Citizen Kane

While watching Citizen Kane, I have noticed how the acting in this movie is much better than All Quiet on the Western Front as the characters react to each other's lines and cut off one another at the perfect timing. The whole news reel at the beginning of the film adds mystery and suspense to the film as it foreshadows the future events in the film. The suspense for finding out what rosebud is keeps me interested in the movie and looking for possible clues in every scene. The main themes of materialism and theme are starting to show in the movie as Kane starts to lose both his wealth and power after the scandal with the "singer". I look forward to more suspenseful scenes in the movie.

Germans in All Quiet on the Western Front

The director's choice of filming this movie with Germans instead of Americans during WW! and WW2 is very interesting, since the majority of the audience who saw this film were Americans who were prejudiced against Germans. Even though it seems that an American audience wouldn't sympathize with German soldiers and their problems, in this movie any viewer of any nationality will not be able to not feel pity and sorrow for the hardships of these soldiers. I think the director used German soldiers on purpose to demonstrate that in the end, we're all humans with the same emotions and dreams. In one scene, the German soldiers were sitting around trying to understand who wanted this war, showing that they didn't want this war anymore than the Americans. This film uses ultra humanization to show how close the soldiers got with each other through the experience of war, which erases some of the hatred towards Germans and makes the viewers understand both sides of the story.

New Concepts of Film Class

Thanks to this class, i'm learning new things that allow me to analyze films and understand the director's message better. For example, I've noticed how the position of the camera portrays the mood the director is trying to portray. Also, there are little hints left throughout the movie that foreshadow what will happen next, like Kemmerich's boots capturing more interest from the soldiers than Kemmerich himself and how now that he's dead, all they care about is the boots.