The two films we watched on Monday were Hamilton and i think the other was called Notes on the Circus. The first one, about the circus, was alright. It had like a folky sounding song going along with quick cuts of the circus. It at least kept my attention throughout, and i felt that the song went well with the images of the circus. I kind of enjoyed all of the images of the circus and the way they were presented. The second film, Hamilton, i didnt like at all. I couldnt pay attention for longer than about five minutes and then i would doze off or just look around and think of other things. I couldnt really follow the plot, if there even was one, because i couldnt hold my attention long enough. The only thing that i enjoyed about that film was the ending, because for some reason the filmmaker chose to play the song "Winter's Love" by Animal Collective, and i actually like their music a lot. I thought that was weird as well because i dont really remember there being much music, if any, throughout the entire film until that one end scene, but that managed to grab my attention.

thislife.org

I listened to the audio called Nice Work If You Can Get It. it was pretty much just about astronauts. I think i picked a pretty bad audio clip to lsiten to because it doesnt really relate to film in anyway i can think of, but ill still talk about it. It was fairly interesting because i learned more things about astronauts than i had previously known. According to this, i guess that astronauts hardly ever go into space, and if you are an astronaut that doesnt even mean youll ever make it to space. So, i guess being an astronaut isnt even that cool of a job because you hardly ever get to go to space, and if youre a lucky enough astronaut to be able to make it to space, odds are youll only go there once, possibly twice. The lady being interviewed also said that she rarely gets to do astronaut related things that she enjoys, such as simulating space walking. They then talked to that guy who plays the PC in those annoying apple commericals. It seemed like he didnt have much to say, and just rambled on about some story. For some reason it would only load ten minutes adn thirteen seconds, so his story got cut off but i wasnt really interested in it anyways. The part about the astronauts was way more interesting. So, i guess being an astronaut isnt nearly as cool as i thought it was going to be, and i guess that it wouldnt even be that fun.

April 2nd

The first film we watched today in class was Jean Genet in Chicago by Frederic Moffet. I thought that film was somewhat interesting. The old footage of the riots in Chicago were entertaining, and the fact that the characters all wore masks made the whole thing a little more unique and interesting than if it was just the real people doing this in more of a documentary style. Although some of it was interesting, I don't think i quite understood the whole meaning of the film. This is probably because of my little knowledge on the subject, as well as little interest. Another film we watched was More than Meets the Eye: Remaking Jane Fonda by Scott Stark. I really didnt like this one. It seemed like the whole thing was just that one guy doing her aerobic excercises while strange or political sentances or phrases would scroll down the screen. In all honesty, i stopped paying attention after about 10 minutes because i found it so boring, so i'm not sure if the film changed much. I just really didnt understand what was so good, interesting or entertaining about that guy doing aerobics accompanied with text. The last video we watched was Stranger Comes to Town by Jacqueline Goss. I kind of liked this one actually, probably due to its weirdness. i didnt understand why the characters were all video game characters, but i found that made the film more interesting and funny. I especially liked the lady from Toronto who was talking about that giant envolope that she recieved. I also thought that the animation was pretty cool at some points, and those video game characters made it more entertaining for me.

Monday March 5th

In class today we watched 5 films. These were "3rd Eye Butterfly", "Available Light", "Night Flight", "Luminous", and "The Dark Room". The first film, "3rd Eye Butterfly" was by Storm De Hirsch and consisted of the screen being split into two different parts, sometimes it was split into eight. There was also a drum beat going on throughout the film. I thought that this film was alright, it had color and sound which I find more interesting than black and white silent movies. The fact that the screen was divided into two parts made it more interesting as well, and it was at its most interesting when the screen would be split into eight parts, usually four of which mirrored the other four. I thought the screen being split made it more interesting because there was multiple things to look at, so if one screen bored you, you could continue looking at the other sections. The next film "Avaliable Light" was also just alright in my opinion. I thought it was pretty cool at first because the colors looked cool when they changed, especially when the colors were changing from a bluish torquoise to white. I thought that was the best looking part of the film, but I think that it was made too long and I eventually lost my attention. I'm also not sure how creative that film would be to make, because Prof. Bogner made it seem like almost anybody could create it by just putting film into an old camera and letting it run. The third film "Night Flight" consisted of a black screen with two black and white squares that would appear when a sound was made. I actually kind of liked this one. It was cool that the black and white squares would only appear when there was a sound, and when there was a beat that would last about 10 seconds or so, it would look pretty cool with the different squares changing every time a different sound happened. The fourth film, "Luminous", I just found kind of annoying because the sounds were loud, screeching noises that just kind of bothered me instead of intriguing me. The last film, "The Dark Room", was easily my favorite viewed today. I really liked the weird water images, and it made me wonder how he got the angles and shots of the water. Although there was no sound, my attention was kept throughout because the imagery was fascinating as well as interesting.

D'est

I thought that the film D'est that we watched this Monday was possibly the worst of all the films we've watched in class. I can't believe how incredibly long this thing was, and how insanely boring it was. I still don't understand the point making something like this at all. I couldn't pay attention at all, and didn't even find the things that they were showing to be visually interesting in any way. I'm still having a really hard time understanding what makes an experimental film "good" because all of the ones we've watched have either made me fall asleep or made no sense to me. Hopefully I'll eventually understand why these are "good", but I probably won't. I can't understand any reason for anybody actually wanting to watch D'est because I found it so horribly boring.

I thought the thing we did in class on Wednesday was helpful in teaching the group how to have a conversation about the films we watch in class. I think this will help us out in later class periods when we need to talk about the films and compare them to eachother and so forth. Probably next time we have the discussion class we will have a thoughtful discussion about the films.

February 13

Of all the films we viewed in class on Monday, my least favorite would have to be Gently Down the Stream by Su Friedrich. I found this film to be slow, boring and unentertaining. This was due to the fact that it was black and white, and silent, and 14 minutes long that seemed to drag on at least half an hour. As of now, I'm starting to think that I won't enjoy any film that is silent, because they just cant hold my attention. Add to the fact that they're black and white and it becomes even harder. Although, I'll obviuosly keep an open mind throughout this class and not jump to any conclusion of how exciting or boring a film will be just based on its length, color and sound.