(Part 2) Top products from r/TrueFilm

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We found 23 product mentions on r/TrueFilm. We ranked the 237 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the products ranked 21-40. You can also go back to the previous section.

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Top comments that mention products on r/TrueFilm:

u/Loneytunes · 4 pointsr/TrueFilm

As that asshole who posted that thing, I...

A. Narcissistically think it's awesome that you're asking this question. Mostly because I asked this question, and I honestly enjoy film more because of it. I disagree completely with the idea that when one understands art more it's thus more difficult to enjoy it.

B. Literary theory is helpful with many films, especially the more standard ones. It becomes less helpful when we get into more avant garde cinema, but either way, I think it's a great jumping off point but one should preferably support the analysis that has been framed in Literary terms via Cinematic ones, because that's where the evidence to support your theory actually lies.

C. Here are my bullet points of advice, in the interest of economizing information:

  • Read some books on film theory. A really good place to start is with the work of Bordwell & Thompson, which is pretty standard practice for film students. That will give you a rudimentary and foundational vocabulary through which you can begin understanding film better, and often that's the problem is not knowing what to look for.

  • If you can, try to talk about film as much as you can with people who know more than you. I meet for drinks regularly with a former professor and screenwriter who has done more in the industry than most and is one of the smartest people I know. I can keep up with him, but he's clearly way ahead of me as he should be. I've learned and figured out specific films almost as much just talking out ideas with similarly informed people, as just sitting there watching them or reading about them.

  • Read up on a wide variety of topics, specifically philosophy, art theory and psychology as well as perhaps some science, anthropology and history. Find fields with which you are really fascinated by. Those who are interested in physics, determinism or analytic philosophy will look at and interpret film in a different way than others, I'd imagine they may be heavily structuralist and influenced by the Soviet Montage school in their own work, for instance. Someone else more interested in history and science may approach film from a sociological perspective as well as subscribe to some interesting ideas such as Jean Epstein's theory that film breaks the space time continuum. Me, myself, I'm really fascinated with psychoanalysis and abstractly cosmic concepts, things that cut to the core of human experience, and couldn't care less about free will or analytics because I don't see how they change anything phenomenologically. So it would make sense that I'm drawn to surrealism, and analyze film is a post-structural, Lacanian way, as well as drawing much of my support for interpretations from the semiotic aesthetics when I can.

  • Write stuff. Often I don't figure out a movie until I start writing, and then it just sort of comes out fully formed much of the time. If you have a blog send me a link too, I'd like to see it. Anyway.

  • Once you've determined your points of interest it will be easier to decide who to read/watch next but I find these ones were the most enlightening for me. So if you like what I said about my own viewpoint above, they will help, and I'll include some things that are standard that I don't prefer but am glad I read as well.

    Christian Metz will teach you about how film communicates information through non-verbal aesthetics. If you want to understand how to analyze film via a non-literary perspective, this is where to start.

    Hugo Munsterberg is the father of most film theory. Oddly, he doesn't seem to like movies very much, but the book has some very relevant information on the interaction between film and spectator, that is essential (assuming a relatively modern approach at least. I suppose a formalist wouldn't care too much about the meaning of the film itself and thus the relationship wouldn't matter).

    Slavoj Zizek has a lot of books on cinema, but also his documentary "The Perverts Guide to Cinema" is one of the most entertaining, as well as informative looks at film I've seen. It doesn't really address aesthetic elements as well as take a Lacanian look at why certain scenes provoke the reactions they do or what they mean, but I think that if one combines this psychological perspective with the understanding of how juxtaposition of elements conditions the viewer as evidenced by a lot of Soviet Film Theory, one can figure out the mechanism of how these meanings are being communicated. Also here's an interesting more structural take on Zizek that I've read.

    I don't find it necessarily essential to my own views, but Sergei Eisenstein has a lot of really interesting work, and his books use a lot of synonymous examples in other art to illustrate how film works differently from theater and other narrative form. It also breaks down the Soviet Montage theory better than almost any other work.

    Another essential book for many that I'm not a huge fan of yet I'd still say is pretty important to read is What Is Cinema by Andre Bazin
    Dude loves movies and is pretty enlightening for many people I just disagree with a lot of his ideas of how film should best be made.

