Initial Research: Marlon Brando Apocalypse Now & Method Acting

 In my performing arts project this term I will be creating a showreel, therefore I want to explore in my initial research acting methods.  I have chosen to look at Marlon Brando and Apocalypse Now (1979) directed by Francis Ford Coppola, as Brando used this acting technique for this epic film. 

Marlon Brando star of The Godfather films, is well known for using method acting. Today states; 'Drawing on inner torment What set Brando apart was the way that technique unleashed his inner conflict. The same qualities that made Brando a world-class actor also made him, by some accounts, a world-class pain.' (TODAY.com, 2004).  Brando used the Stanislavski technique that he learnt as a young actor from his mentor Stella Adler who taught Brando emotional memory 'Adler, argued that the actor’s role was to use emotion to command the attention of the audience as much as possible.' (Kemp, 2022)

Marlon Brando on the set of "Apocalypse Now."

SILVER SCREEN COLLECTION VIA GETTY IMAGES

Method acting can be a gift and a curse, as essentially, the actor, becomes the person they are playing and this scenario went to extremes when Brando played Kurtz in Coppola's Apocalypse Now (Based on Joseph Conrad's book 'Heart of Darkness' (1899).  Coppola's own vision for the character who is lost in the jungles of Vietnam was a "lean and hungry warrior" (Madden, 2022) . Brando had put on a lot of weight and refused to memorise his lines; 'Brando didn’t connect with what Colonel Kurtz..and decided to rewrite his entire character from the ground up..often talking about reformatting the character in his vision. Though they may not have had time to overhaul the entire story, Brando’s plans for Kurtz came entirely from improvised dialogue, often taken from those rambling tangents that happened to be filmed in between takes.' (Coffman, 2023).  The film itself became a nightmare, the budget began at 12 million and became almost 30 million and much of this was Coppola's own money, Coppola faced financial ruin if the film was not completed, and 'the calamitous shoot gave Coppola an epileptic seizure, and on three separate occasions, he threatened to commit suicide' (Madden, 2022) Brando also refused to work with Dennis Hopper who was always high on cocaine and insisted on a continuous supply on these. Martin Sheen suffered a heart attack and nearly died probably brought on by the very stressful conditions of the shoot and Coppola's 'manipulative directing style '(Madden, 2022)  Coppola wanted the actors to become the characters he envisioned, however, Brando had resolved to become the character he envisioned and through the method acting of Brando many actors wanted to follow his lead;  'He [Brando] changed the idea of the type of person male actors wanted to be. They to be visceral, not polished; they wanted to be masculine; they wanted to be intense.' (Kemp, 2022).

Apocalypse Now was a metaphor for the times, and this highly intense and now classic film has stood the test of time just as Conrad's Heart of Darkness, I leave you with some words from Conrad:

“I don’t like work--no man does--but I like what is in the work--the chance to find yourself. Your own reality--for yourself not for others--what no other man can ever know. They can only see the mere show, and never can tell what it really means'  (Conrad, 1899: from Bookroo)

References

TODAY.com. (2004). Marlon Brando redefined acting. [online] Available at: https://www.today.com/popculture/marlon-brando-redefined-acting-wbna5354214.[Accessed 26/10/23]

Kemp, S. (2022). How Marlon Brando changed Hollywood acting forever. [online] faroutmagazine.co.uk. Available at: https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/how-marlon-brando-changed-hollywood/ [Accessed 27 Oct. 2023].

Coffman, T. (2023). A Match Made In Hell: Marlon Brando in ‘Apocalypse Now’. [online] faroutmagazine.co.uk. Available at: https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/a-match-made-in-hell-marlon-brando-in-apocalypse-now/ [Accessed 27 Oct. 2023].

Madden, C. (2022). The Apocalypse Now Controversy Explained. [online] SlashFilm.com. Available at: https://www.slashfilm.com/783841/the-apocalypse-now-controversy-explained/ [Accessed 27 Oct. 2023].

bookroo.com. (n.d.). The 25 Best Heart of Darkness Quotes. [online] Available at: https://bookroo.com/quotes/heart-of-darkness [Accessed 27 Oct. 2023].

Project Sign Off: Uncertain Times

 After considering my ideas I have now signed off my project on 'uncertain times'  This will be a short film using still images.  here is a quick mock-up using one of my images from the sequential work and a stock image of an explosion.  This is the kind of look I will be trying to achieve through my film. 

