151MM March 2017 (One Year Edition) by 151MM

What’s Inside

Preview: March 2017 Section One: Pierrot le Fou

Section Three: 2001: A Space Odyssey

The Elephant in the Room

by Leah Bakoulis

The Subtelty of the Camera in East of Eden by Emily Erlichson

The One Year Anniversary Edition

Children of the Crossfire

by Trevor Weng

10 A Giant in Storytelling by Everett Shen

Section Two: The Dance of Reality

Shin Godzilla: A God Incarnate, a Franchise Saved By Miles Bardzilowski

A Sketch of a Film: Wandering Thoughts by Leslie Liu

The Mother of the Country by Fredrika Pfeiifer

Section Four: Man with a Movie Camera

24 Breaking the Wall with Ryan Ozminkowski: Co-Founder and Executive Producer of Princeton Tonight by Everett Shen

Section Five: Inside Llewlyn Davis

30 An Apology Owed for Existence: Memories of Matsuko by Sarah Hou

31 “It’s Not Your Fault” by Leah Bakoulis

Passengers: The Year’s Best Sci-fi Thriller That Never Was by Francis Moon

Cover design by Everett Shen | All graphics by Nicole Ng | Section intro paragraphs by Trevor Weng Quality check by Theodore Tenzlinger

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This is the One Year Anniversary Issue. You’ve just picked up your monthly dose of enrichment. Go ahead. Feel its smooth texture. Smell the glossy paper. Read it. Experience it. Discuss it. The One Year Anniversary Issue is meant to be savored slowly. Give it a quick glance when you pick up a copy in the hallway. But once you’re home, choose your favorite couch and sit down. Weigh the magazine in your hands. Then lose yourself in its pages. When you’re done, share it with your friends. Your grandma. Your teacher. Your next-door neighbor. Because if there’s one thing that everyone needs to start having a conversation about right now, it’s the importance of art. It’s been an exhilarating year. We’re extremely grateful for those who’ve supported us through it, and invite you to join us in the unfolding of another.

The Staff* Editor-in-Chief: Everett Shen Managing Editors: Theodore Tenzlinger, Sarah Hou Graphics Editor: Nicole Ng Copy Editors: Matthew Dodds, Brian Lu Business Managers: Alan Wo, Daniel Shahab-Diaz Website Manager: Robert Zhang Website Staff: Charles Lu, Connie Xu, Anya Sachdev, Andrew Xie Social Media Managers: Francis Moon, Miles Bardzilowski

We hope you like the new look. Happy exploring!

Writing Staff: Trevor Weng, Charles Lu, Alan Wo, Miles Bardzilowski, Francis Moon, Thomas Martin, Emily Erlichson, Leah Bakoulis, Brian Hwang, Emily Wang

Sincerely, 151MM

Contributing Writers: Leslie Liu, Fredrika Pfeiffer Advisor: John Sullivan

“Movie”

“Studies”

“Beautiful” “Amazing”

Film

“Camera” “Psycho”

“Emotion” “Wine”

“Rolling”

“No more pain”

With the One Year Anniversary Issue, we set out to answer one question: What is film? Based on student, teacher, and filmmaker responses to questions and a word association task, we were able to get a sense of the different ways movies matter, represented by the five sections of this issue. While reading, check out the accompanying interview cuts on our website, 151mmphs.com. *Article suggestions? Inquiring about a position? Email us at 151mmprinceton@gmail.com. Design classes every Thursday in Room 132.

1. Pierrot le Fou

“I’m thinking about my mom a lot, because she’s shown me a lot of good movies. She showed me, for example, the movie Heathers, and was like “I was obsessed with this movie in high school.” So I was a little younger than high school age when I watched it for the first time, but I was like “oh my gosh I totally understand why”, so we’ve kind of realized our similarities through movies.” —Sylvie Tudur, Class of 2019

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“Looking at myself, I see a man who is driving towards a cliff at 100 km/h.” “I am the woman who is in love with the man who is driving towards a cliff at 100 km/h.”

In his seven years of romance with Anna Karina, Jean-Luc Godard’s every film seemed to be unavoidably about love. Karina’s character in this film complains about how sorry she feels that life can't be like a novel. So Godard prepares the wildest, most unconventional script for her—there are only a select few people who can live their lives like characters in a novel! Do we admire them? Would everyone like to live their life like a character in a novel, with the only variances existing in the plot? If so, then there’s no excuse for failing to appreciate life, human relationships, and conversation, because we are all alike in this respect—characters in the novel that is our world.

W SECTION 1: Pierrot le Fou

Giant (1956) East of Eden (1955) Rebel Without a Cause (1955)

Icon: A Triple Study of James Dean

“To grasp the full significance of life is the actor’s duty; to interpret it his problem; and to express it his dedication. Being an actor is the loneliest thing in the world. You are all alone with your concentration and imagination, and that’s all you have. Being a good actor isn’t easy. Being a man is even harder. I want to be both before I’m done.”

1931 James Byron Dean born in Marion, IN

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—James Dean

1940 Mother Mildred dies of cancer, Dean goes to live with his aunt and uncle in Fairmount, IN

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The Elephant in the Room Rebel without a cause - is he, really? What leads to this devastation of youth, who creates it, and is it avoidable? For fear of sounding a little cliche, let’s say - society. The postWWII golden age came down hard on James Dean’s generation. The U.S. was a winner that basked in its patriotism, ushering materialist abundance into the hearts of its middle class. Just as Jim’s father says in the film, “What do you want?” implying, “”What more do you want?” Yes - Jim has his own car, house and material comforts. What his parents want from him is only to continue going downon the glorious road of consumerist capitalism. Jim is here a miniature model of the Baby Boomer generation. But even so, a cause is born. When it comes to the young, parents seem to choose to neglect what we really are and need in our present, only thinking about our future and their own. But we are the ones who dream and the ones who fear. We fear becoming like them, the ones who so often forget the ongoing ills of society, e.g. terrorism, racism,

and corruption in the nation they are so patriotic about. We want to be something other, newer and better. Bottom line is, we want individualism because it is the nature of youth. We want to make our own mark that none of our parents or those of the 50’s America could ever give us. Essentially in these two films, Rebel Without A Cause and Elephant (2003), teenagers are looking for something that can shape them as human beings. Then they fight against social conformity. The other, darker side of this coin could be devastating, however. The young, especially teenagers, also tend to stay in their peer groups, giving free reign to the group to drown out their individuality. Deciding to stand against this force of conformity can be dangerous. Buzz and Jim in Rebel try to use cuff racing to show off their individualism, and Buzz loses his life as a result. It’s tacitly understood that one’s own aggression easily results in being hated. To stand truly apart from the group, you have to pay the price of being an idol or a clown, and we all know the stresses of either choice. Then we keep ourselves in small groups to feel better, while we walk down endless school hallways, reflecting the feeling of being trapped. What is the “cause” of the rebellion then? We are. Both Nicolas Ray and Gus Van Sant depict the perennial conflict between youth and society. The young can resemble a dog chasing after a car blindly and then, some-

1950 Leaves for California, begins freshman year of college at Santa Monica City College, lands role as Malcolm in UCLA production of Macbeth

1952 Secures first leading role on Broadway in See the Jaguar

By Trevor Weng It’s April 20, 1999, a sunny school day. Two kids walk into a high school dressed in trench coats, cargo pants, and bandanas. Eric is 18, Dylan, is 17. At 11:19 a.m., they open the bag and pull out guns shooting their first bullets in the library. By 11:35 a.m., Klebold and Harris have killed 12 students and a teacher and wounded more than 20 others. Shortly after noon, the two teens turn their guns on themselves. On the other hand, Pluto gets shot by a policeman outside the Astronomy Museum for being suspected of attacking the police. Jim (James Dean) raises his hand, showing the gun clip he had taken from Pluto, so as it turns out, Pluto had nothing but an unloaded gun on him... One day and night in a planetarium and one warm spring day in Denver set up the stage for these two Classical Greek-style tragedies. It is as if the wall that occasionally separates space and time in these two films has been torn down: Eric and Dylan’s bullets fly across time bringing death to Pluto.

