Choose ONE film from below to write about, basing the essay upon vis u al style primarily

Choose ONE film from below to write about, basing the essay upon vis u al style primarily (of course tying back the discussion to plot, narrative structure, etc., overall). But the primary focus this time is upon film as a visual narrative (everything from shots to lighting, setting and set design, even props) – everything that makes up a visual composition. 1. Blad e Ru n n e r (dir. Ridley Scott, 1982) The folder of stills on Blackboard gives a number of examples of the famous set design for Blade Runner; it’s the star of the picture in the establishing sequence and at a number of other points in the film. But we also have a “future noir” picture, a detective drama with Blade Runner Rick Deckard in pursuit of replicants led by the charismatic Roy Batty (played by Dutch actor Rutger Hauer). In these elaborate, 1930s-1940s retro L.A. style sets are human figures (a number of whom are, or may be replicants). In science fiction, there is always the danger of style over substance, but Blade Runner has a number of performances that seem to return us to the human narrative (and its central question of what it means to be human). Nonetheless, it is a visually stunning film. 2. Th e Ne w World (dir. Terrence Malick, 2005) As a period piece, a historical (but semi-fictionalized) drama-romance, Malick’s The New World, like his other films, is a poetically visual narrative, as if paintings had come to life. But at its heart is a very human, even tragically human, story. The dialogue is relatively spare, a good portion of it conveyed in voiceovers; so we are left, by and large, with visual storytelling. 3. Th e e b (dir. Naji Abu Nowar, 2014) The desert of Arabia clearly dominates essentially every composition of Theeb, just as it shapes the narrative and the characters’s lives. Its natural colors could produce a fairly drab, monochromatic look: but we feel in the film all the precious signs of life in the desert. And of death. 4. La b e lle e t la b ê te (dir. Jean Cocteau, 1946) And here, in a fairy tale come to life, the visual aspect has the unreal meet the real. This film may also be described as poetic in its visuals, a sort of “poetic realism” that requires a suspension