My week with Mariyln

The portrayal of stardom in 'My Week With Marilyn'


Heyya, this week we watched 'My Week With Marilyn', a film built from the memoirs of Colin Clark, about the life of the one and only Marilyn Monroe.

Today I would like to discuss the portrayal of celebrity life in the film, as I think one of the aspects that struck me the most was the way people perceived and treated Marilyn. Personally, as someone who didn't know much about the life of her before watching the film other than the fact she was very beautiful, the film made clear to the extent of her fame. I know it sounds obvious as she's one of the most famous women who has ever lived who wasn't a monarch, but for me it really hit home that people literally everywhere loved this woman. Although at first this was depicted to be a luxury, with Marilyn having all eyes on her whenever she walks into a room, but as the film goes on it becomes more apparent that there are some unsavoury sides to this extreme fame.

At the beginning of film I wasn't initially too impressed with her as a character, she came across as very fickle and timid even though it as blatant that she was adored by all that met her. The introductory scenes of her being too nervous to even act in her films lacked sincerity and I thought it to be simply attention seeking as my previous assumption of her was that she was the best actor that ever lived, so I found it difficult to buy the whole " I can't do this" shindig. However, once the film began to progress some of the negative aspects of the celebrity life she lived became more clear. From the way people treated and talked about her, it became obvious that they didn't really care about her personal life or character; the only aspect they cared about was the reputation she had gained for herself. This is shown through the frustration of the directors at Marilyn's frequent tardiness, yet they rarely question why she is late, just refer to it as 'just Marilyn', thus demonstrating their lack of care for her as an actual person.

Another part of fame that the film depicts is the complete lack of privacy and personal boundaries that Marilyn faces.  Whenever there is a scene with her out in public, almost immediately she is swarmed by people who want a glimpse at Marilyn Monroe, thus any respect for her personal space is just forgotten.  Her response to this type of attention is always a kind of nervous giggle or flirtatious comment, which makes the potentially traumatic situation seem less invasive, due to this character she reverts to; which you can see in this clip here. The separation of Marilyn Monroe and her personal self becomes more evident throughout, to the point that in one scene when confronted by fans she even asks ' Do you want me to be her?'. However the affect of this dual personalty appears to have detrimental consequences on her personal life, as she reveals in a more emotional moment that 'once people realise I am not her, they run', implying that yet again she is only desirable for her fame and the character that accompanies that, rather than her true self.

For me, the film draws the question can this level of fame actually a be beneficial or even healthy lifestyle for someone to live ? On the basis of Marilyn, I would argue that no would have to be the answer. She is depicted as emotionally vulnerable yet due to her celebrity status no one seems to ever respect that except those closest to her; which are few. Issues like drug addiction are also raised during the film, and this is brushed over by the other characters in the film like it is the norm, suggesting that perhaps the only way to deal with this type of life is to resort to some other substance to help ease the reality of it all. There are people who literally follow her around her every move, so even moments that feel private aren't really as someone is always only a few feet away; again promoting the complete lack of privacy and control that she had over her own life.

Over all the film depicts fame in a negative way for all the reasons above, yet this is counteracted by people's sincere love of Marilyn and her work making some of the issues perhaps seem less extreme, although they are still there.

Andy Dufresne

Hellooo,

Today I am exploring the main character from one of my all time favourite films, Andy Dufresne from the Shawshank Redemption.

Dufresne is first portrayed as a man who was bitter and vengeful about his wife having an affair; so he killed her and her lover in cold hearted murder. As the audience, it is difficult not to take an immediate disliking to him as a character, because our first point of view is a lying man trying to avoid being convicted of murder. He comes across as rude and dismissive with his reluctance to display any true emotion in his court case, thus we do not believe that he is innocent as he claims to be.