1947 Dean begins to star in High School play productions, starting with John Mugford in Mooncalf Medford

SECTION 1: Pierrot le Fou times, drawing a blank when he arrives at his “goal”. Violence against society is only an illusion of a “way out” - a means to an end that always turns out to be of little or no worth. The 50’s have ended, and we are far even from the 90’s, but which one of us hasn’t felt the pull of roaming the streets of New York City that held Holden Caulfield in its grip? We all have. Because the elephant is always in the room and its identity is the imminent loss of youth.

“James Dean kept himself in a small circle; he did not care how people saw or treated him. We could even say that he did not realize the existence of the outside world…Since the day his mother passed away, he became alone, anti-sociable, and afraid of getting hurt. Eventually he backed himself down into his small world…He kept a gun with him when he first got to Hollywood for the filming of East of Eden. He didn’t talk to anyone and constantly stayed in the small dressing room. Fast forward to the last film in his career, Giant, where he would silently drive his Jeep to chase a hare in the grass during the filming process. The vanity fair of Hollywood seemed far from Dean, it seemed like there was never a place that he felt he belonged to, and none could keep a long-term close relationship with him…”

The Subtelty of the Camera in East of Eden By Emily Erlichson East of Eden, directed by Elia Kazan, follows a young man named Cal (James Dean) immediately prior to and during the early part of World War I. Cal has a father, Adam, a brother, Aron, and a long-estranged

mother. The messages in the film, named for a Bible verse regarding the fate of Cain, are many and dense, but particularly fascinating is the storytelling surrounding Cal and his relationship with his father because

it showcases the ability of the camera to emphasize critical points of the narrative. The first scene in which Cal has a tense conversation with his father (Raymond Massey), they are seated at opposite ends of a long table, the distance between them exaggerated by the framing. They seldom appear in the shot at the same time. They are pushed to the edges of the frame, creating as much of a void between them as is possible in the space. Moreover, during tight shots the actors are filmed at an angle: off-kilter. In every way, they are isolated, far apart, and unbalanced. The only time in the scene when they appear in frame together, it’s from a severe angle that continues to emphasize the length of the table between them, and only when Cal’s father is satisfactorily answering his son’s questions about his mother. Once he stops, they are separated once more. Dean and Massey certainly acknowledge the strain and tension

1954 Purchases first sports car after signing contract with Warner Brothers for role of Cal Trask in East of Eden

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151MM MARCH 2017 between the two men. However, aside from some obvious belligerence, the conversation is subdued, like much of this film. It is because the camera has an active role in the storytelling that their hostility is so deeply felt. What could otherwise appear a passing conflict emerges as a consistent and perpetual problem in their relationship. Further along in the film comes a scene in which Cal attempts to present his father with a gift in the form of money, which he made from a business that was profitable due to the war. His father will not take it, being morally outraged at how it was made and at the implication that affection can be bought. Cal, however, sees the money as honestly earned and as a gesture that, despite their differences, he wants to be on good terms with his father. At the start of the scene, Cal is hopeful and his father is unaware. It progresses quite normally, with no severe banking or unconventional framing. However, as their fight manifests and worsens, the men are framed so that Cal’s father towers over him, then so the scene is sharply angled, and finally so that they are pushed to the very edges of the frame, contorting and stretching the typical. Further, their faces are never visible to the camera simultaneously. They have been disconnected, and Cal is devastated. The facet this scene adds to their relationship, and which could not have been included if not for the directing, is how powerless Cal feels before his father. The way Adam stands over him, constant and

9.30.1955 Killed in highway accident en route to race in Salinas

unwavering while his son struggles to understand what he did so wrong, alienates them further and hammers home Cal’s motivation for his actions: he wants to be a good child. The last scene in this article, and coincidentally the last one in the movie, is of Cal and his father finally reaching some common ground. Adam falls ill after Cal betrays Aron, and is confined to bed. Aron is gone, having enlisted in the army, so Cal is all Adam has left. This scene contrasts sharply with previous interactions between the two of them. It is remarkably still in comparison to the others. The camera is not banked sharply, the characters seldom move, and overall the acting is quiet and restrained. Adam and Cal are framed together, both of their faces visible, neither one of them gesticulating wildly nor speaking above a whisper. Cal, sitting sentry by his father’s bedside, is the last shot of the entire film. That last shot, filmed a slight distance away and from slightly above perfectly resolves the conflict of the film, in that in does not perfectly resolve the conflict in their relationship. It’s still not a “typical” shot, just a touch too far right, away, and above, but a flawless resolution would not be believable for these characters. The camera ends the story by suggesting the start to a new one. Elia Kazan, the director of this movie, was a film and theatre legend, though he lived amidst controversy. When he was awarded an honorary Oscar in 1999, he was called “the master of a new kind of psychologi-

1955 James Dean appears in East of Eden and Rebel Without a Cause, receives nomination for Best Actor for Eden

1956 Giant premieres in New York, Dean receives second nomination for Best Actor

SECTION 1: Pierrot le Fou cal and behavioral truth in acting,” for his work which confronted social and personal issues in a way new to Holly-

wood at the time. It is in films like East of Eden his skill in subtext is effectively realized.

A Giant in Narration By Everett Shen Racially progressive. Best Director winner. James Dean’s last performance before his untimely death. George Stevens’s Giant is notable in one way or another, not least because of its epic scope and legendary team. It was one of the highest-grossing films of 1956, winning both critical and public acclaim. But it’s the impeccable plot and character interactions, which are allowed to take place and develop over the course of three decades, that the modern film industry has the most to learn from. These core functions work so naturally well together; there never arises a need for melodrama or contrived plot devices. Despite carrying strong messages about segregation, gender roles, and stagnating cultures, at its heart, Giant is about the ways people around us may change us, if we only let them. The plot follows Bick Benedict (Rock Hudson), the proud only-son of a wealthy Texas rancher dynasty, as he

does everything in his power to ensure that his family tradition is preserved. People come and go throughout his life, and each serves as a wake-up call for him to change his attitude, with or without him realizing it. Fittingly, the story is set around WWII, a turbulent time not only for those in combat abroad but also for individuals at home. But the true beauty of the film’s plot lies in its precise linearity, which is simultaneously powerful and invisible. While Giant possesses the qualities of an epic, every major development is the indirect result of the events of the opening scene and is rooted in the decisions of a single character, starting from when Bick returns from his horse-buying excursion on the East Coast with an unexpected bonus: a bride named Leslie (Elizabeth Taylor). Probably one of the best better-halves in film history, she is everything Bick is not: open-minded, cheery, and self-possessed. Her arrival on the Benedict

