Politics and Media

During the extra credit, three professors spoke.  The first, Robert Sahr, professor at Oregon State University.  Sahr had a very direct, understandable approach about the Unites States political system, first he says that most Americans believe that the US has the best political system, but they have a lot to find out.  Personally, I do not believe that our political system is the best, but I feel like I do not have much of an impact.  People believe that our political system is the best because the government tries to make us believe that it is the best and that we should not go anywhere because anywhere but here will be worse.  I enjoyed looking at the map of the US and seeing where and how different the popular and electoral votes were for different presidents.  In my argumentative writing class we were talking about the US government and if it was plausible to have electoral votes or if we could argue that they were not the best way to elect presidents.  In that class we looked at electoral votes and how the US states have changed on voting for democrat or republic candidates. It was interesting to see how the United States has changed from the 1970's to now.  


Overall I enjoyed listening to the three speakers talk. I'm not big on politics, but the one thing that stood out to me was what Rob said, he said that Obama won the election because of his use of media. Particularly social media. When Obama was running for president I was 15-16. I didn't really have any care in the world about our president yet.  So I didn't pay much attention. And 3 or 4 years later, now that I have a Facebook and a blog and I go on the Internet every day, I see how important and useful it would be for a president to use the Internet as a way to seek out to the general public.

Another aspect that caught my eye was how presidents campaign. They campaign in states that will give them the most electoral votes. It seems silly really, for the public to even vote anymore. With the presence of electoral votes it makes the public think that our individual votes really don't count for anything.

As for me personally. I am not a registered voter anywhere. And I don't plan on voting. Before I ever turned 18 I would hear adults complain about current presidents and current laws and what not. And then I would ask them if they voted. And a lot of them would say no. I believe that if an individual decides not to vote. Then they should not complain about things because in the long run, your vote along with another could have been a deciding factor. At least that is what I believe. So if I choose not to vote. I will try my hardest not to whine about all the promises I know each president will break. How many candidates have Promised to lower the national debt? All of them, right? And how many of them have accomplished this? None of them. We can't believe all the bullshit that they tell us. Its their job to tell us what we want to hear and we are all too naive to shake our heads and know that their job is to suck us in, just like any other job in the world, we do what we have to, to make money.  So this is what they do, they lie to us and make millions of promises.

Footloose (2011)

What do you think about remakes of movies?  Good… or bad?

            

INTRODUCE

I chose this movie because it is a remake of the 1984 Footloose and I had heard from my sister and mother that the new Footloose was really really good.  This movie stands out to me because a lot of remakes are not very good, but of the two movies I actually enjoyed the new movie better, which is not usually the case.  I don’t recall seeing this movie in the news, but I did seem to hear about it more than other movies at the time.

DESCRIBE

This film shows how religion, ethics, and politics can all overlap in the lives of teenagers.  The film shows how all three of these can express themselves very strongly within different groups of people from teenagers to adults, religious leaders and laws.   This movie has a law set in place so that loud music and dancing is not allowed.  A new guy (Kenny Wormald) comes to town and catches the eye of the reverends daughter (Julianne Hough) and tries to get the law banned so that they can once again listen to music and dance in public. 

This film as well as the first, is known for the Footloose song so click here and watch the music video of this well known song!

The main actor is Kenny Wormald who plays a character by the name of Ren MacCormack.  IMDb says, “Kenny Wormald grew up in Stoughton, Massachusetts, and began taking dancing lessons at the age of six. He won a string of dance contests throughout the North East in his teens and took to dancing professionally.  He worked as a dancer and choreographer, appearing in a number of music videos and touring with Justin Timberlake. He made his TV debut in an episode of "The Drew Carey Show (1995) in 2002, but he rose to worldwide fame in 2010 when Paramount announced that he was to star in the remake of Footloose (2011).”

