Weekly Film Analysis: Don't Hang Up (2016)

This film is a 2016 American horror-thriller film directed by Alexis Wajsbrot, produced by Jason Newark and written by Joe Johnson. The themes that run throughout this film were friendships, relationships, negligence, betrayal and loyalty. This film would engage an audience of around 14-21 years as the main stars are teenagers, and of the topic of ‘prank calling’ this relates to this age group as it is what teenagers get up to today. The cinematography of this film was Nat Hill- there are many scenes which create so much meaning to the film, creating a cyclical narrative structure to the film, and holding onto the audience’s attention. This was distributed by Vertical Entertainment and the location of the film was based in the United States. This was released in June 2016 at the Los Angeles Film Festival and released in theatres in February 2017.

The main scene in this film was shown twice in the beginning and at the end of the film. The scene showed a situation of a family being pranked at the beginning of the film, but didn’t show the full scene. Again the scene was shown at the end of the film but showing the harsh reality of what the outcome of the prank call had caused on this family. The use of the performance shows how the family felt terrified and foreshadowed that the beginning scene was left on a cliff hanger making the audience make predictions of what might occur later.

Lion (2016)

Lion is a 2016 Drama film directed by Garth Davis, written by Luke Davies and produced by Iain Canning.  This was based on the non-fiction book ‘A long way home’ by Saroo Breirley with Larry Buttrose. This was on the world premiere at Toronto International Film Festival. Production companies of this film were See-saw films and distributed by The Weinstein Company. The location of the film is set in Australia, India and United Kingdom. The film was set in three languages; Bengali, Hindi and English. The budget of the film was $12 million and had a box office of $75.3 million for its outstanding true based story and wide range audience from huge fans of Dev Patel who played the protagonist of this film. He was also starring in Slumdog Millionaire, reaching out to the audience of that making them watch ‘Lion’ with their similarities of child exploitation, poverty and crime in India. Slumdog Millionaire would be a film to compare as they both star Dev Patel playing as the protagonist living in the cruel third world country known as India.

Performance was a key micro feature that tied together the story performed by Dev Patel telling an astonishing story where he lost home at the age of five and had to survive in Kolkata alone. He was almost sex trafficked but luckily escaped and put into an orphanage where an Australian couple adopted him, giving him the life he needed and brought him up to be a beautifully smart 25 year old business man who wanted to find his real family. The scene where he hugged his Australian mother signified how he showed his love and affection to a woman who wasn’t even his blood, but still considered her as a mother. Young Saroo gathered an empathetic audience who felt very sorry for his poor conditions of his vulnerable reality.

Weekly Film Review: Fifty Shades Darker (2017)

Fifty Shades Darker is the second volume of the Fifty Shades of Grey (first volume) and Fifty shades freed (last volume).

It is a 2017 American erotic romantic drama film directed by James Foley and written by Niall Leonard and based on the novel by E. L. James. This is starring Dokata Johnson (Anatasia) and Jamie Dornan (Christian Grey).

I would say both play as the protagonists and they both want to be together in a non-submissive relationship, however Leila Williams would be the antagonist as she is obsessed with Christian as she demonstrates a sense of submissive behaviour towards Grey. Furthermore, an antagonist to Anatasia would be her boss as he shows his interest in her. Close up shots shows his interest in her by his constant staring at her at work and performance of when he attempts to seduce Anatasia in his office. The production company of this film was Michael De Luca Productions and distributed by Universal Pictures. The location of this was set in the United States. The Budget of this film was $55 million and $144.6 million, giving a rating of 6/10 in only 4 days of been released.