1956 Theatrical Poster for Giant

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ranch in Texas sets into motion fundamental changes, some taking place on a physical scale, others registering only in the depths of another’s subconscious. A mere few days after getting back to the ranch comes the death of Luz, Bick’s gruff and dignified older sister who ran the ranch with a keen vigilance and was bucked off a newly bought horse while attempting to tame it (thus asserting her position as head of the household over Leslie, symbolized by the horse). Grieving and left the sole manager of the ranch, Bick adopts the same stubbornness and adherence to tradition prized by his sister. He rarely smiles and masks his insecurities with a shawl of masculinity and nostalgia, setting high expectations for his son, constantly referencing the greatness of his family history, and looking down upon his Mexican neighbors. It’s quickly seen that misgivings about oneself is the mother of discrimination and stubbornness, which ultimately harm the ones we love the most. Leslie remains very proactive in all of this. Time and time again she demonstrates wisdom and independence beyond her years, vowing early on not to be seen as a thin-blooded Easterner and maneuvering her marital hiccups with skill. But most notable is her knack for balancing out her husband’s stubbornness and consoling him in his disappointment. No one knows her husband better than her, and her treatment consists of both feigning remoteness and staying altogether peppy in the face of his mood swings but also of telling him “don’t blame yourself”. She becomes the only one capable of softening Bick and slowly bringing down the barriers against change that surround him. About thirty minutes in, she tells Luz, “I’m a lot stronger than you think I am.” It’s a simple line, but it rings truer than any other throughout the film. Of the rest of the characters, the most important is Jett Rink (Dean’s character), a Charles Foster Kane-esque persona who starts as a sullen ranch

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1955 Theatrical Poster for East of Eden hand under Bick but becomes a multibillionaire after striking oil on a small piece of land given to him in Luz’s will. Not one to work well with authority figures in the first place, his relationship with Bick deteriorates even more given Jett’s interest in Leslie, his influence on Bick’s children, and the looming threat that his oil farms pose to the Benedict farm in terms of both livelihood and relevance. He is the biggest menace to the ego of Bick, who holds a fear of being antiquated while holding on dearly to tradition. His heated, passionate character contrasts sharply with Jett’s cool, simpering one. One of the film’s most memorable shots is that of a shiny red oil truck gliding down the road where the camera pans to Bick and one of his companions sitting on horses, staring in concealed annoyment, and looking downright neanderthalic on their horses in front of the ranch’s rickety old archway. Yet, at the crest of his unrelenting climb to the top, Jett finds that it was not wealth and escape from mundanity that he truly wanted but rather a sense of love and belonging, specifically from Leslie. His perverted ambitions culminate in a drunken rant in front of a non-existent audience and a sobbing crash to the ground. Dean, who took the part to avoid being typecast as a

rebellious teenager, skillfully creates a persona who is very sympathizable despite being an antagonist. He constructs a tacit layer of insecurity and longing which makes for a truly tragic ruination. As he witnesses Jett’s downfall, Bick relieves their feud and realizes the fallacy of the blind and vehement pursuit of his goals, which makes life difficult for everyone, including himself. Having gone through a very distinguishable five stages of grief over the course of thirty years, he accepts the choice of his children to pursue different occupations and begins standing up for Mexicans rather than shunning them. Throughout the film, it is small moments of tenderness that redeem him (especially those provoked by Leslie), but his final actions make him a truly memorable character. The deaths he witnesses throughout the life, particularly that of a young soldier of Mexican descent, give him a new appreciation for the brevity of life and therefore the criminality of trying to impose restraints on it. Both men are renowned leaders of their field, but only Bick has the wisdom to realize the greater importance of other things in life before it’s too late. By the film’s end, we see that what makes a man truly great is his open-

ness to change and satisfaction with what he has. Despite carrying such heavy themes, the film manages to stay light-hearted throughout, rarely gets bogged down in its own mopiness, and comes beautifully full-circle. In that regard, much of the credit must also be reserved for Edna Ferber, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of the film’s source material, who turned down multiple adaptation requests until Stevens promised to leave the original untouched — rightfully so, as we now see. In the end, the privileged, established Texan still gets the girl and the good life, and the poor ranch boy ruins himself, but we can be made to forget, or even ignore, such things with a skilled storyteller’s touch. Gone With the Wind (1939) wasn’t exactly a landmark in egalitarianism either, but I’ll be damned if Scarlett O’Hara isn’t as holy a figure in America as the Pope himself.

Everything that you will become, you already are. What you search for is already within you. Embrace your sufferings, for through them you will reach me. At the end of time, all that matters returns to its origins. You and I will have been just memories. Nothing may be real; in fact, something may be dreaming us up. Embrace the illusion that lies beyond reality. And live!

Shin Godzilla:

A God Incarnate, a Franchise Saved By Miles Bardzilowski In this age of cinema where it seems every movie that comes out is a reboot, a sequel, an adaptation, or knockoff, it’s unlikely that you’ll see a film with genuine originality and

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creativity creativitybehind behindit,it,especially especiallywhen when that thatfilm filmis isa reboot a rebootofofone oneofofthe the longest-running longest-runningand andmost mostinfluential influential franchises franchisesininthe thehistory historyofofthe themedium medium like likeShin ShinGodzilla. Godzilla.Directed DirectedbybyHideaki Hideaki

Anno (of Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995) and its sequels), this film reinvigorates the Japanese sci-fi franchise that began in 1954 with the original Gojira, which has since spawned 29 more entries — not counting the ones where Godzilla doesn’t show up, like Rebirth of Mothra or Godzilla (1998) — across various continuities and levels of quality. Following in the colossal footsteps of 2014’s Godzilla, Toho, the studio behind the original Japanese films, has created a reboot

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2. The Dance of Reality “I watch movies because, well it’s cliche, but they take me away from normality.” —Thomas Martin, Class of 2017

“Movies are cooler than real life. You don’t see a giant robot fight in real life—yet.” —Miles Bardzilowksi, Class of 2017

of their own. This isn’t the first time they’ve rebooted the franchise; they did it in ‘84 and ‘99, and that’s not mentioning that each film from 1999-2004 was kind of a reboot as well. Unlike all of those movies, however, this one isn’t a sequel to the original 1954 film. The premise is the same: giant monster shows up in Tokyo, now we’ve gotta deal with it. While the original Gojira is hailed as a masterpiece — as long as you don’t watch the American cut — could

Shin Godzilla possibly stand up to the original? Short answer: Yes. Yes it can. I’ll start with what you psychopaths came here to see: the destruction. Godzilla puts an end to more than his fair share of human existence, and all of it is spectacular. The special effects, while not quite as impressive as Hollywood’s budget can allow, blow the previous 28 Japanese films out of the water. Without wishing to mention specifics, Godzilla’s rampage is more awe-inspir-

ing than ever before, as this film makes you feel just how powerful the King of the Monsters can be. While it may start off looking like it’s just another cheesy kaiju flick, some of the scenes toward the end are legitimately terrifying. This isn’t a dude in a rubber suit stumbling over cardboard buildings, this is the might of the gods themselves put to film. Shin Godzilla’s titular monster may be the most inventive design of

