Category: Media Studies

The Stolen Death: Summary & Analysis

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Summary: 

In 1905, a young law student, Robert Hedman, belongs a group of Finnish activists striving for independence from the Russian Empire. He purchases weapons for the rebels from a shady businessman called Jonni. Jonni agrees to deliver a machine gun but also plans to blackmail the group. Jonni’s girlfriend Manja and Robert fall in love with each other and Manja volunteers to help the activists to steal the weapon. When Jonni finds out about the theft, he reports the rebels to the Tsarist militia. Robert is imprisoned but escapes and is chased by the military. During the chase, Manja is wounded and dies in Robert’s arms whereas he manages to sail out of the country. 

Analysis: 

When The Stolen Death/Varastettu kuolema was released in September 1938, it was perceived as confusing. The film that had been widely advertised as an experiment within the action genre, an ‘amazing example of . . . Read More

The Gospel According to St. Matthew (Movie): Summary & Analysis

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Summary: 

The film is based on the events related in Saint Matthew’s Gospel. It begins with the angel Gabriel telling Joseph about the Immaculate Conception and goes on to recreate the Nativity, the flight into Egypt and the Slaughter of the Innocents before moving forward to Christ’s baptism by John the Baptist, Christ’s temptation in the wilderness, the gathering of the disciples, the Sermon on the Mount, John’s execution by King Herod, Christ’s miracles and entry into Jerusalem, Jesus in the temple, the anointing, the Last Supper, Christ’s arrest, Crucifixion and finally the Resurrection. 

Analysis:

One of the most important, controversial and divisive figures in post-war Italian culture, Pier Paolo Pasolini was a filmmaker, poet, painter, novelist, cultural theorist and political activist. An agent provocateur par excellence, Pasolini was a committed Communist who was at one point . . . Read More

Uzak / Distant – Summary, Analysis

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Summary: 

After his wife leaves him, a photographer has an existential crisis and tries to cope with his cousin’s visit. 

Analysis: 

A cockerel crows and a Man From The Country traipses through a field covered in deep snow, a small silhouette making its slow, unsteady way across the white. Behind him the thin white tower of a minaret stands out against the greys and browngreens of an Anatolian hillside dotted haphazardly with uninspiring downbeat houses, unfinished building-works and untended stone terraces, a bland landscape of rural conventionality from which this solitary black figure is seeking to put some distance. Dogs bark, sheep bleat and cars can be heard driving by, all unseen as the Man From The Country walks further away from the village until, for a few moments, beneath the lip of an embankment he too disappears, briefly, only to re-emerge first just as a bobbing head of curly black . . . Read More

Burnt by the Sun (Movie): Summary & Analysis

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Summary: 

The events in Burnt by the Sun take place on one summer day in 1936. This day becomes a turning point in the lives of two men, a revolutionary hero, Sergei Kotov and NKVD secret agent Dmitrii (Mitia). By the end of the day, Kotov is arrested and, as a result, loses his prestigious social position and perfect family; Dmitrii commits suicide. The events of the film elucidate the complexities of the early Soviet period and the onset of the Stalinist terror. 

Analysis: 

In the early 1990s, the Russian film industry underwent a rapid decline, resulting in the fall of film production from 300 films in 1990 to a mere 36 in 1996. This decrease in the number of annually produced films can be explained by a variety of reasons: the collapse of Soviet centralised distribution networks; a flood of low-priced foreign films into the Russian cinema market; the dilapidated condition and outdated equipment . . . Read More

Ugetsu Monogatari (Movie) – Summary, Analysis

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Summary: 

In the sixteenth century, Japan is in a chaotic time of social upheaval and constant military conflict between warlords. Farmers Genjuro and Tobei realise that the pottery they make can sell well at the market in town. Seduced by prospects of wealth and social mobility, they embark on a dangerous trip through war zones, taking their family with them. While Tobei succeeds in becoming a samurai and then, by chance, a commanding officer, his wife Ohama is raped by soldiers and becomes a prostitute. They eventually reunite, reconcile, and go back to the village together. Genjuro is invited to Princess Wakasa’s mansion and becomes her lover. After days of pleasure, he discovers that she is a ghost, escapes her spell, and returns home, where his wife Miyagi and their son welcome him. The next morning it turns out that Miyagi has been murdered by soldiers and yet come back as a ghost. Genjuro promises her spirit to lead a simple life in the . . . Read More

Tsotsi (Movie): Summary & Analysis

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Summary: 

Tsotsi, a gang member living in a township, makes a living mugging and carjacking more affluent people. One day, while hijacking a car, he finds a baby on the back seat and takes him home. Identifying with the baby, he forces a young mother in the township to take care of him. Slowly remembering his own childhood, and his mother who had died from AIDS, he ends up returning the baby to his affluent parents. 