Please find my Project Sign Off here I will be working on this throughout the term and I will post my project plan in the next post.

Initial Research: Lee Miller The Aftermath of World War II

For my photo/film project I will be creating original photographic images therefore I am looking at the images of Lee Miller, specifically the photographs she took at the end of World War II, as these show the aftermath of war. Lee Miller began as a model and muse of Man Ray but later she also learnt photography and became a prolific and exceptional photographer working for Life and Vogue magazines. 'She started her career as a fashion-model in New York, later moved to Paris to try her hand in fashion and fine-art photography and was then appointed as war photographer on the front-line in world-war II by Vogue on behalf of America.'(Kapoor, 2020)  The image below is shot using natural daylight coming from the large windows.  The image has been taken top down so Miller (the photographer) was probably standing on a staircase looking into the room.  The rule of thirds has clearly been observed with the three bodies coinciding with the points of the golden ratio.  

 Deputy Mayor Ernst Kurt Lisso and his family after committing suicide by cyanide to avoid capture by US troops, 1945 by Lee Miller

In the image above the three high ranking Nazi offers are laid out and Calvocoressi states; 'Leaning back on the sofa is a girl with extraordinarily pretty teeth. waxen and dusty.  Her nurses uniform is sprinkled with plaster from the battle for City Hall (Calvocoressi: 2002:P62)  The aftermath of the final battle is palpable and this is the consequence of defeat shown in poignant detail here in Millers image. The object on the desk show a previous ordered life, the telephone, the stamp paper and pens, an in-tray.  The mayor sits at his desk for the final time and now there is endless darkness. Like the photographic shutter there is a light, a moment and then a moment of complete darkness before the next frame appears, which is never identical to the last. Alllmer argues in her paper that 'Miller composed images that destabilised Nazi iconographies and explored the breakdown of Nazi aesthetic representations.' (Allmer, 2012).  The power of the image was used through propaganda from all side in World War II and now images are so prolific and with social media manipulation of events and 'fake' news has made our times even more uncertain.  

In my own work I will be looking at more research on Lee Miller and her images and I will explore further techniques and skills to inform my own photographic and film work for this project. 

References

Kapoor, M. (2020) Lee Miller: A woman who took 60,000 WWII photographs and also bathed in Hitler’s tub, the day he..., Medium. Available at: https://medium.com/the-collector/lee-miller-a-woman-who-took-60-000-wwii-photographs-and-also-bathed-in-hitlers-tub-the-day-he-b7f04f07c137 (Accessed: 18 October 2023). 

Calvocoressi R. (2002), Lee Miller: Portraits from Life, London, Thames & Hudson.

Allmer, P. (2012) Lee Miller’s revenge on Fascist Culture - Edinburgh Research explorer, University of Edinburgh. Available at: https://www.research.ed.ac.uk/en/publications/lee-millers-revenge-on-fascist-culture (Accessed: 19 October 2023). 

Major Project: SMART Objective

 After considering my initial ideas and creating a Milanote with intended research I am now ready to write my SMART Objective for my project.  SMART means Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Timely.

Film Still, The Man Who Fell to Earth (1976) Directed by Nicholas Roeg. Above David Bowie 

My photographic project this term for Digital Arts will be a short film of no more than three minutes that will incorporate original and stock still photographs to produce a visual narrative. The concept for the film will be 'uncertain times'.  I will use either a voice-over or subtitles to tell the story, in the manner of Chris Marker's Sans Soleil and copyright-free music. I will take the original shots using an Olympus OMD-Mark II DSLR and I will edit the film using Clipchamp.  This will be completed by the beginning of December.

Milanote Board: Photo Story Project

 In this post I will show my Milanote board which I have used to show the research I intend to do that informs my photo/film project and will inform my project sign off meeting.

Milanote: Photo Journey

Please click on the link above for the full-size Milanote!

Major Project: Initial Ideas

 For this term my first idea is that I use photography but I would also like to use some mixed media to create an art collection of between 4-6 images that could be my portfolio for this term. Maurizo Anzeri has good examples of this idea, in this image he has overlaid the Photograph with embroidery creating a strange mask over the woman underneath.  I like the muted colour palette here and this kind of sepia look is a possibility for my own work. 

Angelo,  from the “Let Them Play” series, 2010

Miles, for Dazed and Confused, 2011*

In this image the pink embroidery again really works over the black and white image and actually this image reminded me of Lazslo Moholy Nagy's work, it has a kind of constructivist sensibility to it. 