SECTION 2: Dance of Reality the iconic creature in its six-decade lifespan. Godzilla has been interpreted many ways, from the disgusting, mutated, cancerous mass of the original to the almost catlike, combat-oriented design of the ‘90s to that one time where he was the resurrected vengeful spirits of the victims of Pearl Harbor. ShinGoji takes his inspirations mainly from ShodaiGoji (aka the original ‘54 suit), being a horrific walking tumor like its predecessor. ShinGoji, however, takes that notion to the next level... and then a few levels further just to be safe. The CGI used on his body really helps bring out the feeling that this is a creature that shouldn’t exist, shouldn’t be allowed to exist, but is forcing itself to anyway. Its behavior is unique among Godzillas as well. Not acting as a hero (like Terror of Mechagodzilla (1975)), villain (Mothra vs Godzilla (1964)) or morally ambivalent force of nature (Gojira), ShinGoji seems to be the first Godzilla to be acting out of a desire for supremacy over humanity. To achieve that end, ShinGoji evolves itself to overcome obstacles. ShinGoji almost seems more like a Godzilla-inspired adaptation of the angel Iruel from Evangelion than it does Godzilla, yet it remains faithful enough to the spirit of Godzilla to not come across as something new and worse, spitting in the face of a time-honored classic, like what that 1998 movie did. Outside of the action, the filmmaking is all top-notch. The cinema-

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tography never ceases to impress, even when Godzilla isn’t doing anything onscreen. Obviously, the most astounding shots are the ones that make Goji feel like the massive beast he is: for instance, a perspective shot from the point of view of a car driving by his feet. Much of this film doesn’t even feature Godzilla, just conversations between people trying to figure out how to stop him, but it can jump from 0-100 within a few frames. It all feels very Anno, effectively building tension even when Godzilla is nowhere to be found. The score is composed by Evangelion’s Shiro Sagisu, and much like Eva, the music is masterfully written and I will be buying the soundtrack. In fact, the score takes several songs directly from

Eva. Specifically, the song "Decisive Battle" is performed in several different compositions. Several songs from previous Toho movies also make wonderful returns, such as themes from Godzilla vs King Kong (1962), Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster (1964) and Battle in Outer Space (1959). The best song on the OST, however, has to be "Persecution of the Masses". A haunting choir sings over an ominous melody, an omen of the tragedy to come. Seriously, go find it on YouTube or something. ‘S good. Perhaps this movie’s greatest strength is to be found in its writing. The entire film is focused on one thing: Godzilla. He shows up within a minute of the film’s opening credits and his influence is felt in every frame that follows. Its sharp focus pairs nicely with its fast pace, which starts quick and never lets up, not unlike last year’s Mad Max: Fury Road (2015). The characters, of which there are many, all manage to be engaging, and even have a fair share of moments of humor in spite of the situation. If I have one complaint about the characters, it’s that the American ambassador to Japan was clearly not American, though she was still likeable and gave a good English performance. The subtitle work is excellent, and even manages to capture the comedic timing of the dialogue. Anno clearly derived some inspiration from some of the better early episodes of Neon Genesis Evangelion, namely episodes 6, 7, and 9. From 6 he carried the mounting action,

151MM MARCH 2017 planning, and that thing he does where every new piece of military hardware gets a subtitle introducing it to us; from 7, poking fun at Japan’s military system failing in times of crisis; and from 9, the pace and feeling of impending doom looming over those trying to prepare. The film is more about people trying to figure out the best solution to Godzilla while working around red tape than it is about a monster breaking things we’d rather be left unbroken thank you very much, but it never lets you forget what you came here to see. Working not only as a giant monster movie but also as a satire of postwar Japanese politics, the film builds its political undertones while never being so heavy-handed that it can’t throw some exploding trains at a

giant laser lizard. Shin Godzilla is an astounding opus from one of Japan’s greatest directors. A brilliant reinvention of one of the greatest movie monsters of all time, Shin Godzilla is the reboot everybody should learn from. In stark contrast to films like The Killing Joke (2016) or Godzilla ‘98, Shin Godzilla understands and builds upon the original source material, creating a separate entity that’s breathtaking in its own right. Now if only Funimation would hurry up and drop that Blu-Ray so you could watch it while you’re still in school.

A Sketch of a Film: Wandering Thoughts By Leslie Liu There’s something about slow, quieter films that I appreciate. Perhaps it’s the natural flow of the narrative, the attention to detail, that makes them pleasant to watch. Giuseppe Tornatore’s The Legend of 1900 (1998) knits together a whimsical story that’s two parts enchanting and three parts thoughtful. The film is a bit of a fairytale: it chronicles the life of Nineteen Hundred, a pianist anchored to the ship he was born on. Told in media res, The Legend of 1900 plays with the idea of artistic expression and seeks to define the meaning of art. Much like its leitmotif that conjures up a scene of starry Van Gogh skies, traces of The Legend of 1900 also appear in life. I found the enigma surrounding Nineteen Hundred interesting; having lived his life on the Virginian, travel must surely hold a different meaning for him. Having seen crowds of people swarm to new places allows Nineteen Hundred to “read people”: he’s able to write them in music. It’s not just a live performance, a piece done impromptu; rather, it is something greater: an understanding of the universal language and a revealing of the universal soul. And so this film is more of an inward reflection than it is an outward expression. It resembles the sea as well as life, which as an accordionist remarks, is immense. It contains the gentle horror of the waves. Its dangerous beauty demands raw emotion. It is gentle and surreptitious, just like this film—it creeps up on you and it tugs on your heartstrings and plays wild violin until the end has come—and when the closing credits appear, it all feels like a dream.

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Passengers: The Year’s Best Sci-Fi-Thriller That Never Was By Francis Moon Passengers was expected to take Gravity (2013) and make it into something Hollywood has never seen before. Thus, I walked into the theater with pretty high expectations. Starring Jennifer Lawrence and Chris Pratt as two of 5,000 passengers on an intergalactic voyage to an extraterrestrial colony, it seems the director couldn’t decide whether the film should be romance, science fiction, or adventure, which makes sections of the movie drastically different. We’re on the Avalon — whose aesthetically pleasing, double-helix design, by the way, is probably one of the best features of this movie — a spaceship carrying people to a colony called Homestead II in a new galaxy. The starship’s passengers are meant to be in a type of hibernation for 120 years before waking up as they reach their destination. However, Jim Preston, an engineer played by Pratt, and Aurora Lane, an adventurous author and journalist played by Lawrence, are awoken early— but only one by accident. The first part of the film fo-

