In-Class, April 7: Movie Critique (Unit 3 Paper)

In-Class work for Monday, April 7th:

Today, we’ll put off our surveys, because we are waiting for our results to come in on Wednesday (and I have to proofread your research essay components in the meantime).

Therefore, we are beginning with our short unit 3, which will deal with a movie of your choice that contains a SOCIAL MESSAGE.

Your TASK will be to write an argument to convince: You are creating a movie critique, and you have to either convince your audience to see this wonderful movie, or not to watch it, because it is not worth while.

You will be allowed to use powerful language that appeals to the corresponding audience (e.g., teenagers), but it should be publishable in a movie magazine.

In your critique, you have to analyze the arguments the movie director has made – with what kind of scenes did he/she evoke feelings (pathos) in his audience, what were his/her tricks to create funny/shocking/sad scenes, how did he/she manipulate the audience (for example, to believe something wrong, e.g. in a thriller where everybody thinks the murderer was somebody else). Did the filmmaker make forensic arguments, such as mentioning a past historical event? You need to state how well the filmmaker developed his arguments, and how effective the movie overall was.

Thus, your task is to say HOW the filmmaker created his effects, not WHAT he did (focus on the efficiency of his arguments/art, not on the mere content on the film!). So far, we’ve analyzed RHETORIC, but a film contains much more than just words (images, light effects, sound effects, color effects (just think of the pink dress of the little Jewish girl in Schindler’s List, a black-and-white movie), flashbacks, dream scenes, surrealism, time travels, etc. etc.) All these are "arguments."

To finally evaluate the movie, you have to invent your own rating scale! You can paste icons in your paper for that. Look at the three links below to see other movie critiques.... you can assign “rotten tomatoes,” for example, or stars, or a dice (six points are very good, one point is bad), or anything interesting you can come up with. At the beginning or the end of your critique you have to mention how many points out of the highest possible number your film would get; and of course, you have to state why.

Today, we’ll begin with the preliminary steps:

1.
Look at the sample links for movie critiques (you can also google other examples):

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/

http://www.filmcritic.com/

http://www.metacritic.com/

2.
Make up your mind which movie you want to talk about. It can be any topic that has a SOCIAL MESSAGE (body image, terrorism, war, racism, gender issues, gang life, ...). When you've selected your movie, publish a very short comment on THIS blog in which you say which movie you've selected, and whether you're going to write a pro or a con critique about it.
3.
Write a short summary about this movie, so that a person who has not seen it yet will know what it deals with. The summary should be FREE of any personal evaluation; JUST FACTS! (argument to inform) The summary should not be longer than 200 words.

4.
Search the Internet for critiques of your selected movie. Find out what other people have said about it. Then, make up your mind whether you want to write a positive or a negative critique about your movie.

• If you write a POSITIVE critique, select three NEGATIVE critiques by other credible sources (published newspaper/magazine criticism). If you cite from personal blogs, you need to find the corresponding MLA quotations in A Writer’s Resource.). CITE from those three sources, using correct MLA style for online quotations, and write why you contradict those statements.

• If you write a NEGATIVE critique, select three POSITIVE critiques by other credible sources ((published newspaper/magazine criticism). If you cite from personal blogs, you need to find the corresponding MLA quotations in A Writer’s Resource.). CITE from those three sources, using correct MLA style for online quotations, and write why you contradict those statements.

5.
Invent your rating scale, and rate your movie accordingly.



Overview:

Components of Unit Essay 3:

1. Title (should be a title that could appear in a movie magazine)
2. Paste a picture of a scene in your movie (found on the Internet) as attention catcher
3. Short summary in your own words (about 200 words) of a movie with a social message (neutral; no personal evaluation yet)
4. Three statement of the opposite opinion, with correct in-text MLA citations
5. Your contradiction of these three statements
6. Your analysis of why the film was effective/ineffective
7. Application of your rating scale (you can insert icons)
8. Short conclusion with recommendation
9. Works Cited page with correct MLA citations of your three opposite opinions (can be blogs, online movie magazines, or printed movie magazines)

Requirements: 2-3 pages, 12 font, double-spaced. The critique must be CONVINCING!!! Use the right language that would appeal to your reader (google sample critiques). Your language can be modern, and include colloquialisms, but should still have some standard so it could be published in a movie magazine.