However it is this same lack of emotion that through out the rest of the film makes him more likeable, perhaps it is because this is a contrast to the rest of the characters in the film; as most of them are far more open to the audience in terms of their personality thus Andy's calm and collected persona makes him unique. It makes him more intriguing as a character as he becomes something of an enigma to both the viewer and the other inmates at Shawshank, because although he does not often succumb to any big displays of emotion, he often challenges the prison and its usual rules, more than often or not getting his way. This is displayed in the best scene in the film is when Dufresne hijacks the sound system plays a record to the entire prison, but he does so in such a nonchalant way that adds a real feel good response in the audience. Here is a clip of the scene so you can see how fab it is yourself :

This sense of rebellion is subtly displayed throughout the entire film, from actions as simple as writing a letter to the council in request to improve the prisons library, to him actually outwitting the Warden and escaping. This side of his personality add charm to his character, making the audience rethink their primary opinion of him to the opposite. To add the the complexity go his character he is also very intelligent and uses this to be kind to his fellow inmates as well as to manipulate the system into his favour into making his prison experience more positive. The generosity he displays triggers sentiment from the audience as it makes him an easier character to root for, as you begin to forget he is a convicted murderer and concentrate more on how he is genuinely helping other people. This becomes particularly clear when he assists  new inmate Tommy Williams learn how to read and write and for me this is when I my opinion was completely reversed and I began to actually believe he didn't commit the crime he was convicted of; this is then shortly confirmed by Tommy's story about another inmate from a different prison confessing to the crime.

Perhaps it is the fact that we only really see Dufresne through the eyes of his best friend, Red, who is obviously very fond of him and a the narrator naturally some of that opinion will influence the audience, but I think it Andy Dufresne is one of the most undermined protagonists in any film. He is underestimated by the prison warden, his fellow inmates and the audience even though he repeatedly shows resilience and a calm motivation to succeed in life, despite the tragic circumstances that he is living through a sentence he did not actually deserve. He is perceived as a simple man with a simple dream in life, to move to a small island on the coast of Mexico, yet beneath this he has a complex personality that is only subtly shown to the viewer. This simplicity is maintained even throughout his escape, making his achievement more admirable. The effect this has is that it builds up loyalty to him as a character because they have to wait to see more of his personality rather than it being revealed all at once.

'Andy Dufresne crawled through a river of shit and came out clean on the other side' both literally from the prison, and also from the audiences perspective as it changes from a dislike at the beginning of the film to admiration in the end as he successfully cheats the system. This to me demonstrates the brilliance of his character as he a as a person does not change, he remains emotionally refined and ambiguous throughout the film, yet the audiences perspective of him turns a full circle.

Practice 1: prep

2 minute Opening to a film Preparation

Our Second AS media task was to create and develop a character and use this character in a 2 minute film opening set in a given location. We had to create a plot, cast, film and edit this 2 minute opening in two weeks. Both characters in the group we were given had to meet at some point during the opening and to spend at least 20 seconds in the location we were given.

Creating characters
In our lesson we were given an A4 sheet with pictures of people from the internet, our task was to choose one image and create a character and a backstory for that character. Here is a picture of the images we were provided :

From these images Megan chose the girl in the top right:

After choosing my person we were then told to brain storm ideas for who my character was, what she did, her friends, her lifestyle. To basically craft an entire character from this one image, this is what Megan  came up with...

 I created a character and brainstormed the same way Megan did however I chose a different image therefore creating a completely different character to her, she used this image:

Creating this mind map of her ideas to what her character could be like etc:

Characters
The characters Megan and I created were...

Ellie (Megan's character)
The way I created Ellie was I thought of issues I am facing at the moment and people I know, Ellie is a good girl gone bad. She was brought up in a middle class suburban area. Her mum and dad have good paying well respected jobs, she works hard at school to get the grades she needs to get into a prestigious university. Despite having an amazing life full of opportunities ahead of her. She appears to be in with the wrong crowd, she wants to fit in with her friends and to do that she goes to parties, gets drunk, does drugs and one night she gets into a car with some drunk friends and towards the end of the evening they hit someone in a car and he dies. They try to hide the body. Her life goes downhill and shes stuck with this group of manipulating people getting her to do things like drug deals threatening to call the police on them if she doesn't, which is where we meet Tasmines character.

55 year old man
The character I created was a sleazy 55 year old homeless man who is dating a young super model, he does drug deals to get his money. He had a wife and a family but he's now divorced and very rich, he often cheats on his now girlfriend the same way he did his wife, he has two kids that he doesn't talk to. They have completely disowned him. He used to manage a top bank in London. He wants the best for his kids and secretly buys them gifts.