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cuses on a solitary Jim, stranded on the ship for around a year — although he does get to talk to a robot named Arthur played by Michael Sheen. Several scenes in this sequence drew noticeable chuckles from the audience I was watching with, brought out through Jim’s character and actions, and the movie seemed to be off to a strong start. After a significant amount of time all alone and many fruitless attempts to find a way go back into hibernation, Jim debates with himself — and Arthur — as to whether or not to arouse Aurora, who he had been rather creepily watching for a while, from her hibernation. Of course, he eventually does, and a shot of guilt hits him immediately. For a while, Jim keeps the fact that he woke up Aurora secret, and the two begin to fall in love. Throughout this sequence, Pratt and Lawrence show their chemistry and pure acting prowess. On the other hand, there are a few too many romantic sequences in a very short period of time to the point that the film becomes repetitive and seems to veer slightly off topic. However, Aurora eventually finds out and is understandably enraged, accusing Jim of murder. Shortly afterwards the ship’s tendency to suffer small malfunctions violently exacerbates. Consequently, the action involved in scenes escalates extremely quickly, involving a few life-or-death situations and a randomly introduced character played by Laurence Fishburne, a captain of the ship

named Gus Manusco who is also mysteriously awoken and presumably added to somehow amend the tensions between the two main characters. Without giving any spoilers, I can say that nothing that happened was especially surprising or unexpected, although its final sequences did make up for the lack of “drama” in the first few parts of the movie. Morten Tyldum (The Imitation Game (2014)) kicks off the film as a high-powered sci-fi with loads of promise, but fails to really deliver after that. Chris Pratt and Jennifer Lawrence show why they are two of the hottest stars in Hollywood despite a weak script. The best components of Passengers are the futuristic design of the ship’s interior and exterior and the casting of Pratt and Lawrence, who display good chemistry. As well as the setting that was supposed to make the film a one-of-a-kind blockbuster. Unfortunately, the film fails to truly reach the potential that its storyline had. It has several plot holes and unclear aspects, such as the vague background of Jim Preston, although Lawrence’s character’s past is explored with lots of detail. Nonetheless, Passengers definitely has its moments, as at times, we can’t help but sympathize and feel as if we're right there on the Avalon with Jim and Aurora. I recommend taking a chance with this film if you’re a fan of Pratt and/ or Lawrence, science fiction, or simply want to see a decent film.

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“Film, for me, is a way to not only see the world, but to see how others see the world, because it really opens your view, in terms of how others cultures see the world, if you watch international films, or how different people and different positions see the world. And through film, you can express your views. And you can, I think, change how people view things through film, and that’s why I like it.” —Vivian Loomis, Class of 2019

The bone hits the ground, then gets thrown into the air, transforming itself into the form of a spaceship. Evolution is the key to a whole new experience, a whole new world. 2001 comes in the shape of a black obelisk, splitting up and opening a door to the future to reveal an endless path that glitters with bizarre beams, while “Also Sprach Zarathustra” teases the human ear. We may be the lions of destruction as in Nietzsche’s metaphor, but we will be changed—by ourselves—into babies gazing at the world with curiosity, wanting to embrace the uncertainty, to create our own fate which is the end of this movie.

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3 2001: A Sp se

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3. pace Odysey

“It may be that our role on this planet is not to worship God - but to create him.” —Arthur C. Clarke

3. 2001: A Space Odyssey

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Children of the Crossfire By Leah Bakoulis While gruesome images of soldiers lying on sandy beaches with blood covering their faces and dirt cemented into their hair is effective in showing the cruel and gory reality that soldiers face on the battlefield, the horrors of war are best displayed through the eyes of children. Both Au revoir les enfants (1987) and Empire of the Sun (1987) use young teenage boys to show different perspectives on world events during World War II in France and China, respectively. Despite the fact that both movies have little to no violence, they are both highly effective in capturing the terrible effects war has on humans. Centered around the quickly-formed friendship between two boys at a French boarding school in 1943, the autobiographical film Au revoir les enfants, written and directed by Louis Malle, slowly and strategically reveals references to one of its main characters’ Jewish faith and the motives of the Nazis in order to show the viewer the negative consequences of war. It’s only because of the historical lense the viewer has that we can infer that the film is headed for a sad ending, otherwise it appears to be a movie simply about friendship. The film is truly tragic, not only because the Nazis end up catching up to one of the Jewish protagonists in the end, but because the majority of the conversations are centered around lighter topics such as the boys’ complaints about schoolwork, teasing of their professors, and sharing about their families, in order to show that if it weren’t for the war, the boys most likely would have remained friends for the rest of their lives. Steven Spielberg’s Empire of the Sun uses the story of Jim Graham in an internment camp after being separated from his parents during the Japanese invasion of Shanghai in 1941 to show how war changes the definition of day-to-day life. In a world where people fight to get enough moldy soup and soldiers burn down prisoner’s

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151MM MARCH 2017 houses when they lose a battle, Jim is still able to maintain some aspects of his privileged life, just in a different way. For example, toward the end of the movie when Jim is dehydrated, starved, and exhausted, he sees a glowing ball of light in the distance sky and assumes it’s a supernatural occurrence, when in reality, it’s the atomic bomb that killed tens of thousands of people and changed the course of history. Likewise, while his camp is being bombed and most people are rushing to find shelter, Jim’s first thought is to run to the top of the hospital to admire the planes which he calls “the Cadillac of the skies.” After a few minutes of running around and yelling with enthusiasm, it’s only when a doctor grabs a hold of Jim and reminds him of his situation that Jim loses his happiness, telling the doctor, “I can’t remember what my parents look like,” and begins to cry. During one of the film’s most emotional scenes, when he is

reunited with his parents, Jim runs his fingers over his mother’s lips and cheeks before allowing her to hug him, meaning that something as simple and familiar as his mother’s face had truly become almost foreign to him. The Second World War takes away the chance of longlasting friendship for two boys in Au revoir les enfants and a boy’s idea of a normal life in Empire of the Sun. By using a child’s point of view, the directors are showing the audience that what’s truly terrible about war is not the fighting itself, but what it takes away.

The Mother of the Country By Fredrika Pfeiffer

In a time where history is said to be being made and the world seems to be spinning more quickly than usual, I highly recommend that you put aside a few hours to appreciate Jackie (2016), which surrounds the life of John F. Kennedy’s widow following the days of his assassination. Natalie Portman portrays a character that is unknown to

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most, and exposes the private side of an icon. Jackie allows for beauty, class and a famous marriage to take a backseat behind Mrs. Kennedy’s poise and bravery, reminding the world of the the importance of both the First Lady and history. What makes this film so fantastic is its historical accuracy. Portman’s breath-filled Long Island accent is so on point, her clothes so meticulously recreated, that it feels as if you’re watching the real Jackie as she glides through the White House halls. Portman’s portrayal is made even more seamless with integration of

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clips from the 1960’s that are scattered throughout the film, making it difficult to differentiate between what were once news stories and what is a modern day recreation. As you're led through the days following Kennedy’s assassination, stories of mistresses and lovers quarrels leave your mind completely. As you watch the grieving widow fall apart, it is then that you realize how strong of a woman Jackie Kennedy really was. We like to remember Jackie as being the woman who stuck by her husband, tended to her children and wore pillbox hats. We make her a passive being whose entire identity revolves around her femininity. Jackie focuses on one specific part of her identity that tends to be forgotten—her love of history. She speaks of her love of books and former presidents and how their lives influenced her decisions on her most difficult days. Being the wife of a current president, she deems it very important that her husband be surrounded by reminders of those who have come before him. She is seen restoring the White House as she tracks down historical furniture that used to reside in the monumental building. Though this may not sound out of

the ordinary today, Mrs. Kennedy hunted these items down at a time when vintage furniture had no place in most homes and modernism was the the newest trend. She searches for artifacts that are today considered vital components of the White House’s history. But at the time she is criticized for spending funds on “knickknacks”. As you are let into a life that calls to be remembered, it’s difficult not to apply Mrs. Kennedy's wisdom to our current events. As the film pan’s through clips of the White House in the 60's, full of relics, one cannot help but worry that the current White House will all be wiped away and turned into a Pennsylvania Avenue version of Trump Tower, its grand rooms full of history and thought to be replaced with gold lions and trashy furniture. As we reflect on who our First Lady is today, and a government whose focus is tweets and hand-size instead of history and tradition, we are reminded that though others may disregard it, history must not be forgotten, and we must preserve it whenever we can.