    Andrew Sarris is a relatively important guy for understanding American film criticism. He and Pauline Kael warred for a while, and I think Pauline Kael is a blowhard ignoramous who never actually said anything relevant or informed about movies. People love her though, probably because she was an entertaining writer, and she was influential. But anyway, Sarris was the one who brought auteur theory, the dominant theory of understanding filmmaking today, to America from France.

    An interesting look at directorial style and authorship is Martin Scorese's "A Personal Journey Through American Movies". It's not comprehensive or detailed, but it will not only show you some great classical era films to look up, but he has a unique idea of the director as filling one of four roles, storyteller, illusionist, smuggler and iconoclast. As a side note, I think Scorsese sees himself as a Smuggler, and attempts to be much more so in the wake of his reaching iconic status. For a much more challenging work of film criticism from a director that is still alive, check out Histoire(s) du Cinema by Jean-Luc Godard.

    Finally I'd say Tom Gunning, who I actually met once and was fascinating to listen to, is pretty important. He's mostly focused on early film, and the development of how a film communicates narrative. He will illustrate some interesting things on spacial reasoning and editing and how logical information is communicated. For instance now in film you know which character is on the left by giving him some negative talk space in close up on the right, and when a character leaves frame on the right they enter the next from on the left if one wishes to maintain continuity of space, time and setting. Also his cinema of attractions theory is pretty interesting and explains exactly why people go watch Michael Bay movies, as well as elucidating the mentality of film-goers in the pre-Griffith era.

    Also, look around the web. Some places like Slant.com, RogerEbert.com's essays and blogs sections, or Mubi.com occasionally have some really interesting stuff. Also there are random blogs around that do really enlightening work (like mine! shameless self promotion aside, if you want it I'll send it to you but I'm not gonna be that douche) that I sometimes stumble across.

    Let me know if you have any questions or need clarification, and good luck!
u/fernlino · 7 pointsr/TrueFilm

I'm searching for serious criticism to my film, Retirement Home (US & UK). I would be very thankful if you were generous with your time and we could discuss my film here.

I made most of the film by myself: directed, edited, shot and produced it. The soundtrack was done by an incredible musician called Pedro Gaspar. And the sound mix by Branko Neskov (who worked with the best filmmakers from Portugal: Manoel de Oliveira, Pedro Costa, João Canijo...).

I think my film is quite good. I sent it to the Cannes Film Festival and it wasn't accepted by the festival but I received warm compliments from Christian Jeune (if you're familiar with the world of submitting films to festivals you know that's almost a miracle to receive feedback from one), who's one of the most important persons in the team responsible by the selection of the Competition Program. Almost all submitted films go through him in some capacity. There's rumors that he watches at least 5 films a day. He said, and I quote, "Your film was considered but to be frank, we take so few documentaries, even though we thought the film was touching, it was a long shot to be selected.".

I received many almost's after that one from sales houses, some quite reputable, that represented Oscar winners and nominees. But I ended up releasing the film myself.

A few months ago I was talking with this foreign lady that I just met in a restaurant and the subject of my film came up. I said that financially it didn't do very well, but that I'm still very proud of it. I think that it's a film that represents in portuguese cinema the time period when it was shot very well and it's a good portrait of the elders. To which she said that it wasn't its time yet. The way she said it, it felt true to me...

I was influenced by Yasujiro Ozu, DA Pennebaker, Frederick Wiseman, Manoel de Oliveira, António Reis and a few more filmmakers. Because it was a one man team job, there's one thing that I could get as well or even better than almost anyone making documentaries, which was, intimacy. My camera was really close to the elders and they didn't care. They got used to me hanging out with my gear as if I was just one more of the gears that made the retirement home work.

So, I hope I can hear from you. Am I stupid for thinking that my film is any good?

Many thanks in advance.

u/enchilladam · 1 pointr/TrueFilm

My favorites:

The Visual Story


In the Blink of an Eye

How to Read a Film (personally bored by it but a lot of film classes I took in uni versity used it)

The Filmmaker's Eye (huge fan of this book)

The rest of this post is just general advice on how to gain a deeper knowledge of film.

If you want to learn the grammar of film, read about film history (it will help introduce you to editing/camera movement/directing techniques and the filmmakers/films that influenced your favorite directors).

Read criticism from Pauline Kael, Andrew Sarris, David Bordwell (his blog is a fantastic resource), Jonathan Rosenbaum, and older critics such as Bazin/Eisenstein. There are more out there, but this is a good start.

