaser.  The star studded cast took a colorless script and made it a success with their outstanding performances.

Although Noami Watts fails to deliver an authentic russian accent as Daka the prostitute, she is able to amuse the audience.  Murray plays a magnetic and diverse character who has a wide range of personalities in one film.  He delivers every line with perfect timing and once again shows us his exquisite command of comedy.

Melissa McCarthy takes a new approach to dramatic acting as Maggie and has a genuine screen presence, even when she’s not screaming and falling over into something as she does in all her other movies.  She plays the strained single mom extremely well and sincerely creates empathy.

For me, seeing a production that was filmed in the same working class Brooklyn neighborhoods where I filmed my short last summer was the best part.

You will be mesmorized by Murray’s charm.  You will laugh and you will cry.  Then you may go out there and befriend and unlikely person on an impulse.

The Supreme Price (2014)

written and directed by Joanna Lipper

In select theatres in the US since October 3rd

Showcased in 11 international film festivals this year

The Supreme Price is a notable political story of Hafsat Abiolaunfolds as she follows Nigeria’s evolution from independence in 1960, through a series of military dictatorships to present day civilian rule.  At the beginning, archival footage is used to show the political, religious and tribal conflicts over the years and the resulting corruption and poverty.  The second half of the film depicts Hafsat working tirelessly with her organization (Kudirat Initiative for Democracy) to transform a corrupt government into a democractic system that would better protect Nigeria’s women.

In 1993 M.K.O Abiola becomes president of Nigeria which marks the end of military dictatorship.   This is short lived and his victory is annulled after another military regime staged a coup and Abiola was imprisoned.  This began what many people see as the most brutal dictatorship Nigeria ever had. While Hafsat was studying at Harvard, she was asked to sign a petition for the release of a Nigerian prisoner.  It turns out it was her father.   Before long, Abiola dies in prison from mysterious causes.  Hafsat’s mother works to continue the pro-democracy movement but she too is assasinated for taking a stand.

This is clearly a film made to not only educate the western world about the plight of Nigerian women but also to empower them to break from a path set out for them by their culture and to envision a better future.  In Nigeria, the most fundamental rights of women and girls are being violated.  There is a resistance to girls being educated as it might be a threat to their traditions.  Harvard-educated Hafsat encourages girls to marry later so they can stay in school, perhaps go into politics, break boundaries and choose unconventional paths even though this is what ultimately killed her own mother.  Hafsat herself is able to skillfully juggle the life of an activist with being a wife and a mother, even though it is still dangerous to be outspoken as a Nigerian woman. Women in Nigeria are not just marginalized and forced to be submissive.  They are almost invisible.  Even Hafsat’s own brother says he would never vote for her if she ran for President.

 

This narrative is very timely since currently there are worldwide headlines about whether the muslim terrorist group, Boko Haram will release the remaining 250 schoolgirls that they kidnapped in April.

Following the film, I stayed for a Q&A discussion by a researcher for Human Rights Watch Women’s Rights Division who had actually interviewed a few of the luckier schoolgirls who escaped.  This sparked a great conversation about the lack of women’s rights in Nigeria.  I was left to contemplate their efforts and to think about how a GirlsHelpingGirls chapter might be able to offer support.

Before seeing this film, I had read little about Nigeria’s politics in the news.  It was a great introduction and I was left curious about an oil-rich country with such disparity in wealth.  I highly recommend this film that honours not only the struggles of Nigerian women backdropped against the never-ending struggle for democracy but also the reality that working for Human Rights can quite easily cause one’s death.

Rosewater (2014) Review

written and directed by Jon Stewart

in theaters November 7th

Image: Imbd

One of my favourite events at the Toronto International Film Festival in September was the Mavericks session with Jon Stewart.  Jian Ghomeshi, host of CBC’s Q, moderated a discussion with The Daily Show with Jon Stewart host and Maziar Bahari, an Iranian-Canadian journalist who was imprisoned in Iran for 118 days after appearing on The Daily Show.  Jon Stewart, a television comedian and host, spoke about directing his first film, Rosewater, which tells the story of Bahari’s imprisonment.

Stewart spoke about his career path, including bartending, stand-up comedy, late-night MTV host, author of two best-selling books, and hosting the Oscars.  He discussed the serious subject of the film with emotion intermixed with humor.  He mocked his own cinematic credentials. Then Bahari described his time overwhelmed with desperation in solitary confinement inside an Iranian prison and how he felt when he was told the world had forgotten him.  The two discussed the making of the film.