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4. Man with a Movie Camera Double exposure, fast motion, slow motion, freeze frames, tracking shots... If we had eyes like movie cameras, how much would it change life? A man with a movie camera would be a runner, an enthusiast and a dreamer. We’re born with one eye staring at fantasy, the other at reality, and when the two met, the world becomes a drunken hallucination, alluring until the end, until death.

“Film is my mode of expression. It’s how I’ve always thought about things, and I kind of for a long time didn’t realize how unique that was, that, the way I think about things is visually, and how quickly I’m able to break down a script. I think studying classic films, by like Howard Hawks, even contemporary directors, like Edgar Wright, you see that there are people who think in that way too. It’s just, how they see the world, how they break things apart, and it’s a very unique medium to get your vision across. And it’s the only way I could ever think of getting my vision across, and saying things I want to say.” —Adam McGill, Director of PUNKED!

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Breaking the Fourth Wall with

Ryan Ozminkowski 151mmphs.com Co-Founder and Executive Producer of

Princeton Tonight Interview Conducted by Everett Shen

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151MM MARCH 2017 Words from the interviewer:

One freezing Thursday night on the brink of winter break, I was glad to find myself out of the raging winds, and in the warmth of Murray-Dodge Hall on the Princeton University campus, facing one of the creative talents behind campus broadcast show Princeton Tonight. While conversing with Ryan Ozminkowski, Class of 2019, I was lavished with a flurry of ideas that reflected a level of passion and dedication bordering on sensational. The topic of conversation shifted from the show to his high-school career to some of his favorite films, and I felt a contagious enthusiasm increasingly pulsating through the room, until my companion began to vibrate uncontrollably and dissipated into a beam of blinding light, assuming spirit form. Admittedly, that last part may be slightly exaggerated, but the producer’s story held some truly inspiring words for the aspiring cinephile. Read our conversation below to learn more about the meaning of film, from the perspective of a filmmaker!

Could you give a brief introduction of the show and talk about your role in it?

In order for them to go to an event, it needs to be something really interesting.

The group is Princeton Tonight. It has some very talented people, talented performers, talented artists, talented business people, talented marketing people, all kinds of people coming together with this central idea of providing entertainment. All we want to do is make people happy. We want to be that thing that whether it be the show they go to, or the show they turn on their TV or the thing that they read, we want that to be something that people just like. We don’t want it to be a stressful thing, we want it just to be an enjoyable experience. There’s the TV show, which airs monthly, every Thursday and Friday throughout NJ on the cable access, and that’s usually about an hour long, made up of sketch comedy, man-on-the-street [interviews], interviews with our celebrity guests, you know, just fun stuff like that, reviews of movies, and it’s really going to branch out to a lot lot more. But Princeton Tonight is so much more than that. You know Art Garfunkel. Very little of that is going to show up in any sort of broadcast television. But we just so passionately want people to enjoy everything. We want people to have a great time when they see Art Garfunkel. So much of our crew—we had 15 or so team members—was working on that, between making the posters, getting the money secured, even just running mics during the event. Coordinating dinners with certain lecturers here, we did this fun little event where it was a spontaneous showing of The Graduate (1967) [on] Saturday, it was like a 4:30, and the school gave us a bunch of Raisinettes, Mike and Ike’s, M&M’s, just to get people excited. Princeton people are just so busy.

What are the main roles in your crew? How many members do you need for each shoot? Oh god, interesting question. So, it absolutely depends on what the shoot is. There are multiple groups. We have our writers’ room, that’s about 10 writers that meet a couple times a week, and they’ll make their own sketches, go over others, they’ll brainstorm on big ideas, like, we had these Canadian filmmakers come last year, so that room was like “Alright let’s do some maple syrup shots with Canadian trivia.” We have a marketing team, about half a dozen or so, people that meet weekly that make the posters, they’ll set up the website, they’ll make sure people can fill Richardson. Then obviously there’s the production team, there’s a lot of talented individuals, they’ll do everything. Some shoots, like a man-on-the-street, we’ll just send two people out, one with the mic, one with the camera. Others might require a bit more, [where we] might have a few people behind the camera, you know, boom, producer, or director there. It’s nice to keep it small. I mean we’ll definitely be delving into some bigger projects next semester. Also I think [with] fewer people, there’s a better sense of ownership, much more of a grassroots kind of thing. If you and I just went out and were like “let’s go film an interview” [then it feels like] only the two of us can make this. But if we go out with a 50 person team, then there’s always someone else that might do [your part]. So I like this thing. It allows for a lot more ownership and passion for what they’re doing.

SECTION 4: Man with a Movie Camera What part of Princeton Tonight are you most proud of? Creating the team. I think not the show, not creating events, or bringing guests, but creating a team of people. On Princeton’s campus there are so many extra-curriculars. Literally anything you want, there’s like a thing for it. So one, you have to compete with all of them, because like why are doing Princeton Tonight, when your time could be spent doing like Comic Book Theater? Like I don’t know if that’s a thing, but then two, it takes a lot to have belief in the program. I mean it’s a one-year-old show. We started it last year, and when you have Triangle, which is the oldest touring musical group in the country—it’s 125 years old this year, it’s professional, it owns McCarter theater, and [has] million dollars of endowment—you know it’s a lot to be like, “Don’t do that, come trust us, there’s a lot more potential here, come with us and do that.” And so that’s one thing. It’s just so amazing to get people here to do it, and on top of that I think it’s great because there’s such a diverse group of people involved with it. You have your finance guy, the guy who resolves all the financing and accounting and funding requests. But then how is he supposed to connect with an actor who’s had a small role in a few sketches? They’re just so different. It’s hard to both claim ownership of a show or feel like they’re part of that organism of Princeton Tonight. There’s just no need to ever interact. But it’s cool that it’s still just a big cohesive team. So yeah, creating the team, and that whole dynamic—I’m really proud of that. Did you guys start off with a few core members? How did you expand? Good question. So I guess the story in terms of member growth started off with Jordan Salama, whose younger brother just got in, and me, Class of 2019. The two of us met in the basement of East Pyne, and we watched this film screening of another film group on campus. And we started talking, and we realized we got along really well. We had really similar interests, and he was like “I kind of did this really casual talkshow in high school”, and I was like “I made a film festival”, and we were like “Why don’t we both do stuff?