Laszlo Moholy Nagy, Gelber Kreis (Yellow circle), 1921

Laszlo Moholy Nagy in his studio

My second idea is to create images and turn them into a film a little like Chris Marker so it may be a combination of personal images with stock images - this will create a narrative like La Jetée (1962) - A short movie by Chris Marker or San Soleil.  La Jetee is a science fiction movie that was the basis of Twelve Monkeys, [Terry Gilliam's] '12 Monkeys (1995), his 1995 film inspired by La Jetée, develops Chris Marker’s ideas even further'(Filmicmag, 2015) . Filmicmag states; 'An interesting cinematic spectacle unlike anything I’ve seen recently, the artistry behind Chris Marker’s seminal film, La Jetée, is groundbreaking. Simplistic in scope, yet vastly deep in its subtext, the film is told through a combination of still monochrome images and the voice-over of a man.' (Filmicmag, 2015).  When I first saw this I was in my first year at university and its photographic beauty is astounding.  I would take black and white images and create a story - this can be narrated and/or there could be subtitles.  There is a simplicity to the images but the soul and longing are palpable throughout and it is the stillness of this moving film.

La Jetee by Chris Marker (1962)

Sans Soleil (Sunless) - Chris Marker 1983

San Soleil is an epic that goes around the world a woman narrates the story and talks about the place the people, and the stories, the diegetic sound comes through quieter and louder depending on the place and the colour and life moves through the world, this a moving film rather than photographs but includes still images and the beauty of the stillnesss again comes through and the film covers so much of life war, sex, work, children, life...

I like the idea of moving between the images, feeling life breathe in-between the images, there have been papers on that moment between images, or the moment we press the shutter. I like the ideas here I want to tell a still story that moves through narrative, through time.  

References

Filmicmag (2015) A comparison of 12 Monkeys & La Jetée, Filmic. Available at: https://filmicmag.com/2015/12/29/a-comparison-of-12-monkeys-la-jetee/ (Accessed: 16 October 2023). 

Advertising Research: Gen X & Retro 1980s 2nd Version

 In this post, I am going to look at advertising in relation to Generation X which will link to my advert for the 1980s retro party event. 'Gen X still reads newspapers, magazines, listens to the radio, and watches TV (about 165 hours worth of TV a month). However, they are also digitally savvy and spend roughly 7 hours a week on Facebook' DMUIC (Digital Arts Handout, 2023) In regards to my own advert as I would like to reach my target market I would put advert in a music magazine such as Q, however this has actually closed down now (Savage, 2020) and possible on social media but probably Twitter and Facebook. Magazines have struggled to survive with the rise of online magazines, cost (now a magazine is very expensive as print costs have soared and the covid pandemic meant that now people really relied much more on information online as they could not physically go out.  The editor of Q stated; 'We've been a lean operation for all of my tenure, employing a variety of ways to help keep our head above water in an extremely challenging print market.' (Savage M. 2020)

Q Magazine, David Bowie Issue (2016) 

Forbes magazine askes the question; 'Why is Gen X-centric marketing still missing the mark so badly?' (Wiley, 2022), Wiley reminds us in his article that Gen X are the smallest generation and often we are overlooked.  However, we are at the height of our earning power in our careers and therefore should have money that we want to spend on goods and services that perhaps other generations would struggle to afford and being that we are older we want more luxury items as our tastes have evolved over the years! Wiley states; 'Gen Xers are in their prime spending years, second only to baby boomers in terms of buying power'  (Wiley, 2022).  Therefore considering advertising for Gen X I would use any means available as Gen X will access both traditional and digital media and I do think if adverts were honed to attract them they would be more likely to spend money, Personally as a Gen Xer I am out off by adverts aimed at Gen Z and Y, they do not have what I want and I will spend more time searching for the goods and services that I am willing to spend money on.  

References

DMUIC Digital Arts Handout (2023), Target Market Behaviours, Leicester, DMU

Savage M., Q Magazine to close after 34 years. (2020). BBC News. [online] 20 Jul. Available at: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-53477377 [Accessed 25 Oct. 2023].

Wiley, D. (2022). Council Post: Here’s How Brands Can Authentically Connect With Gen X. [online] Forbes. Available at: https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesagencycouncil/2022/03/31/heres-how-brands-can-authentically-connect-with-gen-x/. [Accessed 25 Oct 2023].