Group Brainstorming

 In our groups, we were given a location in which our 2 minute opening had to be situated. We got 'farmyard' . We then had to come up with a scenario in which these characters would meet. It also had to be engaging.

We did a lot of planning for this, we mind mapped ideas, one of our ideas we mind mapped we eventually decided not to do because it would take up longer than 2 minutes and would be too hard to film in the end. The area was too difficult and we could not get someone to drive us there during the week as parents were working so we created a new story line with a location just outside Aidens house, We decided that he would be her dealer, or something of a more suspicious nature. Aiden joined us half way through our project as he moved classes and proved extremely helpful.

We came up with some other concepts such as her being another fling but we decided that was not in the character (Ellie's) nature. We also thought maybe we could film flashbacks from her hitting someone with a car but in the end we thought we would start the film half way through to engage the audience so they had to concentrate.

Here are some of the notes we made in class as a group:

Location
The location we were given was a farmyard. We had some difficulty trying to find a suitable location that we would have relatively easy access to. We had a feew different options:

• A farm my friend owns
• Megans friends yard
• A public footpath that lead to a farmyard

After enquiring about my frineds farm we realised that none of us would be able to get there easily and the owners were not particularly comfortable with us using it to film on se we had to decide between the two other options. In the end we went for the public footpath due to the fact that it is easier for us all to acces; and we thought it had a better aesthetic for what we wanted for our opening.






Casting
Casting the roles proved rather difficult, as we had to find actors who were free on the evening we needed them and who were actually willing to act for us. On top of that we had to find people who looked similar to the images of the people we based our characters on. We had to find a female actress, fairly young with blonde hair and fair skin. Luckily one of my friends who goes to the same 6th form as me fit the required description, she was willing to act for us so that was one of our characters cast in the early stages of this project. This is the actress chosen:

I chose her because she is an incredibly talented actress for her age and takes drama at school and keen to be part of the production, she fit the wide eyed and scared criteria I needed for my character.

The man was the hardest to cast as we actually had to find a middle aged man who was willing to film as part of our production, who was free in the evening and didn't mind acting with someone younger than him. Again luckily my dad volunteered to help us, he didn't fit the description but he was an excellent and helpful choice, it saved me having to do actor hunting across Wymondham and surrounding areas.

Props

Props we might need include :

- A brown parcel ( being handed from the man to the girl ) probably around medium size, easy to stuff in the bag

- A necklace ( something for her to fiddle with so we can tell she is anxious )

- A bag or small rucksack

Plot

We have finally decided on a definite plot line for our opening, for a few weeks we had been playing with different ideas but today we have decided on one.

The start of our opening is our female character walking down a long wooded path, a tunnel of trees. She looks bedraggled, messy hair, very anxious. She is playing with a necklace and looks very uneasy, she has a rucksack on. She reaches the end of the path and turns into the farm, she looks around, we don't know what or who she is searching for until a man, dressed in mismatching clothes walks out with a parcel in hand. He hands her the parcel and she shakes his hand. Then she stuffs the parcel into her rucksack and as she is walking away someone walks round the corner and catches them in the 'deal'.

Soundtrack:

We decided not to include any dialogue in our opening scene as we thought just a good soundtrack would be more effective to help create the atmosphere that we wanted. Finding a track that both fitted our footage and our idea of what it should be like was more difficult than we initially thought it would be, however in the end we managed to find something that we thought achieved both those aims. The options we had were:

• The xx - Intro
• Bang Bang ( my baby shot be down)- Sonny Bonno
• Where did you sleep last night - Nirvana ( Unplugged version)
• IV- Meltybrains?

In the end we decided not to go for the songs with lyrics as we thought that may take away some of the impact of our actual footage, rather than adding to it. Out of the other two, we thought that Iv by the Meltybrains? had the best overall effect as it went with our  footage the most naturally. Furthermore, it isn't too dramatic to sound odd but enough to give the enigmatic vibe we were going for.

On Thursday 22nd of September, we're getting the bus afterschool to the location near Aiden's house and hopefully completing all the filming on one day, if not we can go back on Saturday as everyone is free.

Hello

Hey!

Welcome to my AS media studies blog; I will be posting all of my work on here so I hope y'all find it even just a little bit interesting.

Hope you have a fab day,
Taz x