The audience was most curious about how comedian and satirist Stewart became involved in the project.  It turns out, he felt responsible for telling the story after his show became implicated in the conflict.  In 2009 Newsweek journalist Maziar Bahari was in Iran to cover the controversial elections. Iranian-Canadian himself, Bahari was a bridge between local and international media.  While he was covering the election, he spontaneously captured governmental violence against protestors on film.  The Daily Show sent Canadian-born comic/correspondent Jason Jones to Tehran to interview  Maziar Bahari, who has a distinguished career as a documentary maker.  Jones jokingly referred to himself as a spy.  After the satirical segment aired on The Daily Show, Bahari was immediately detained and interrogated brutally during the next four months. The Iranian authorities accused him of being an American spy using his Daily Show appearance as evidence. Bahari wrote an account of the events in a book called Then They Came For Me.   Wanting to tell this important story on a grander scale using his industry clout, Jon Stewart took time away from his show to make this book into the film Rosewater.

Rosewater had its world premier at Telluride, then at TIFF 2014 beforing premiering in Britain yesterday at the BFI London Film Festival. With sectarian violence all around us resulting in far too many tragic murders of journalists, a story about a journalist’s imprisonment, torture and ultimate release is timely.  The film follows Bahari in prison as he learns self-preservation while being tortured and continuously interrogated.

Although this political thriller is incredibly compelling and compassionate, it is unfortunate that we know ahead of time that Behari is eventually released.  This detracts from what could have been nail-biting suspense.  Another flaw is the relationship between captive and captor.  There is a failure to create a meaningful dynamic between the interrogator (nicknamed Rosewater after the purifying spritz he uses every day) and Bahari, mostly due to the vanilla character of the interrogator.  The relationship is central to the film and eventually the monotonous discourse with lack of intimacy leaves one disappointed.

The film did make me wonder though how youth today can help in these tumultuous times. The answer is of course not clear cut, but Bahari himself said that speaking up and staying active is the best way to slow down the spread of tyranny.

The Judge (2014) Review

 

Crowd-pleasers are often chosen to open film festivals and The Judge (2014)fit the bill as solid popcorn fare at TIFF 2014.  Although it missed out on a TIFF award, I predict that Robert Duvall will at least earn an Oscar nomination as the cantankerous old coot in David Dobkin’s first non-comedy.  You may want to see this film when it opens in theaters on October 10th but I can’t promise you will love it.

 

Robert Downey Jr. plays a big city, hotshot lawyer returning to his childhood “Nowhere-ville” Indiana town for his mother’s funeral.  His semi-estranged hardass father, revered Judge Joseph Palmer (Robert Duvall), has just run down an evil criminal who he’d previously failed to convict.  Was the intent there for manslaughter or was the judge so upset by his wife’s death that he blacked out?  Did he really not remember anything from the incident?  Hank, the slick son, reluctantly takes on the case to defend his father, the very man he despises.  He suspects his father’s old drinking habit is to blame and needs to know the truth.

 

The Judge is a mix between a small-town homecoming movie, a courtroom drama and a dysfunctional family relationship farce.  The actors pack a punch.  Vera Farmiga stars alongside Downey and Duvall and there is also a stellar supporting cast: Billy Bob Thornton as the oily local DA, Vincent D’Onofrio (Law & Order: Criminal Intent) as the older brother, whose baseball career was ruined in a car wreck caused by Hank, and Dax Shepard, the hopeless small-town lawyer.  Even though these and other overused characters make the film quite predictable, they are played well by impressive actors.

Something in the film seems off as the plot floats between comedy and drama.  The plot twists are contrived and the cliches are corny.  Because of the many unimportant subplots, the film drags on too long.  In order to add some female presence, an ex-girlfriend and her daughter are thrown in.  Hank is renewing his acquaintance with a childhood sweetheart, who has a law student daughter (Leighton Meester), whose father might be Downey.  We also meet his young daughter who is the subject of a custody battle.  These subplots are simply out of place.  The most disturbing tangent however is the incestuous idea that Hank may have hooked up with the daughter he didn’t know he had.  Even his interaction with his uncomplaining older brother is uninteresting and causes the film to overstay its welcome.

The film is not wholly without merit.  Some redeeming aspects help this legal drama make the cut as a form of entertainment.  There are several father-son bonding moments that pulled at one’s heart strings.  It is worth sitting through the 141 minutes to watch them work through their issues and to try to understand complex sibling relationships and parental expectations.  Both Duvall and Downey put on powerful performances, Duvall as the heavy-handed “bully with a big bag of tricks” and Downey as the charismatic, snarky and egotistical black sheep of the family.  They have terrific on-screen chemistry.  The most memorable scene is of Duvall surrendering to old age and swallowing his pride amidst the indignity that goes along with it.

Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBvK6ni97W8

My Extraordinary Week

I am happy the rains have stopped.  I recently lived through four months of monsoon season in India.  I learned how to drive this week from a Sikh instructor and listened to the stories about his wedding to his newly arrived bride.  He complained that she cooks with too much Ghee.  I sat Shiva for seven days with my siblings after my father died last Tuesday.  That was just after I helped train Olympic Gold Medal-winning wrestler, Mark Shultz, in the gym at the Dupont estate in Pennsylvania.  I hiked 1,100 miles on the Pacific Crest Trail, was tortured for being a spy in an Iranian jail, helped crack the Nazi Enigma code, sang with the American Boy Choir at the Yale Christmas concert and learned to bet at the race track with my elderly next door neighbor.

 

A movie can act as an escape hatch when I want to release some tensions, even if the effect lasts for just a few hours.  Films have the ability to take me to faraway places or back to long ago times.

I especially love documentaries because they offer insights into how the world works and what we are made of.  They engage me in issues of today and yesterday and fill me with questions.  I attend the film festivals because I enjoy learning about world-wide cultures, socioeconomic issues and political affairs.  Movies create awareness about the importance of education, medicine, art and politics. Films also tell me more about the depravity of the homeless, and the plight of underdeveloped countries, and countries stigmatized by years of war. Movies help awaken my sense of responsibility and empathy towards such situations. They influence my thought process and motivate me to take action.  They inspire me to tell my own stories by making my own films.

 

Movies have become such a major part of my life that it is tough to imagine a world without them.  Now back to math and english.

Reconsidering Films

When watching a film for the first time, it is easy to focus on a couple of aspects of it that you dislike and miss parts of it that are actually well done. Yet, when you rematch a movie, set your sights on the aspects that you can learn from. 

The first time I watched the 2010 film, Frozen, I was turned off by the sub-par acting and weak dialogue. In addition, this film, a story about three young adults who are stuck on a ski lift when the ski resort is shut down for the week, did not interest me because of its very gruesome scenes including one man breaking both of his legs badly, close-ups of severe frostbite and two of the main characters being torn to their death by wolves. Yet, after re-watching the film recently, I realized that there are elements that the director, Adam Green, incorporated that elevated the film and that other filmmakers, including myself, can learn from. The film used foreshadowing well, the sounds helped create necessary tension, and had effective lighting. 

To begin, during the scene on the chairlift where Parker, Dan, and Joe, the main characters, have just realized that they may be stuck for a while, they talk about the worst ways to die. Dan mentions being eaten by a shark, which foreshadows his death when he is eaten by wolves. In addition, Parker, talks about the victims of 9/11 who jumped out of windows to escape being burned by the fire. This draws a parallel between the way two of the characters tried to jump off the chairlift to avoid dying of frostbite or hypothermia. Already having prior knowledge of the plot, this allowed me to think ahead and try to connect their worst fears about dying and the way they would actually die in the film. This foreshadowing is effective as it engages the audience in the plot by giving them clues about the action coming and, therefore, creating a more entertaining plot by sparking a desire in the audience to keep watching. 

Moreover, though the score was weak at times, it helped to create tension for the audience. In a film similar to Danny Boyle’s 127 Hours, where the main characters are stuck in a confined location for a large part of the story, it can be difficult to keep the audience interested . Yet, the music that was chosen enhanced the film by building of points of drama. For example, before the first man jumps off the chairlift, tension rises as the music becomes more energetic and dramatic. This helped me personally become more emotionally invested in the story as I knew something was about to happen to the main characters that was important to advancing the plot. Furthermore, the howling wind sounds sounds that they added in post production helped to create the cold and barren atmosphere that made the audience feel as if they, too, were stranded on a stopped chairlift. From this I learned that not only visual components are important, but the audio effects can also play a large part in engaging the audience and helping them experience the story with the characters on screen. 

Lastly, another aspect from the film Frozen that I learned from would be the way that the crew lit the scene. Many parts of the movie took place on the chairlift during nighttime. Since the ski resort was meant to be shut down, there were no lights shown in those scenes normally. Despite this, the lighting was still done in an effective fashion, yet not too harsh given the time of day and climate. In the last scene, when Parker finally gets to the bottom of the ski hill and is lying on the road before a passerby finds her, the lighting is dull and cold. This reflects the Parker’s sadness after experiencing the horrific death of her boyfriend and close friend. It also projects her mood of hopelessness to the audience in addition to her utter hypothermic state. If the scene were to be lit with a bright effect and warm colours, it would not have had the same effect on the audience. 

I discovered even though when you first watch a movie and you don’t particularly enjoy some elements, there is always something to learn from, however small it might be. When I looked past some unpleasant aspects of Frozen (2010), I saw that there was well-used foreshadowing, strong audio, and impressive lighting. Perhaps it would be useful to go back and re-watch films I had previously written off in order to learn more about film and techniques used to enhance them.