ASSIGNMENT 2

SCHEMATIC, ARTEFACT AND PRESENTATION

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REFLECTIVE STATEMENT 

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FILM OVERVIEW / PRESENTATION NOTES 

The first thing we did for the movie was to sit down and watch it again. I had first watched Akira several years ago whenever I was much younger, it was cool for the time. However, once I re watched it, I picked up on quite a lot of things I wouldn't have really paid attention too. I would say that one of the most foremost aspects of the story that Akira deals with, is the folly of man. We are presented at the beginning of the film with a large explosion detonating over the city. This alerts the viewer to the underlying fact that whatever they are about to see on screen is going to be futile to prevent what is going to happen, which gives some of the slower scenes in the movie some sort of underlying tension that wouldn't really be there if we weren't already hinted too that destruction is imminent. This is further enforced by the feel the viewer gets from the climate of the city. The cities corruption has spread to its very core, where gang violence and acts of terrorism are never far away from the streets.

As the movie progresses, there is a series of mini events which occur - it is not one event that leads to the event being carried out. For example, first it is a pure coincidence that Tetsuo collides with Takashi which triggers the entire event in the first place. Then, further in the film, Tetsuo's power is triggered whenever he takes Kaneda's bike and pursued by the rival biker gang -  and Kaori his love interest gets assulted. As events unfold, various factions are at play to try and get a hold of the situation, the Colonel on the side of the state, and then the anti government  forces that Kei and Ryu are involved in. However, as Tetsuo's power grows the  state of things decline until the image we are presented with at the beginning of the film is shown to us. By the end of the film the citizens of Neo Tokyo have dedicated themselves to the streets in frantic repent as the fear of a growing "Akira", translating into english as "bright" or "clear". With the state of Neo-Tokyo as it is the viewer feels that its fate was sealed with either way. We are left wondering if Kaneda, Kai, Kaisuke and the Colonel are the only survives of the event, as for the first time in the film clear, blue skies spread across the ruins of the city. 

In my part of the schematic, I had to evaluate where the Colonel was, and where he was going within the story. We all chose characters, took notes and placed them in the Photoshop document. 

Then for the the artefacts, we defiantly needed to use the bike in some way - it is an iconic motif of the film. Knowing that we would be hard to replicate it exactly, we took the idea of Tetsuo's transformation at the end of the film, and just combined the two by covering a red bike we had made up with lots of brains/flesh (clay) and scrap (metal wires). 

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PEER ASSESSMENT 

Myself- I felt like I could have done more myself for the group. In the background, there was the other Maya classwork I had to keep up with, which i felt that I was struggling. I had started working in a group for the floating city project with members who where, and still are way better at working their way around Maya than me. Once that went underway, I felt that there really wasn't any real deadline this part of the course. But I think most of us pulled together in the end to show something for the assessment. 

Alicia - Great ideas and modelling for the concept. Of the second Artefact. Came in for group meetings and participated well. 

Travis - Took the helm of the group relatively quickly and pushed things on to make sure that everything was done. Great ideas when coming to the artefact  and good use of the 3D printer for some of the development work. 

Kai - Although did show up for some meetings, was more or less absent for most of the groups progress. 

Emmet -  Showed up for group work, was really good to play around with ideas with for the hand ins. Put in the hours for the artefact and was fun to work with. 

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TASK 1

INTRO TO TERM 2 & READING 

Our intro lecture we discussed an array of topics, focusing all about the concept of narrative. 

Is story and narrative the same? Arguably, at a first thought, yes, a story is a narrative - however the idea of a narrative has a somewhat more dense, complex meaning than just a story. 

We were given some books to look into, and to prepare a short presentation on for next week. We were then divided into groups to get going to the task at hand. 

Joseph Campbells Hero with a Thousand Faces, published originally in the 1940s, is the first book I looked into. From reading the opening chapter and introduction, the author touches on some theories that I studied first about 3 years ago whenever I was sitting AS Religion, particularly the theories of Freud and the ideas surrounding our unconscious coming through in our dreams. 

Within the group, I was asked to research the archetype of the "Shapeshifter"- a complex type of character who's role is to confuse and muddy the hero's thought and journey. 

In Volgers Book, The Hero's Journey , the author writes of how a shapeshifter may appear to the viewer. In biblical terms, the shapeshifter is often a women, the Temptress. For example, Jezebel, who is a character from the book of Kings. She is the queen of a foreign nation who has married the Israelite king Ahab. She pushes foreign gods onto the people of Israel, and in the end, she is punished by being fed to the dogs. 

Another example the book lists as an example of a "Shape Shifter" is the Femme Fatal characters that we see in 1940s film noir movies. For example, in Hitchcock's The Paradime Case , Gregory Peck's character plays an attorney defending Maddalena Paradime (played by Alida Valli) who stands accused of the murder of her military hero husband. The two fall in love, only in the end Paradime admits fully to the murder of her husband. 

However, it would be incorrect and sexist to have every shapeshifter character a woman. There are many examples of males who play the role. A particular example of this is the American tv show Homeland  - were the main character, Nicholas Brody (played by Damian Lewis) is a US marine imprisoned by the Taliban for 8 years. On his return home, something is not quite right, and later it is revealed that  Brody may indeed be a terrorist sleeper agent. However, the viewer is kept on edge with the constant back and fourth that the programmes  protagonist may also be the antagonist. 

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