Read reviews after you watch a film instead of beforehand--those reviews will hopefully give you a deeper view of the film. That being said, you really have to look around to figure out who you like, stylistically speaking. There are a lot of critics that have no idea what they're talking about from a technical standpoint. If you're bored with short reviews without substance you might like FILMCRITHULK.

Watch YouTube tutorials and video essays on filmmaking. Video essays are particularly helpful at illustrating and pointing out things that you might not have noticed otherwise. It's also a hell of a lot more entertaining than reading criticism that was written in 1962 in another language.

From a practical standpoint, pick up a camera and shoot something. Edit it. Read books on composition--I've found that photography composition books are pretty helpful. Read scripts from films you love and films you haven't seen to get an idea of how a film exists before the first day of shooting takes place.

Keep watching films, and watch them actively. Don't text during films, and try to watch them in one sitting. The goal is to immerse yourself in the image and analyze the shots/cuts/etc. as they happen. Watch films with commentaries, watch them with the sound off, and branch out into different genres and time periods so that you can attain a more concise view of film.

Above all else, watch as many films as you can. You'll find that the watchlist keeps growing, no matter how many films you see.

u/chubby_faggot · 5 pointsr/TrueFilm

There's a documentary series called The Story of Film: An Odyssey which is pretty good for learning about some of the key filmmakers and movements from the beginning of cinema. I haven't actually watched any of this myself yet but it looks promising and the reviews are good!

There's also another book that I'd really recommend which is Oxford's Dictionary of Film Studies. It's got definitions and explanations for pretty much all the basic terminology, theories, movements, etc for film studies and they're not too lengthy to read. Most entries in the book are around a page long or less, so if there's something you'd be interested in looking up and reading about it's brief enough to not cut into your study hours but still in-depth to give a fairly detailed introduction for you.

u/drneilpretenamen · 2 pointsr/TrueFilm

I second Bresson's Notes on the Cinematographer. Very fascinating, if not obtuse read (which could also be said about the filmmaker). I remember an old interview with Lance Hammer (the director of the masterpiece Ballast) noted that he kept that book in his back pocket on set.

Some other great reads :

Catching the Big Fish by David Lynch

Getting Away With It by Steven Soderbergh (but done as a conversation with Richard Lester, one of his favorite filmmakers)

And there's some great "(insert name of director) on (insert name of director)" interview style books. I remember the Mike Leigh and Federico Fellini ones both being enlightening reads.

u/soapdealer · 3 pointsr/TrueFilm

I'd agree. It's not a great manual, but it's big picture view of editing is essential.

I think people get too wrapped up in the technical stuff sometimes though. The best editing books for editors, rather than for people with a general interest in film are The Invisible Cut and On Film Editing both of which focus largely on examples that predate NLE systems. If all you want to do is learn Avid or After Effects or whatever, you're probably just as well watching tutorial videos or the like.

u/diarmada · 44 pointsr/TrueFilm

[Stalker](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalker_(film)

The argument I make for this being my top film choice is a rather economical one...I watch this film once every year and I carry it (the spirit, feeling) with me for months after each view. Each time I watch it, I appreciate something new or re-appreciate it all over again.

The film was shot 3 different times, with differing crews (using over 5,000 meter of film), with almost identical results...this points to a vision that was unrelenting. The fact that the core of the movie is ambiguous, creates a mystery that is compelling and grows upon repeat viewing.

One of the other reasons I really like Stalker, is from the wealth of apocrypha and literature dealing with the movie and production. The documentary "Rerberg i Tarkovsky. Obratnaya storona Stalkera", the definitive 'Tarkovsky on Tarkovsky' "Sculpting in Time", the beautiful "The Films of Andrei Tarkovsky: A Visual Fugue", the scholarly tome "Andrei Tarkovskys Poetics of Cinema", and the upcoming work "Zona: A Book About a Film About a Journey to a Room" by Geoff Dyer.

u/IFeelOstrichSized · 10 pointsr/TrueFilm

Okay, The Power of Film is a very well known book on film in general, its history and importance.

Film Art: An Introduction is another very popular book on film in general, focusing on techniques, criticism, and a little bit of history.

The Oxford Guide to Film Studies seems to be a good introduction to film analysis and study.

Movies and Methods seems to be a frequently recommended book on film criticism. Film Theory and Criticism: Introductory Readings seems to be more complex(with an apparently deceptive title), but very popular as well.