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Let’s make something happen.” It was just the two of us, and we shot our first episode of Charlie Baker, who’s a student here, a musician. We shot our first ten minute long interview with him, and he did some good talk, and that was that. So we were like “We did it. This is so cool!” And then after that we were like “We should start growing a little.” Like we had our talents but we needed some more talent with this. So we brought on two other guys: Ben Jacobson and Rami Farran. Just two of our friends. I knew Rami had wanted to get some sketch comedy on, and we knew Ben was a director, had done some stuff in high school, [and was] also very good on the technical editing side and everything. So we had the four of us, and we did our Emmanuel Udotong interview, who was another student on campus who did this startup in Africa. And we were like “Oh man we did it. That’s so cool!” and then we sent out an email to all the listeners. We invited everyone to Lewis 306. We told everyone, “If you’re interested, come come come.” And about ten people came. I’d say about eight of them are still with us. It was just the most oddly organized meeting. It was a meeting to talk about Mike DelGuidice, a member of Billy Joel’s band, who was going to be here January. This was like last December. Jordan and I had no idea what we were doing. You know, we literally assigned roles. We were like “We’ll need to email...who wants to email, anyone? You want to email? Ok great, you can email…” Kind of throughout that year it organically grew. A friend would bring a friend, so we maybe grew to about fifteen or so active people last year. It started getting a little notice on campus. Still not everyone, but you know, people reach out, and were like “I really want to do Princeton Tonight.” “Hop on you guys.” And this year was the big time, during the fall, just big recruiting, a lot of freshmen, a lot of other sophomores or juniors. So now we have about 40 active members, between all of our teams. Part of where we’re pivoting now is interacting with more groups on campus. Like, “Hey, let’s get the improv group to act in one of our sketches”, or like “Let’s all make this really funny thing with the dance group dancing behind it.” So that’s kind of a direction we’re thinking about.

What was your film experience prior to entering Princeton and starting Princeton Tonight? *Laughs* Well there was definitely nothing well-coached. For the longest time I wanted to be an engineer. I was like dead-set, like MIT’s the place to go, and then one of my best friends, he’s actually the one who designed the logo, during freshman summer, was like, “Hey I wrote this little piece, it’s The Cask of Amontillado by Edgar Allen Poe, but it’s like a 20 years later thing, and it’s a story of revenge and this and that” and I was like “Dude this is ridiculous” and he was like “Yeah we’re gonna film it in Ronald’s basement.” So for like 3 weeks, we’d be up until 3 in the morning filming in the basement. The whole thing came to like a 25 minute movie. Lots of fun. The mistakes in it were just...like there was this scene where we had to a sound effect with chains, and it was literally a person rattling chains on the floor, and you could see a little of the chain rattling. Is it on Youtube? Yeah, [the studio is] Above the Line Productions. You can check them out actually. [It’s] a lot of fun to look back on.[...] That was the filming side. But we also did a lot [of other things]... the film festival was I think the proudest thing that we did. The Yesterday Again Film Festival, named after our second film. I come from an agrarian part of California, [and] it’s a very non-arts heavy anything, and our junior year we started this film festival. We had twenty something submissions, [and] we had 200 or so people come. It was fun. It was a night of just showing stuff and then voting and everything. And the next year we made it bigger, 400 people came and we had

151MM MARCH 2017 like 50 submissions from a dozen different schools. We had a whole arts thing out in the gallery, with ceramics and photographs, and paintings. And we just kept building and building. It’s still going on today. It’s in it’s fourth year, so we’ve passed it on.

kind of starting to get one and it’s like this wild thing so, I can’t answer that, I don’t know. I don’t know exactly what it is.

That’s an important thing. So I note to you, with your magazine. Start thinking of people to pass it on to now. That’s my biggest regret with the film festival, is not coaching people on how to take over. Like anyone will be able to keep publishing it, but to keep up a demand for improvement, that takes a lot. You know how, the founder will be so passionate about it. That’s you, you know, you’re like “I love this”. You’ll come here at like 10:30 on a Thursday. You have school in the morning. Like, you’ll come here and do this, which is amazing, like I respect that so much. It’s phenomenal. But you’ll need to start grooming freshmen now, and it’s a little bit of what we’re doing with Princeton Tonight.

How many hours do you spend on production per week? What does a typical production cycle look like? Well it’s a hard thing to explain, for example Jordan and I (Jordan’s my best friend), I was in his room until 3 o’clock last night, just talking about Princeton Tonight. It was talking about trying to get [censored by request of Ryan] here, talking about our next guests, who are some guests from [also censored], about some group dynamics, about the necessity of training and writing and production. This was just us talking and loving it so much. The team collectively is probably putting in a hundred hours a week, because right now it’s just at such an interesting stage where so much growth is happening and our minds are going like “Do we want to start this dinner series? Do we want to work with these groups? Starting up these shorter series?” It’s weird, because it’s a year old, so it doesn’t really have an identity yet, but it’s

What are your plans for the future? Plans for the future that I can say on record...I’d be happy to tell you. It’s not that I don’t feel comfortable. It’s just that I don’t know if it’d be accurate. I mean a lot of it’s just ideas. I really think it’s just important to throw out fifty ideas, start going for them, and then seeing one or two that will stick. Are you planning on staying within the campus? No. We are not a campus oriented show, and we don’t want to be. We want to make sure all of our content can be enjoyed by everyone. We don’t want to be a broadcast show that says “Wilson dining hall had this for dinner…..” It’s not that at all. But we want a show that can be enjoyed just as much by a student in his dorm room in Rocky as lets say, my mom in California. We want to make sure they still understand. In our seasonal opener we had President Eisgruber, but we presented in a way that we thought was open to everyone.

SECTION 4: Man with a Movie Camera Tell us about your favorite films! Aww heck yeah! My favorite movie... Love the Coen Brothers’ movies, they’re just great. Umm...Ethan Coen, Class of ‘69 philosophy major, no, Class of ‘79, from this school! Joel went to NYU. Favorite movie would be Cinema Paradiso (1988). It’s just great, it’s Italian. Wait for the subtitles, [they’re] ok. [Having] subtitles doesn’t mean the movie’s bad, black and white doesn’t mean the movie’s bad, you can put up with it. It’s fine, sometimes it’s a good thing. It’s a great movie. It describes my life. I have my Alfredo in my life too, who worked in the movie theater, and was like “Toto, you must leave, go to Rome, don’t come back here, we’re not welcoming you”, but it’s [in] Italian, not just [with] an accent. It’s a great movie. I also had a girlfriend in high school. He kind of had a girlfriend there. It’s my life, if you want to know, [and] that’s our small town [where] I came from. We didn’t really have a town drunk, that like stood in the square and was “This is my square!” We did have some homeless people downtown on School Street and Elm. There were a few people there. But they were fine, they were polite, [and] they really didn’t say anything. That’s a great movie. Why do you watch movies? What draws you to them? Movies are cool! So movies are fun, I think it’s important to analyze them, but at their core you need to just have fun with them, and enjoy them. Or feel the appropriate emotion. But like happy, sad, both are fun. It’s fun to experience emotions. I think they’re cool because they’re our culture. I think small talk like, “Oh, you seen any good movies lately?”, or “Hey Rogue One’s

