British Film Institute

Great news followers of Chicano Cinema, the school has finnaly managed to work together and arrange a trip to the BFI. This is great from my POV as they get infomation ready for you for when you get there and also allow you to look stuff up yourself while your there. This I'm hoping is gonna be research heaven :D

Also tomorrow s Friday which is when Mr O'Connor is in school so hopfully I can track him down and pin a date on an interview with him and his wife, fingers crossed. I'll report back to you soon so that you know wheather I found him or not :)

The Reading

Goood morning folks. Just to keep you posted on what is happening in the world, yesterday all the film classes came together and poured through various resources including magazines, books and also portfolios and projects to find more qoutes and infomation on our topics. I unfortunatly didn't find a huge amount but was able to find a review looking into the film Bus 174. This is especially great new because out of all my research it is the one people and myself know little about. Ofcouse I understand the story from the way that the director wanted it to be portrayed but it would be nice to see what other people thought of the situation.

Reading the Book

I am reding into the book that I bought which contains infomation around Latin American contemporary cinema, so much so as you ofcourse allready know the book is called Contempory Latin American Cinema. It has alot of interesting points but one that I hadn't really thought about previously was marketing. I never thought about how a film could have one trailer for its homeland and one for neighbouring and far away contries, but this ofcourse is the case. The Boat that Rocked is a good example of this as the film was ofcourse British, but had a seperate trailer to entice the Americans across the Atlantic. This means that what a local or even national audience see in a film could be almost a completely different to what an international viewer could see in the same movie. Motorcycle Diaries, my focus film could be interpreted in three different ways. Firstly it could be seen as a simple road movie, it could be seen as a way of documenting the early years of Ernesto "Che" Guevaras life, or thirdly it could be seen as a way of documenting the suffering of the Latin Americans. All thre are a correct way of viewing the film but depending where you come from or what you are interested in is what you see in the film.

One particular part of the book which I found really interesting was when the director of the Motorcycle Diaries was mentioned. Origernally a documentry maker from Brazil Walter Salles is cosiderd the father of brazilian cinema and that is no exaduration. After the 84 day trip which Salles and the crew recreated Salles said " As well as being a Brazilian filmaker, he now knew that he was a that he was Latin Amererican filmaker." It appears to be that in his films Salles cant help but try to represent the people he depicts like in the film "Central do Brasil he includes" footage of real people. Much like what appears in the Motorcycle Diaries when Ernestio and Alberto interview people in the cities they enter. You can tell these scenes are different by the use of black and white. What is strange however is how Salles appears to be in a sense an auteur, hos production company helpes Latin American people and films which ofcourse is a good thing but does mean that he appears to have a say in every film that leaves the country. Making it appear as if instead of having many views thaere is simply a representation of Wlter Salles Latin America.

IMDB + Survey Monkey Update

Great news. Discoverd today a message from sombody who has given me the names of two other films to look at Elite Sqaud and Carandiru, I plan to also watch these films and see how they compare to what I have seen in the other three films.

Survey Monkey has suddenley taken off, I pasted a link which attched the questionaire to an email and then sent it to everybody I know on Facebook. I have had some random awnsers but the majorityso far have been informative and helpfull which is really good news. Lets hope it continues.