COP 2- seminar 2

Our first task:

Visual analysis 
Consider two short films in terms of but not limited to the following 
the films we have been asked to analyse are:
Kristen Lepore, bottle 2010 and siri melchior, the dog who was a cat inside 2002

Some thoughts on these animations are as follows:
. Technological/production values
. colour and light
. contnet and symbolism
. Relationship with the sound track
. Historical and contextual factors
. function, and fitness for purpose
. target audience and how it communicates with them
Write a short review analysing comparing and contrasting the two films in ratlin to the above. minimum 500 words to be posted onto blog. 

Kristen Lepore, bottle 2010

This animation is a pixillation meaning it uses lots of photographs to make a moving image. in this film there are two characters. One is made from sand and the other from snow-they live across the sea from each other  one sends a bottle with some objects in to the other, who puts the objects on themselves and sends more objects back and they become friends like pen pals. They do this over and over until the sand guy sends a drawing of himself and the snow girl meeting under the water. When they try to actually do this, unfortunately they both die because neither snow or water can survive underwater. This animation can be taken in lots of ways. one way is about identity and they are sending each other what they think the other person should wear but they are choosing where to put them on themselves so maybe that is like trying to create your own style? It also covers the subject of long distance relationships like saying they don't often work in the end or something. Another thing you can get from this is about social media like a Facebook profile picture they are putting things on their bodies to make them someone they're not and when they get in the water,all the false things come off and they become themselves again. This also works with the long distance theory so they pretend they are someone they're not through long distance relationship where they don't actually have to see each other then when they actually meet up they see each other for who they really are and they don't like it.

www.kirstenlepore.com/bottle

siri melchior, the dog who was a cat inside 2002

This animation is a story of a dog with a cat inside him. The style is a very simple 2D drawing. We think that this is could be portraying a few different subjects which are transgender or homosexuality- the dog is a dog so he should like dogs but the cat inside thinks otherwise. Or the dog is a dog but he wants to be a cat and his personality is just like a cat but he can't show it because people will think it's weird. The dog was never happy because he couldn't be the cat and the cat was never happy because he couldn't be outside and show himself like the dog. Until he found a cat thats a dog inside at the end and found someone he could talk to about it. 
It could also be tackling personality disorders. Like they have a split personality so sometimes they are the cat and sometimes they are the dog and they fight between the two as we see in the film. I think it is good that its simple because it shows clearly the issue and also i like that they used animals because then you can read different issues into it being human. Humans often have these issues that could be read into it so i think it's really nice that someone has explained this so simply for people to understand. However maybe people that have these issues might be offended that they used animals or made it so simple because it's not a simple thing at all. But you can interpret it how you like for instance children will just find it entertaining that theres a cat stuck in a dogs body and find it nice when it finds a dog stuck in a cats body.

In the animations they both end up underwater at some point. I think animation is a good platform to address this issue because it means you don't have to address it head on which can be easier for a lot of people to handle and maybe if older children are watching this it will be the start of them understanding this.  


About the lecture
Lara cCroft could be said to challenge the generalised roles of men and women but actually she is just as sexualised  as all the other women in media with her sex appeal and big boobs and small waist etc. New ones are more normalised. Although Lara is an archaeologist and smart and educated if you didn't know this you would judge her from her looks just like in Jessica rabbit where she says "I'm not bad I'm just drawn this way"

Bayonetta- cool character still very sexualised
Something to think about is : Do we have such sexualised characters because most of the industry is run by men and games are played by majority men? 

We watched an animation call the hat bymichele cournyer 
I actually found it extremely disturbing but maybe that was the intention because it shows just how creepy the male gaze is. I also got the feeling it was saying something about sexual abuse maybe child abuse because the drawing of the woman kept turning into a child and there was one scene where the child was hugging and sliding down a mans penis which is just wrong and either the artist is very perverse or she was tackling the issue of child sex abuse. 
This animation was completely the opposite to things like Jessica rabbit. She is attractive and appealing and you want to watch her but with 'the hat' I just wanted to turn it off. But that might have been the idea, you want it to stop so you should want it to stop in real life too.  
Then we watched pleasure of war ruth longford.- men are fighters of war women are objects. But in this case the woman uses her sexuality to slay the man, they know the man can't resist the womans' charm. a bit like Judith beheading Holofernes. women goes and seduces the man then cuts his head off but is it objectifying to women to say they have to use their sexuality to conquer. Is nudity objectifying? However it does show how powerful their sexuality can be and how easily men can fall for it. They are using sexualisation and objectification as a weapon, using what she had to get what she wanted. Some would call that resourceful!