coming out this Friday!” is a cool thing. Like “What’s your mom’s favorite film?” “Love Actually (2003).” “That’s my mom’s favorite film too!” So it’s just such a cultural thing, it’s a thing we center around. They can last for...You know The Wizard of Oz (1939), it’s like, 75 years old, [but] it still has [as much] cultural influence as even like a Deadpool (2016) that comes out recently, you know, and you just have that constant interaction. It’s popular, it’s Hollywood, it’s gold. As the Oscars motto was a few years ago: “Everyone dreams in gold”. You know, if they’re telling you otherwise, they’re lying! People love that. It’s the movies! It’s magic! What kind of movies do you have the most fun with? Ok [laughs]. One of the best movies I’ve ever seen is Hot Fuzz (2007), which is like this British comedy. I don’t know why I liked it so much. That was just a great movie. I like the British stuff. Going back

to Love Actually, I love the Mr. Bean scene, when like, with Rowan Atkinson, he’s putting that sprig of holly in the bag for Alan Rickman, and that whole thing...I guess it’s just a British thing. I guess British movies are fun. Monty Python, I grew up on those, but [I] also like Mel Brooks, Spaceballs (1987), Blazing Saddles (1974), just these little things that are like honest and human. I know that sounds like a really sort of pretentious things to say, but like *laugh*, they’re not trying too hard. Just very silly. Those are great. Other fun things....I mean anything Wes Anderson. Wes Anderson movies are so fun. You know, if you have an Ed Norton with some telescope, you know like the product commercial, like Jason Schwartzman, he breaks down, he’s in a car and the car breaks down, in like this small Italian town square, and he goes “ahh familia! We’re familia! Ahh!!!!” It’s just the dumbest— “Ahh!! My steering wheel was screwed on backwards! That was the problem!” That doesn’t make any sense, but it’s fun!

Other IMPORTANT Dates: • • • • • •

Mar. 25th: Whiplash Smartphone Film Challenge @ Princeton Public Library Mar. 27-Apr. 2: Princeton Environmental Film Festival Mar. 31st: Teen-Only Screening of April and the Extraordinary World (France, 2015) @ Princeton Public Library Apr. 1st: Submission Deadline for Nassau Film Fest @ Princeton Garden Theater Apr. 3rd: Submissions due for 1st annual Walnut Lane Film Festival Apr. (TBD): Princeton Film Festival @ PU

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5. Inside Llewlyn Davis Life is a cat named Ulysses. It tends to run away as if floating on an untethered raft and you’re incapable of holding it fast in your hands. It is capricious, clueless and addictive. No matter how badly you are defeated by life or how badly you try to find its meaning, it's a runaway. Chasing it feels like crawling toward something in the dark...then you halt. Is life just this infinite cycle of failure and aspiration? Then doesn't every trigger of change add its own unique perspective? So, hold on, generations! Ulysses will be back, and Llewlyn Davis is just one in the crowd singing the song of life.

“I think it’s the combination of two separate mediums. You have a visual medium and an auditory medium, and the way our brain combines and perceives things, because of [this combination, film] is really unique. It’s not just something you get from looking at artwork or listening to music, it almost happens subconsciously. Sometimes we hear things from a film, and we don’t necessarily know that we’re hearing it, and that evokes an emotional response. The same way a configuration of light and darkness creates an emotional response that can be mirrored in the sound, or contrasted. It’s just so dynamic.” —Christian Gonzalez, PHS Filmmaking Teacher

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An Apology Owed for Existence:

Memories of Matsuko By Sarah Hou Memories of Matsuko was the first Japanese film I’d ever watched. Directed by Tetsuya Nakashima in 2000, the film opens with the nephew of the protagonist, Sho, who is greeted by his estranged father with the ashes of his recently deceased aunt, Matsuko. While combing through Matsuko’s belongings in the sordid apartment she left behind, Sho slowly unravels the mystery surrounding her murder, along with the ups and downs that eventually sank her life into a sea of suffering. There were many moments during the film’s first fifteen minutes where I asked myself, “What am I watching?” Its eccentric stylistic approach bears resemblance to that of Nakashima’s Kamikaze Girls (2004) and The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014), preferring bright, saturated

colors and highly diffused lighting over more natural pigments, which makes the entire film susceptible to being mistaken for an episode of anime. Nakashima intentionally makes the acting farcical as if he’s directing a 1930's Charlie Chaplin comedy, with actors speaking at fast-forwarded speed and making dramatic facial expressions more at home On a Shakespearean stage. Much of its strangeness, which may deter some viewers, can be attributed to the conflicting extremes: the colors, the vaudeville-style buffoonery, and the musical numbers interweaved into its 130 minutes easily trick the audience into believing in an auspicious ending, but lying underneath the comedic atmosphere is a depressing story. “Everyone dreams, but only a handful of people see their dreams realized. The rest of us accept our fate, fall into ruin…”

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This is a movie about life, the authentic, human life, not the happily-ever-afters. Our heroine, Matsuko, is among the “rest”, who starts out sanguine and full of anticipation towards the future, but is eventually defeated by reality. She tries to please her father, but fails as the unfavored child next to her sickly little sister; She steals her colleague’s money in an attempt to cover for her student’s thievery but gets fired by the school board; After running away from the family that offers her no love, her life begins its unceasing fall from grace, a procession of abusive relationships, prostitution, crime, and ostracism, yet she never stops yearning for that perfect love that will make her world colorful once again. At age 53, Matsuko becomes the overweight crazy lady that the audience sees in the first few minutes of the film, beaten to death by a group of children. What a funny way to die, you may remark. In fact that is precisely what Nakashima wanted to convey: her life was such a failure that even her death is ridiculed. At this point the juxtaposition should be stark. Nakashima tells Matsu-

151MM MARCH 2017 ko’s tragedy in candy-colored hues, and dance and music, resulting in a cacophonous collision of bleakness and gaiety. In the end, bleak reality defeats Matsuko’s unfaltering dream for a good life, and

she, just as the opening sentence of the film predicts, falls into ruin, like many before her. Memories of Matsuko is relatable because almost everyone can find a piece of

It’s Not Your Fault “It’s not your fault.” These words didn’t mean much to me until I heard them said during one of the most famous scenes in Good Will Hunting (1997). The title character, a janitor at MIT who has a talent for math and has been bailed out of jail on the condition that he seek therapy, is told this sentence by his therapist nine times before he understands it and then begins

to cry. At the time I watched this movie, I was, like most students, sleep deprived, overwhelmed with school work, and worried about the future. But these words brought comfort to me, almost as if their speaker was talking directly to me. In fact, the moment Will began to cry, tears started falling out of eyes as well. To this day, when I’m struggling

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themselves in its protagonist. It exposes the inherent suffering aspect of life, which few films go so far as to embrace.

By Leah Bakoulis through stress and sadness, I remind myself of these words and am comforted by them just the way I was the first time I watched the movie. It always impresses me to hear stories of movies changing the way people see others, the world, or themselves, and I hope that everyone will be able to find a movie that means as much to them as this one does to me.