The Oxford History of World Cinema is a really great basic book on film history.

I have not read all these books, but I have pdf copies of several and am planning on buying some of these so, please, someone comment if you think one of my recommendations was bad or if you have a better suggestion with a similar subject.

*I added titles.

u/soldierofcinema · 24 pointsr/TrueFilm

Cinematography: Theory and Practice is great textbook.

Lots of people here are probably gonna recommend you Youtube video essays, but I'd recommend not wasting much time with them. They mostly bullshit and/or extremely superficial. Instead of those just watch great classic films.

And of course it's always great if you can shoot your own stuff and apply that theory to practice.

u/MarkerBear · 2 pointsr/TrueFilm

A note on Waking Sleeping Beauty- as a student of animation, I've seen the documentary many times and read a few histories on the subject.

My complaint, if it can be called that, is that I actually don't completely agree with the 'arc' of the documentary (casting Don Bluth and Katzenberg and Eisner and Peter Schneider as the 'villains', portraying the animators as the unfortunate victims of company culture).

I know that some documentaries are histories and some are opinions and some are Michael Moore, but I just got the feeling that Waking Sleeping Beauty calls itself a history documentary, but it is made from the automatically subjective views of the people in it.

That being said, I'm always very very impressed with the quality of the archival footage.

For a separate writing on the subject, The Pixar Touch includes Eisner's Disney and the Bluth and Katzenberg split within its Pixar history.

u/PintsOfCoffee · 5 pointsr/TrueFilm

[Film Art: An Introduction by Bordwell & Thompson](Film Art: An Introduction https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0073386162/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_gicvCbCT23HZ2). A really useful book that goes into a ton of detail about the language, technique and styles of cinematography.

Some of the newer editions are pretty pricey because it's a go-to for most film students, but you can pick up used copies for a fair price. I've got the 9th edition and it does the job just fine!

u/monday_thru_thursday · 4 pointsr/TrueFilm

Sidney Lumet's book, Making Movies, covers most of the spectrum and is simply a great read.

As for other books, they are generally more technical. For screenwriting, there's McKee's Story; for editing, there's Reisz and Millar's Technique of Film Editing; for cinematography, there's Blain Brown's Cinematography Theory and Practice. And Lumet's book would complete this tetralogy, being a book essentially about directing.

u/SandyRegolith · 3 pointsr/TrueFilm

I'm honestly wondering whether I saw in in video or read it in Difficult Men. If it was video maybe it was his post-season-5 talk at a university somewhere … I'll try and find it.

EDIT: /u/kugfersez linked to a video here

u/MiloBender · 2 pointsr/TrueFilm

A bit, just chasing google trails. I've been trying to find Zizek's analysis but most of the longer videos are in other languages without subtitles. I found an article looking at Jungian "persona" in the film. And then this book: http://www.amazon.com/Cinema-Philosophy-Bergman-On-Film/dp/0199655146

But that book seems to specifically deal with Bergman's relationship with a specific philosopher (Eino Kaila) who, as someone mentioned below, hasn't been translated into English.

u/GinsbergsPeacock · 1 pointr/TrueFilm

The film was adapted from a short story whose central conceit was the introduction of nonlinear time perception (via loose extrapolation of Sapir-Whorf linguistics and Lagrangian physics) to humanity by aliens. The short story would not have been written without that conceit. The film would not have been adapted without that conceit. You are trying to argue against the very reason the film exists.

I also suspect you really didn't understand the the film's message, otherwise you wouldn't be so quick to discard it. I might add that the alternatives you proposed make for a pretty uninspired, conventional plot. The point of the film is not to be awestruck and confused of the alien unknown, but to discover that you can empathize and communicate with it.

Also, your writing style is spastic, impressionistic, and kind of angry. So I'm really struggling to find any reasons to respect your opinion. Go meditate or something. Read a book. Make some pasta. Maybe take up painting. This movie would rather you improve your outlook than try to change what is already determined.

u/USOutpost31 · 1 pointr/TrueFilm

https://www.amazon.com/Days-Rage-Underground-Forgotten-Revolutionary/dp/0143107976

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wall_Street_bombing

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Class_conflict

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch01.htm

Leftists consider all social interaction as violent class and identity struggle. They have undertaken centuries of violent terrorism to back up their theory.

Usually, they kill the working-class, and successful peasants. Wall Street being a fine example.