KeTasha Johnson

English 1301

Dr. Childs

01 December 2012

Classic Tragedy

 

 

No Country for Old Men is a movie full of unexpected surprises. The good guy does not get the glory, the town hero does not save the day, and the bad guy does not go to jail or die. The film had so many twist and turns and the outcomes are not what you expect. You can see a lot of cognate tasks in a Shakespearean tragedy play. William Shakespeare drew inspiration for his dramatic plays from Aristotle's definiton of tragedy. There are six elements that make up Aristotle's idea of a great play of tragedy. The plot, character, thought, diction, melody, and spectacle must be done well for the play to succeed. Plays like Hamlet and Macbeth are great examples. No Country for Old Men could easily be listed as an example of Aristotle’s definition of tragedy.

The Greeks believed that tragedy was the highest form of drama. Aristotle, a famous Greek philosopher, believed that tragedy is the imitation of an action that is serious and also, as having magnitude, complete in itself; in appropriate and pleasurable language in a dramatic rather than narrative form.  This means dealing with one very serious issue with great importance. The drama that ensues throughout the movie are from the actions of Moss’s negligence of morals. When he went hunting that day his intentions were to get a nice size buck to tell his wife about when he got home. He didn’t plan on coming home that day with a brief case filled with 2 million dollars from a drug deal gone bad.  All of the six elements should be present to make a great tragedy but the most important are plot and character. The Coen brothers used these two elements to their advantage.

Aristotle felt that the plot of the play was the most important of the six elements. He said, “All human happiness or misery takes the form of action….Character gives us qualities, but it is in our actions that we are happy or miserable.  A good plot will have discovery or peripety and sometimes both. Peripety is the change from one state of things in the beginning  of the play to the complete opposite toward the end.The discovery in the plot is a change from ignorance to knowledge. The tragic hero should not be good and not be bad but he must end up in misey. The plot in the film No Country for old Men contained a complete plot that stayed true to the main issue throughout the entire movie.
 Llwelleyn Moss was a Texas native who wanted more from his life. He felt that the goverment owed him for his time spent in Veitnam and he has yet to reep the benefits. He comes across a quick come up when he seizes the briefcase from a drug deal gone bad. Morals do not play apart in blood money, Especially when you can get away with it. He just wanted to be able to provide for his wife and retire her from Walmart. He had it all under control. For these reasons Moss could be considered a tragic hero in the film. He was an ordinary person that made his character very relatable. The desicion he made could be a circumstance left up to any of us. His decision to take drug money and leave a critically wounded man bleeding in the passanger side of a pick up truck in the middle of the desert was themorally bad decision that cost him his life.
Peripety of the plot in the film is the change of the character Moss having it all. He had the money, Carla Jean was safe away with her mother, and there was no one to identify him as the culprit with the money. He did not take into consideration that the black leather briefcase concealed a tracking beacon. He also didnt think he would be hunted by the likes of a psychopath assasin. Chigurh came along and turned Moss's life upside down. The cloud nine that Moss was floating on quickly ran into a thunderstorm.

 

 

 

 

 

My Neighbor Totoro Movie Review

KeTasha Johnson

English 1301

Dr. Childs

2 October 2012

My Movie Review: My Neighbor Totoro

       A good family film will appeal to a variety of ages and teach a lesson of some sort. It seems that a lot of the Family film directors lately are more concerned with filling seats at theatres than spreading a positive message. Miyazaki strategically used diegetic to gain my attention and  had me engulfed me into the mystical world that Mei and Satsuki so confidently believed in. What better way to see the countryside than on a Cat bus that moves swift ly through the hills like the wind. Or Better yet! What about being friends with cute furry tree spirits that protect you and look out for you in your time of need. Hayao Miyazaki was able to create the ultimate family fantasy film by exceeding the expectations of a family film.
        The movie is family oriented and displays a very strong family bond.  The girls are moving to the country with their College professor dad to be closer to their Mom who is in the hospital with an unknown illness. The illness has kept her hospitalized for long periods of time and left the family longing for her presence. Instead of dwelling on Mrs. Kusakabe’s absence they moved to be closer to her. It is the summer time so the family is able to go and visit Mrs. Kusakabe a lot but the distance to the hospital is hours away on a bike so they take the time in between to do things together. Satsuki valiantly steps in her mother’s footsteps and takes up the slack to make it easier for her father Mr. Kusakabe while her mother is away. She cooks, takes care of her household chores and takes care of herself and her little sister Mei. She enjoys being able help out her dad.
       The use of Kiyazaki’s creative imagination made way for some very interesting anime characters. In My Neighbor Totoro there are no villains. There are no scary monsters in the closet, Evil men or women trying to kidnap kids or puppies, or big bullies picking on smaller children. It’s a family movie you can watch with your kids and not have to share your bed space with them once it’s over.
        The scariest thing about the whole movie is that the old dilapidated house in the country that the family is moving into is rumored to be haunted.  The girls encounter dust sprites while trying to open all the windows in the house. The dust sprites are only seen in dark shadowy places and run from light. Occasionally there was one or two that linger but, the caretaker Granny, calms their fears by letting Mei and Satsuki know that laughter will drive them away to the next empty house. They put their ghost busting skills to the test and Grannies remedy works and sends the dust sprites on to the next empty house.
       Mei is left at home with her dad while Satsuki goes to school and notices a small, furry, rabbit looking, creature collecting acorns in her yard. The creature notices that it can be seen and it fades into its surrounding like it disappears. This puzzles Mei and now she is determined to catch another glimpse of what she thought she saw. The furry friend reappears minutes later and gets chased by Mei underneath her house. She is fearless now so she waits at what she thinks is the only way out from under the house. As she repositions herself she notices not only the little rabbit that she was chasing moments earlier but there is another one and it’s a little bigger than the original one. The two trolls eventually lead her through the forest and down the hole in the Camphor tree to Totoro, the biggest of the three. He is ten times the size of the other trolls but he is portrayed as a big, fluffy, comforting snuggle bunny. Mei is not scared at all she is actually comforted by her new forest friend and falls asleep on his fluffy belly to his soothing, rythmic, deep breathing.