“The best way to explain One from the Heart, is that it is a musical show. It’s not a conventional musical in the sense that people start singing in the middle of a scene rather the story itself is told by songs, music, and dance.” Francis Coppola describes his 1982 film, One from the Heart, as a story about love itself told through the various scintillating scenes of music and dance on the set of a homemade studio version of the city of Las Vegas. Coppola plays with the relationship of realism and expressionism to create the visual projection of his emotional experience through colorful lighting as well as brilliant gradually dissolving transitions. A simple story of a mechanic, Hank and his partner Frannie, a travel agent, that have been together for five years when we come across the moment Frannie yearns for excitement and adventure. Their dreams become separate and as the movie progresses, it stays that way as Hank carries a jealous envy over Frannie’s decision. From a dazzling circus performer to a singing waiter, the adventure begins as we watch vibrant dancing over the terribly hard to watch representation of love between Hank and Frannie. It comes to a point where neither character is showing that they need one another in their lives. It seems to be a comfort zone. In comparison to the film, Two Days One Night, directed by the Dardenne brothers, the film is steadily shot through medium close ups and follow shots. To allow the audience to feel as if they are getting the first person perspective of the main character, Sandra’s life. The director opted for simple transitions, no additional soundtracks, clean cutaways, and natural lighting to show the realistic challenges of mental health and class struggles. Director Coppola decided to express love itself by stylized expressionist decisions of the state of emotional or psychological state of characters through intense colors that seem to come out of nowhere. I question whether these changes of lights reflect the emotions of the current state of the characters. In many scenes red is used for different emotional states such as passion and anger. To elevate his expressionistic ideas through, One from the Heart, Coppola went one step further and required the strip of Las Vegas to be man made rather than use the real location. This way every aspect of the film could be controlled such as lighting styles and small architectural details. Robert Brody and author from the New Yorker, writes, “Coppola had to create and finance the equipment that he used, and he supplemented it with some elaborate sets; the budget expanded from twelve million dollars to twenty-seven million dollars.” For such a simple plot, Coppola went overboard with elements of the film so much so that it led him straight to bankruptcy. He says, “I tried to tell a love story in a setting that was like love itself, set in Las Vegas, as a city of glitter one second and depression the next.” Which can be seen through how Frannie and Hank treat each other, all the way from the opening to closing scenes of all the film. Professor puts it best when he states, “In some ways, this is the only realistic method for producing something entirely expressionistic. By shutting reality out completely, Coppola could rebuild it as he saw fit.” The ability to control all aspects of this space with exaggerated Coppola's ideas also involved elaborate transitions. Though repeated throughout the film to suggest the separation waiting to happen a scene that stands out to me is where Leila, the circus performer, is dancing for Hank in an imaginative junkyard. The dissolving transitions aesthetically fit with Leila’s face with the sign of the blue woman, opening the beginning and closing the end of her performance. The blending of foreground and background images through transitions create a visual effect of a dream-like state. As if the scenes jump from place to place. In many ways, it throws off the audience to where they think they were with the story. Some other notable scenes that are enhanced by the dissolving transitions effect are when Hank and Frannie are in different locations but seem to inhabit the same space at the same time. Coppola’s drastically expensive decision’s and ideas produced a film that implicated emotional effects through visual enhancement of intense colors as well as the dream-like transitional pacing of the film. Along with an upbeat soundtrack and plenty of dancing, Coppola focused on aesthetics rather than plot. There’s nothing that ties the audience to any character, we are simply observing instead of reliving the moments with the characters. These many bright and obnoxious elements cover the lack of character development; thus creating a film for the aesthetic purpose of exploring expressionism. Sources: https://www.newyorker.com/culture/richard-brody/movie-of-the-week-one-from-the-heart https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7svT3YH9TBA http://thelastdetailfilm.weebly.com/one-from-the-heart-1982.html Clash by Night [1952]During Fritz Lang’s hollywood career he had released four films in the same year (1952) which led to a heightened critical respect for his career. One of which included, Clash by Night, a black-and-white definitive work of late film noir filled with drama, broken romance and typical expressionistic shadows. The film is adapted from a half-forgotten Clifford Odets play, involving three main characters including Mae Doyle played by Baraba Stanwyck, Jerry D’Amato played by Paul Douglass, and Earl Pfeiffer played by Robert Ryan caught up in an unforgiving love triangle. Lang utilizes every part of the frame to enhance the middle class lifestyle as well as realistic romantic states through pessimistic details of setting and characters. The opening credits scene of violent waves crashing foreshadows the film as a whole best. A wave represents forthcoming events and hidden emotions which implements well with the characters turmoil as well as visual effects of the style