Analysis:

A major success in both South Africa and around the world, winner of the 2005 Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film, Tsotsi took some risks: it featured no stars, but for the most part young unknown actors, was shot on location in Soweto, and its dialogue is mostly in tsotistaal, a hybrid of languages, such as Afrikaans, Sotho, Zwana and Zulu, spoken in the townships around Johannesburg. At the same time the film sparked much debate and controversy as far as its politics are . . . Read More

Trois Couleurs / Three Colors Trilogy: Summary & Analysis

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Summaries: 

Blue: 

A car accident causes the death of a well-known composer and his young daughter. Julie, the composer’s wife and the girl’s mother, survives the crash but withdraws into isolation and silence. She is slowly brought back to a social existence by small claims on her attention in her immediate proximity, and then by the revelation that a child will be born out of the dead husband’s affair with another woman. She finally returns to composing music. 

White: 

A humiliating divorce from a French hairdresser forces the emigrant Karol to sneak from Paris back home to Poland, impoverished and crushed. Having eventually hustled his way up the economic ladder, he stages his own death as a trap to lure his ex-wife to Poland, jail, and sweet revenge. 

Red: 

Valentine, a student and occasional model, is distracted from her . . . Read More

Touki-Bouki (The Journey of the Hyena): Summary & Analysis

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Summary: 

Mory and Anta are young lovers who dream of escaping from the slums of Dakar, Senegal to the city of their dreams, Paris, capital of the former colonial power. Anta attempts to study at university, Mory rides around town on his motorbike decorated with zebu horns on the handlebar and an elaborate Dogon fetish as a backrest. They choose to wear ragged, filthy clothes, Anta dressed as a youth with her hair cropped short, while their contemporaries sport the latest 1970s striped flares and cool shades. Through a series of bizarre incidents and adventures they contrive to steal money, clothes and a chauffeured car. Anta leaves for France, but Mory is unable to board ship, left behind to a dubious fate in Dakar. 

Analysis:

Djibril Diop Mambéty (1945–1998) was born to a Wolof family in Colobane, a small town on the fringes of Dakar; his father was an imam – ‘all these films are immersed . . . Read More

All About My Mother – Synopsis – Analysis

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Synopsis: 

Manuela, a single mother living in Madrid sees her only son, Esteban, die in a car crash as he runs to request an autograph from Huma, a theatre actress he idolises. In her grief, Manuela travels to Barcelona to find Esteban’s father, a transvestite named Lola who does not know that they had a child. In Barcelona, Manuela is reunited with her friend, Agrado, and meets a young nun, Rosa, who is pregnant with Lola’s child. Manuela gets a job as an assistant to Huma, the actress her son admired. When Rosa discovers she is HIV positive Manuela gives up her job to nurse her and on Rosa’s death adopts her son. At Rosa’s funeral Manuela meets Lola and introduces him to his second son, also named Esteban. Despite contracting HIV at birth Esteban Jr. is free from the virus at the end of the film. 

Analysis: 

All About My Mother is an Almodóvar film. This is not simply a director’s . . . Read More

Daybreak (1933 Movie) – Summary – Analysis

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Summary: 

Unable to pay the local taxes imposed by the warlord, Lingling and her fiancé, Zhang Jin, leave their hometown, a fishing village, for the big city Shanghai, where their cousin and her husband live. The four of them work at the same factory. Unfortunately, Zhang is soon fired and has to start to work on the sea. Meanwhile, Lingling is raped at a dinner party hosted by her young boss at the factory. When the girl pointlessly wanders around afterwards, she gets abducted and ends up being sold to a brothel. Two years later, having endured the painful life of prostitution, Lingling turns into a skillful and street-smart social flower. Zhang returns back to Shanghai as a revolutionary. The two meet at Lingling’s apartment, without knowing that a secret agent chasing Zhang has followed them there. In order to help Zhang escape, Lingling gets arrested and is sentenced to death. When they are about to execute her at daybreak, the girl keeps . . . Read More