Acting and Acting Styles

Three actors I chose are Tom Hanks, Vin Diesel, and Matt Damon. Tom Hanks and Matt Damon I see as a stylized and realism actor. Vin Diesel has a style of acting which is realism.  All thought they all have done different in different films Tom Hanks and Matt Damon appear to be switching styles based on his role in the film.  In Saving Private Ryan they all are doing realism acting.

The Reasons I classified the actors as I did was each role each actor has you can tell they are acting by the accents they have or their dim wit mentality like Tom Hanks’ role in Forrest Gump.  Stylized acting is described as being used when actors and directors want to call attention to the fact that the actor is, indeed,  In Saving Private Ryan Tom Hanks used realism acting as he had a natural reaction in each scene.  Vin Diesel had a small role in Saving Private Ryan as Private Caparzo, he was part of the squad to save Private Ryan but ends up getting shot by sniper in a bell tower. He has played in many roles but he has a  realism acting style which is described as an acting that doesn’t draw attention to itself but instead gives the impression of genuine human action and reaction (Goodykoontz, B., & Jacobs, C. P. 2014).  Matt Damon in Saving Private Ryan plays Private Ryan in the film and has uses a realism acting style. 

Tom Hanks does not fall under the same category of acting.  He uses different styles of acting based on his role in the film.  In Saving Private Ryan and Apollo 13 he used realism but in Forrest Gump he used stylized acting.  His ability to switch acting styles based on his role in my eyes makes him an amazing actor and lets him do many different style of films and tailor his acting style based on his character.

Saving Private Ryan – Functions of Sound

Describe each of the three basic categories of sound (dialogue, sound effects, and music).

Dialogue: The dialogue is when the characters in a film are talking to one another (Goodykoontz & Jacobs, 2014).  The dialogue in a film plays a big role because it can set the tone and the pace of how the film is going to pan out.

Sound Effects: Sound effects plays a big part in any movie.  It lets the audience feel as if they are in the movie by hearing everything that’s going on in the film.  For example action movies you hear a lot of gun fire and explosions.

Music: Music is used to set the mood and make the audience “feel” the mood of the movie or a particular scene.  It can also be tied in with dialogue to help the audience feel as if there was a bigger impact for that particular scene.

Explain how the different categories of sound are being used in your chosen film.

• Assess the impact of sound in establishing the theme.
  • Sounds plays a big role in any film. It was a major component in Saving Private Ryan.  For Saving Private Ryan the sounds they used set the tone for scenes with the gun shots and explosions going on all over the place.  The way the movie was filmed it make the audience feel as if they were storming Omaha Beach with mortars exploding and the sounds of bullets hissing by.

• How does the use of sound inform the mood of the scene, or the film overall?
  • The use of sound is crucial especially in Saving Private Ryan. The Sound of gun fire and bullets flying by or even impacting the ground around the soldiers can set the tone of a scene.  Without the sounds it would make the movie boring and not as intense.

• Can you identify specific sounds in your film that allow you to infer a particular genre?
  • As I stated earlier what makes this a action movie is the sounds of gun fire, exploding mortars, the cries of fallen soldiers for a medic. It makes the scene pop out to the audience and gets them to want more of what is going on.

• Since each category of sound may produce a range of effects, how might you characterize the effects in your film? For example, realistic and expected sound effects may have a different effect on a viewer than exaggerated or unexpected ones.
  • There is one scene in Saving Private Ryan. The scene is with one of the soldiers has a kid in his hand and he is trying to help all you hear the child crying and the rain hitting the ground..  Capt Miller is telling the soldier to give the kid back to his parents but he doesn’t listen.  Capt Miller grabs the kid and gives the kid to his parents and then you see the soldier fall to the ground and a second later you hear a gun shot.  That sound of the gun shot catches you off guard.  the clip below is of the scene.

