Post by drnix on Jun 12, 2013 3:01:32 GMT -5
Hi - I'm new to this forum but I'm a big fan of De Palma's work over the years. I've tried to work out why I like his films so much and I think it's because he is an true auteur who keeps revisiting the same themes over and over again. I've tried to capture De Palma's most common themes & obsessions succinctly below... interested to know if anyone thinks I have missed anything...?
De Palma’s Most Common Themes & Visual Styles:
Pure Cinema - Visual Grammar/Visual Stylist
Voyeurism & Film Technology - “Enamoured with the ‘flickers” / Film within Film / Cameras/Telescopes/Binoculars as plot devices
Obsessions/Guilt/ Helplessness
Film Noir Trappings
Femme Fatales
Imperfect Flawed/ Morally ambiguous Heroes/Antiheroes
A love lost/A chance of Redemption/ Sentimentality/ Romantic Cinema
Dreams/Blurred Reality/ Dreams within Dreams
Operatic Balletic Violence / Bravura Style / Elegance
Hyperbole Melodramatic Heightened Performances (deliberate exaggerations to create emphasis or effect)
Overt Artificiality /Deliberate Tonal Shifts & Implausible Coincidences
High Camp/ Kitsch/ Grand Guignol
Suspenseful
Psychological
Sleazy Sexuality
Fragmented/Multiple Personalities/Mirrors/ Doppelgangers/ glimpsing oneself in peripheral vision
Darkly humorous/ Playful/ Cunning/ Deception -the camera lies, don’t believe everything you see
Symbolic use of colours – Red, White, Black
Regular use of film references/homages – Hitchcock (various)/Kubrick/Coppola/Antonioni/Eisenstein…& De Palma’s own back catalogue!
Split-screens/Slow Motion/ Long single-tracking shots/ Canted Angle Shots/Split Focus Shots (Di-Opts), Gliding, swirling camera 360-degree pans/Soft Focus (dreamy)/P.O.V.
De Palma’s Most Common Themes & Visual Styles:
Pure Cinema - Visual Grammar/Visual Stylist
Voyeurism & Film Technology - “Enamoured with the ‘flickers” / Film within Film / Cameras/Telescopes/Binoculars as plot devices
Obsessions/Guilt/ Helplessness
Film Noir Trappings
Femme Fatales
Imperfect Flawed/ Morally ambiguous Heroes/Antiheroes
A love lost/A chance of Redemption/ Sentimentality/ Romantic Cinema
Dreams/Blurred Reality/ Dreams within Dreams
Operatic Balletic Violence / Bravura Style / Elegance
Hyperbole Melodramatic Heightened Performances (deliberate exaggerations to create emphasis or effect)
Overt Artificiality /Deliberate Tonal Shifts & Implausible Coincidences
High Camp/ Kitsch/ Grand Guignol
Suspenseful
Psychological
Sleazy Sexuality
Fragmented/Multiple Personalities/Mirrors/ Doppelgangers/ glimpsing oneself in peripheral vision
Darkly humorous/ Playful/ Cunning/ Deception -the camera lies, don’t believe everything you see
Symbolic use of colours – Red, White, Black
Regular use of film references/homages – Hitchcock (various)/Kubrick/Coppola/Antonioni/Eisenstein…& De Palma’s own back catalogue!
Split-screens/Slow Motion/ Long single-tracking shots/ Canted Angle Shots/Split Focus Shots (Di-Opts), Gliding, swirling camera 360-degree pans/Soft Focus (dreamy)/P.O.V.