Always Research is a Good thing

      While researching material for a paper I am writing for the film, Wall-E, my teacher my class an assignment to read and article, by Luis A. Vivanco called "Seeing Green: Knowing and Saving the Environment on Film," hoping that it could be useful in our papers. More evidence is always welcome when making a claim.

      When I started reading this article I was worried if this would actually benefit my paper. Vivanco is analyzing documentary films which are vastly different from my animated family movie, or so I 

thought. As an anthropologist, Vivanco, looks at how things effect a people group and their influences on a particular society. This ideology is very different from environmentalists who is critiquing the movie on it's truth to the cause it is depicting. Vivanco takes a look at how these documentaries influences the public by the techniques they might use and means of story telling that occurs in these films and those topics can transcend the borders of genre.

      One of the things said in this article stuck me in how well I felt it could relate to my paper despite the fact that the author was talking about animal nature films. "…kinship relationships, in which culturally preferred notions of monogamy, responsible parenting, industrious work ethic, deferred gratification, and the sexual division of labor are presented." I thought it was interesting how in a movie that might have been about lions in Africa was filmed and narrated in a way that the audience could recognize the family and society structures in their lives. Which is something I think the movie Wall-E does in depicting a very human-like life as well as behavior for machines.

      Another thing that struck me in this article was "…scientific validity of films relies on perceptions of the film maker's virtue and integrity." I thought this was interesting because it's true. In a movie like Wall-E the science is often over shadowed by the story that takes precedence over any bigger picture. The science shown to the viewers is often taken at face value because in a situation like where the environmental element is just a means to tell a story we have to believe that the science behind the story is correct.

     The last thing i thought could relate to my paper was "…audiences do not respond well to pessimistic 'doom and gloom' scenarios." Which I think is very relevant to a family movie where the audience is children and their parents. the environment message maybe toned down from the intense fear that waste product by humans can destroy a planet to properly tell a story about the love between two robots.

     After I read the Article by Vivanco I looked at his extensive list of sources and came across an article by William Cronon, "A Place Stories: Nature, History, and Narrative" which by skimming I think takes about how people write about nature and since Wall-E is a narrative story might be useful to my paper. 

Fern Gully: Analyzing the Undertones of a Children's Movie

When I was a child I saw cute animated movie about a magical rain forest were fairies and animals were living in harmony until, a giant machine with the help of these humanized smog cloud came and started destroying the place they live. So that the combined efforts of fairies, animals, and a magical shrunken human they set out to save their habitat. That is the movie “Fern Gully: the Last Rain Forest” and it is a campaign for the save the rain forests and the animals wrapped up and presented as a cute happy, slightly dramatic, children's animated movie.

In the trailer posted, you hear a generic movie voice man giving the narration to the images of rain you believe in the night sky. His slightly out of monotone soothing voice piques our interest into what we are being shown. He mellow tone tells us about nice song filled world without humans that is until now. The dialogue of the introduction is giving off the feel that you're peeking into world that exists all around you.

            The trailer then goes on to introduce the main characters of the story to forge a bond with the audience to its leads, Krista and Zach. After reading the story’s Romeo and Juliet they are greeted to a friendly animal companion voice by the unmistakable superstar of the 90s Robin Williams, America's favorite comedian. Then introduces the conflict of the machine and villainous smog, but only for moment. Because the audience has to know that everything is going to be all right good does prevail, I mean it is a children's movie.

            This movie trailer does a great job of hiding its intended to children. It never directly tell the audience that the humans are to blame it gives them the honest human eyes pollution to fear and distracts them from reading too deep songs and magic. It gets the “save the rain forest” campaign across about even saying it. We need to save Fern Gully; wait isn't Fern Gully in the rain forest. I can't say this movie doesn't work. It is a very good job of slipping in green thinking to children. I know I saw the movie as a child and was devastated by what was happening to the fairies and in turn making me more environmentally conscious. It wasn't till I was older and re-watched the movie that I picked up on the subtleties.

Lorax Approved?

When I read the article “ ‘The Lorax’: in Thneed of Some Marketing Help”,by Kate Sheppard, I thought it was a very tasteful article about how Hollywood for advertisers and promoted that might necessarily fit the movie image and what the movie is trying to promote. I wrote in a way that was not laced with anger and demeaning comments that can be a little off-putting when reading about a movie aimed at children. Very calm way presenting the facts and addressing her opinion in a tone that convinced me to continue to read and hear what she was trying to get across to the audience. The whole time I was reading it never felt what she was pressing an agenda that made it feel like I could reason with what she was saying income to the conclusion that I felt the same way. I enjoyed how she said she liked “The Lorax” but she was confused about the kind who partnerships universal chose to make. Like with Mazda who offered incentives to schools in which the school would receive $25 for every child that ask their parents to test drive. I also like how she made parallels to real life situations and situations in the movie to show how hypocritical a movie studio can be. When in the movie the Lorax was used to sell the very product that was ruining his home and in real life the Lorax was being used to sell “green” household cleaning products. Also, she ended her paper with a humorous and uplifting quote about a child being able to see through the marketing by saying “the Lorax doesn't even drive a car.”