In the first Footloose, Lori Singer was the lead actress and she beat out Madonna who also auditioned for the part.  Lori Singer also won over Madonna in the movie Fame.  Another interesting fact is that Craig Brewer had originally turned down the invite to remake Footloose because he didn’t think there was a way to remake Footloose because what town would ban music and dancing these days.

ANALYZE

A few of Craig’s work seem to surround the idea of music, not any certain type of music, but music within itself.  Other movies of his, Black Snake Moan and Hustle and Flow are two examples that are surrounded by music.  I haven’t seen either of these movies, but from what I have read it seems to me that these three movies also have a “slut” character and an “abusive” character in them which I think is a bit weird; it shows how times have really changed I think and how our society thinks that these ideals are okay.  In an interview with Home Theatre Forum, Craig says that Hustle and Flow was made by inspiration from the original 1984 Footloose so I think it’s pretty cool that Craig was able to remake a movie that he already enjoyed very much.

As you can see from the pictures above, the two movies are very different.  You could easily guess without knowing when the movies were made, that they were made in two very different times.  The first picture shows the main character by himself and the second picture shows the main character with a girl.  If the second film had just the man on the cover now-a-days, I think that it would not appeal to as many people as it does with the man and the woman on the front cover.  The two films are very similar as they have the same story plot, but they are so different because of how the characters react to the same situations completely different because the stories are meant to be played in two completely different times.

INTERPRETATION

This movie matters because it shows the difference between the first movie and the second.  The second movie shows how times have changed and how movies have really changed.  This movie definitely reflects our culture, the type of dancing and the type of music that is played throughout the film shows how and what we do with music now-a-days, especially compared to the 1984 Footloose.  Because this movie is a remake from 1984, it targets the majority.  My younger brother who is eleven liked this movie, my sister, roommate, and I enjoyed this movie and so did my mother.  Footloose is an all around good movie for anyone.  Footloose shows stereotypes throughout the film, some examples include the popular girl in school and that her boyfriend, it displays her as a slut and him as an abusive boyfriend.

EVALUATE

Remaking a film is not always easy, you usually have to out dazzle the first make and sometimes that just makes a crappy movie that no one enjoys.  Craig did a very nice job keeping the main idea of Footloose and did a very good job in making a modern twist throughout the entire movie.  I really liked this movie, I thought it was put together very well and was one of my favorite remakes.  I like this movie better than the first and so does my sister, but my roommate likes the 1984 version better than the new one, so it really depends on the person if they enjoy this film but overall I haven’t heard any bad comments.  Overall it was a good movie, but you have an older version to compare it to, so it is up for interpretation.  I would have to say that because Craig Brewer loved the 1984 Footloose that he probably enjoyed making/directing this film more than any of his other films.  After all, some of his other films were inspired by the 1984 Footloose so I would imagine that he had a lot of fun remaking the movie.  This movie is memorable to me because I remember watching the 1984 Footloose with my mom when I was younger, I thought it was kind of a weird movie because I wasn't in to musicals and that is what it reminded me of with all the music.  Now I find myself appreciating the 1984 version so much more because the two movies show the differences in times and how our society, values, and beliefs have changed, but in the same way they have stayed pretty similar.  The 2011 Footloose is way more modern which catches the eyes of a younger crowd and since it the second film or more related to our generation it makes it memorable for us.  If you were to show my generation the 1984 version, we probably wouldn't like it much if we hadn't seen it before the 2011 film.  Most critics really enjoyed this movie; Mike LaSelle of The Charlotte Observer says that Craig Brewer did everything he needed to, to make this new film as good as the first.  He says that Brewer did an excellent job in making Footloose appeal to our youth today who would most likely not be interested in watching the older version because times have changed so much.  I also read that some critics didn’t like the way dancing was filmed because it did not show that the two main characters (Kenny Wormald and Julianne Hough) were really professional dancers, they said that the short clips were not portraying that these two had the dance experience that they claim to have.