film noir. The film introduces Mae, a bitter and cynical woman, moving back to her hometown, a fishing village in California, after sometime in New York. Mae moves in with her brother, Joe Doyle, a local fisherman. Mae soon catches the interest of a guy with a large heart, Jerry D'Amato, who owns the boat Joe works on and meets Joe’s brutal friend Earl Pfeiffer. Although Mae has a strong and adventurous spirit she settles down with a man who is safe and cares for her, rather than have nothing at all, Mae lives like this even though she soon grows to become unhappy. Mae contradicts what she wants when says in the film, “Confidence. I want a man to give me confidence. Somebody to fight off the blizzards and the floods. Somebody to try to beat off the world when it tries to swallow you up.” She doesn’t just want to be cared for; she wants someone who will make her feel strong and yet not feel emasculated by it. Which is why she begins to have an affair with Earl and falls in love with him. Fritz Lang has been referred to as the father of one of the first noir films ever made, after the notorious 1931 release of M, and although Clash by Night, is a lesser known film he still is able to bring subtle aspects of shadows and dark features throughout the film to enhance how the intense and passionate emotion of the love affair. Lang reaches out and not only uses shadows from windows such as when Earl and Mae sit at the table together but also utilizes dark symbols such as waves crashing against the rocks. After Earl drunkenly stumbles to Mae and Jerry’s home, he talks with Jerry on the porch before passing out. Jerry carries him to an empty bed and soon goes to bed himself. The camera pans across the bed, as we see Mae is not there. She is standing by the windows smoking a cigarette late at night, staring at the waves crashing. Lang’s realistic use of shadows in settings and detailed placement of characters implies a story through visual effects rather than dialogue. The spaces of darkness and symbolic use of waves enhance the noir style as well as create a pessimistic mood that reflects Mae’s state of being and overall happiness. Critic Adrian Martin argues that “it [mise-en-scene] can transform the elements of a given scene; it can transform a narrative’s destination; it can transform our mood or our understanding as we experience the film.” The gloomy visuals of the fishermen village environment and pessimistic attitudes of the protagonist give the film an overall dark mood. As the film persists, we reach the point to where the secret is out: a scene starts in the kitchen, an arid affair between Mae and Earl arises. She’s chosen the type of man she wants and they "clash by night". Mae finally admits her true emotions by explaining to Earl that, “It's me, me, something in me… The days go by, down to the grocery store back to the house, hang out the wash, take out the dishes from the closet. Go to bed. Wake Up. Shut your mouth, close your eyes, this is the man you married. This is the life you’ve made Expect for nothing. Hope for nothing. And every day a little older, a little dumber, a little stupider. Love is superstition..Without love there is nothing.” Mae finally admits to herself and everyone around her dramatically that shes living the life she never wanted to live. An article published in 1952 from the New York describes the love triangle best when stating, "Miss Stanwyck is professionally realistic in the role. Paul Douglas is a physically convincing portrait of the simple, muscular and trusting Jerry. But it is difficult to take his extreme idealistic devotion. As the lover, Robert Ryan is natural in his depiction of a man groping for a way out of a lonely existence." Sources:
https://www.nytimes.com/1952/06/19/archives/odets-clash-by-night-on-screen.html http://www.sensesofcinema.com/2002/great-directors/lang/ http://www.noiroftheweek.com/2009/04/clash-by-night-1952.html
5 Comments
Kayla Tomaszkiewicz
3/21/2021 08:17:59 pm
I loved how you brought up the plot from "One from the heart ". The director doesn't really focus on it too much. I also liked how you mentioned that we aren't drawn to just one character. You brought put a great example with the lighting in "Clash By Night". The waves and dark lighting does give a negative or dark emotion.
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Ngoc Ngo
3/21/2021 08:58:27 pm
i noticed the transition through some reading but your explanations is way more detail. i found some transitions but i miss the leila face transitions during her performance. very nice detail.
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Aidan Geoffroy
3/21/2021 09:12:25 pm
I really enjoyed reading your blogpost for the week. I liked how you mentioned the lighting comparison from the movie Two Days One Night to One from the Heart. Two Days, One Night used all natural lighting that really highlighted the main characters change of emotion while One from the Heart used different colors in lighting to help express emotion. I liked how you mentioned this because I didn't think to compare the two movies together.
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Ryan L
3/21/2021 09:21:03 pm
yeah i agree with One From The Heart i think thats why i didnt care for it too much cos it wasnt character driven or plot driven. Clash by night used characters to its purpose but i guess i can be biased cos i like noir style themes more than flashy.
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julia
5/15/2021 05:31:46 pm
Wow ! I really enjoyed reading your blog post. For one for the night. I like how you went into the detail about production and what need to be created for the movie to be what it is.
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Film As Art:
From a college film course. Note: I haven't had time to write but I've seen many new movies since taking the class and hope to find spare time to continue writing reviews based on my interests rather than parameters of a class. THANK YOU! |