• Assess how the scene or sequence would play differently if you changed or removed a key category of sound.
  • If say gunfire was removed it would make the film not as intense and not that exciting to want to keep watching more. Saving Private Ryan is an action film and those sounds of gun fire and bullets flying through the air play a big part in making the film what it is.  If this movie was maybhttp://youtu.be/HYrf0RheJP8e a drama it could fly but not in an action film.

Saving Private Ryan – Lighting

Lighting: Saving Private Ryan used low-key lighting. One scene that was great for low-key lighting is where Capt Miller and his squad are in a church. In this scene Capt Miller talks about people he has lost and the comical moment of what one specific person did.  Then Cprl Wade talks about how he would pretend to be asleep when his mother would get home from work and want to talk to her son but for whatever reason he would act like he was asleep to avoid talking to her but doesn’t know why he did it.  Here his regret is expressed as he faces his own death.  This is a remarkable religious scene, the epiphany through violence. The benefit of using this style of lighting produces more of an intense action scene or even a more dramatic moment. The lighting technique suited the film very well I think.  Although I don’t think they used it for all the scenes.  I think some scenes were natural light but one scene where low light was used is that shows how brutal war can be is after the church they continue on to find Pvt. Ryan in the shroud of darkness to avoid being seen by the enemy.  It shows bright light from explosions in the background and you see Capt Miller and his squad walking in the foreground.  Without the light coming from the explosions in the background you would never know they were there.  If a different lighting would have been used I don’t think in the scenes I talked about I think it wouldn’t of made the church scene as personal or dramatic and after they leave the church if it was a day time type setting it wouldn’t show the realism and intensity that war brings.

References: 

GoodyKoontz, B., & Jacobs, C.P. (2011). Film: From watching to seeing. San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint Education, Inc. https://contentashford.edu

Saving Private Ryan

Title: Saving Private Ryan

Writer: Robert Rodat

Director: Steven Spielberg

Year: 1998

Actors: Tom Hanks (Capt John Miller), Tom Sizemore (Sergeant Horvath), Edward Burns (Private Reiben), Barry Pepper (Private Jackson), Adam Goldberg (Private Mellish), Vin Diesel (Private Caparzo), Giovanni Ribisi (T-4 Medic Wade), Jeremy Davies (Corporal Upham), and Matt Damon (PvT James Ryan).

Story: Opening with the Allied invasion of Normandy on 6 June 1944, members of the 2nd Ranger Battalion under Cpt. Miller fight ashore to secure a beachhead. Amidst the fighting, two brothers are killed in action. Earlier in New Guinea, a third brother is KIA. Their mother, Mrs. Ryan, is to receive all three of the grave telegrams on the same day. The United States Army Chief of Staff, George C. Marshall, is given an opportunity to alleviate some of her grief when he learns of a fourth brother, Private James Ryan, and decides to send out 8 men (Cpt. Miller and select members from 2nd Rangers) to find him and bring him back home to his mother.

Plot: After the invasion of fortress Europe on June 6th 1944, Tom Hanks leads his squad from the 2nd Ranger Battalion of the 29th Infantry Division, on a mission to find and bring home Private James Francis Ryan after the death of his brothers. The mission takes them through Nazi occupied territory to establish contact with Ryan’s unit an element of the 101st Airborne Division. This exiting war thriller brings the reality of history’s bloodiest war into the homes of ordinary people, but also brings into light the reality of broken and lost families in a time of total and encompassing war.

Chronology: This movie was in chronological order. It starts out showing the name Ryan on a fallen soldiers back pack then moves to where the letters to families were being typed. A woman seeing the name Ryan and finds two other letters and takes all three letters to the Major in charge. He then brings it to the attention of a Col who takes it to a General where he says they will get out of the warzone and back home.

The way the film was shot made it seem as if you were right there on the beach or walking through the open fields with the small group of rangers. When they storm Omaha Beach the camera kept sweeping back and forth as if you were running on the beach and looking at everything that was going on. If the film was shot in a different way I don’t think Mr. Spielberg would of been able to get the intensity he wanted in the film. In the combat scenes it would of been almost boring to watch and not as intense.