ENGAGE

I have not bought this movie on DVD, but I do plan on buying it since I also own the 1984 Footloose.  I looked up some of the characters online because I had not heard of them and I was surprised to find out that one of the actresses was a member on Dancing with the Stars, I thought that was really cool.

The Vow

What would you do if the one you loved forgot you and 

your past together within a matter of seconds?  

Anything can change in a minute.

DESCRIPTION
The Vow is a movie that is based off a book, a true story of a couple played by Channing Tatum and Rachel McAdams. As IMDb states, “A car accident puts Paige (McAdams) in a coma, and when she wakes up with severe memory loss, her husband Leo (Tatum) works to win her heart again.”  I have watched many movies played by Channing Tatum and Rachel McAdams. I’ve watched Dear John, She’s The Man, Step Up, Step Up 2, and Step Up 3 with Channing. I’ve also seen Rachel McAdams in Midnight in Paris, The Notebook, Wedding Crashers, Mean Girls and The Hot Chick.  The movie trailer is 2 and a half minutes long and it was published in June 2011.  The movie does not premiere for almost a year after the trailer is published.

ANALYZE
This trailer definitely pulls you in by emotion, who wouldn't want to find out if this couple reunites and fall back in love and live happily ever after?  It also pulls viewers in because this movie is based on a true story.  Most of us like to watch movies that are based on true stories because we want to think that the good that happens in movies will some day happen to us: most true stories have bad in them, but end with a good side which gives us hope in bad situations in real life.  I don't really understand how a movie trailer could have an Association Principle because we watch movies for entertainment and that's all they benefit us.  If you buy an iPod you can listen to music anywhere you want and it can be the music that you want and enjoy, but watching a movie is really just entertainment right?  They aren't linking anything together to make everyone believe that it will benefit us all.

INTERPRET

This movie reminds me a lot of The Notebook, with Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams, which is why I can’t wait until this movie premiers.  I believe that the target audience is almost to anyone.  Anyone who is capable of love is in the target for this movie, but mostly a young audience I think.  It’s mostly geared towards a younger crowd because of the age of actors and actresses, but personally I believe anyone could enjoy this movie.  But I don’t believe that young children would get much out of this trailer.  Other than being confused that their mom or dad could magically forget part of their life.  This ad in a sense could stereotype to young people more likely getting into car wrecks and also stereotyping that women forget things easily.  But other than that I don’t think that this movie trailer is really stereotyping anyone.

EVALUATE

There are some strengths and weaknesses of the trailer that I noticed.  I think they did a great job of portraying this movie, but I don’t necessarily like that they give away most of the movie in just the trailer.  I don’t like this aspect of all movie trailers though.  I love the connection that they show between characters and I also like that this movie is based off of a true story.  It makes me want to go watch this movie more and more. To me, this movie trailer is memorable because it makes you walk away guessing what is going to happen.  As like every other trailer, or for the most part.  But as I mentioned I don't like how trailers give away a lot of information in such a small two minutes.  I will definitely be going to see this movie when it comes out in theaters on February 10^th!  This movie reminds me a lot of The Notebook and it is by far one of my favorite movies.  I’m really excited to see this movie because it is based off of a true story of a young couple that got married and got in a car accident with the wife losing 18 months of her past memory.  It makes me wonder what I would do in that kind of situation, it’s crazy to think what lengths two people will go in this tragedy.


ENGAGE
I have not seen this movie of course, because it will not be in theaters until February 10th, but I  will definitely be going! Probably with my roommate and our boyfriends.  Can't wait to see if this movie is as great as I expect it to be.


Click here for The Vow blog


CONCLUSION
This assignment has taught me more about analyzing trailers to movies and I’ve also enjoyed learning about blogging as well.  It's very different than something like Facebook or Twitter.  Blogging is more engaging and I feel like I could learn a lot by searching blogs on topics.  I've had a ton of fun searching around and messing with the designs of my blog.  I had trouble starting out and had trouble getting videos and pictures on the blog, but it all worked out!