Hoje eu quero voltar sozinho (Daniel Ribeiro, 2014) 

It Happened One Night (Frank Capra, 1934)

Vertigo (Alfred Hitchcock, 1958)

The Grapes of the Wrath

We are studying Steinbeck in "Literatura norteamericana III" but we only have time to read "The Pearl". Instead of reading The Grapes of Wrath, which is a long novel, we watched the film adaptation.


Are they different stories?

Well, I have not read the novel, so I can only tell you what we were told in class. It seems that the novel by John Steinbeck was very controversial, even banned and burned by citizens, but was also a success and Steinbeck won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 1940.
And what about the film? Was it also controversial? We all know that Hollywood films are not done to make people think, but to make money, so the film is a sweeten version of the very controversial book. Even dealing with a difficult theme as the Great Depression, the film has some brief moments of comic relief (the dance at the government camp) which do not appear in the novel.


What I liked the most of The Grapes of Wrath (John Ford, 1940) is that you can find some of the Steinbeck's literature characteristics if you look closely. For example, generalization. Generalization means that one character does not only speaks for himself, but represents a collective. The story of the Joad's is also the story of a lot of people who were forced out of their lands, their homes. These people is somehow connected to their lands. As if they could not live out of it, as we can see when grandpa (Charley Grapewin) dies right after the trip starts. 

Another characteristic of Steinbeck's is that his works has references to the Bible. These family, that represents every family of farmers, set out on a trip to California, the promised land, as the Israelites crossed the Red Sea (Colorado river in the film).

Another reference to the Bible can be found. Casey (John Carradine) is seen as Jesus Christ, as both spread a message to the mass, especially to the poor people. Tom Joad (Henry Fonda) is Casey's Peter. At first, Tom becames an apostle (follows Casey's ideas) and when he dies, he takes his places and becomes the responsible of spreading the message.

 Tom Joad after deciding to leave the camp.

To finish, I am going to discuss the ending. In the novel, after that long trip, the family loses everything after a big storm. However, they seem to have a future (not bright, but at least an opportunity) in the film.

Midnight in Paris

If there is one thing that I like about Midnight in Paris (Woody Allen, 2011)  it is the treatment of time. The film plays with time in the sense that the protagonist "travels" to the past for a certain amount of time, every night when a car passes through the same street.

I do like Woody Allen. I find his style very interesting, but he reminds me to the writer Paul Auster, since both are always using the same kind of story again and again and... the reader of viewer find themselves reading or watching a film or a book that has a different title but is, essentially, the same as all their works before. 

Peter's friends

Peter's friends (Kenneth Branagh, 1992)  tells the story of six old friends who first met in England, where the film takes place. They have the first meeting for the first time in years. To let us know how they became friends, the film starts with a flashback of the times they met, when they shared all their life and meant everything for each other.

The main attraction of the film is the appearance of famous faces of the British television: the comedian Stephen Fry and the popular Hugh Laurie.

Then, it goes back to actual times and shows us how time acts. Because time changes everything and it is not fair. All these six friends are now unhappy in some way. They used to be fortunate, but their lifes now seem to be a poor version of what they hoped. Expectations never met reality.

Even more, the special relation seems to have changed. Years have passed and they are not able to rely on each other. They do not feel comfortable sharing their misfortunes with the others. The film is about these changes: before, they understood each other, now they feel judged. 

Is it impossible, then, for a friendship to survive? Only the memories will stay even if the friendship was pure? In the film, a difficult situation will prove if the old friendship is still somewhere in there , hidden, or if it is completely dissapeared now. Who knows if they will face up to it together, as they would have done before..?

The Lion King

When I was a child I used to watch The Lion King (Roger Allers and Rob Minkoff, 1994) almost every Sunday. My brother and I sat down on the sofa and just stayed there for 90 minutes. It has been almost 10 years since I last watched The Lion King and now I can say it it is a different movie. 
Well, it's the same movie. It's only that I'm not 7 years old now.
It's still a really nice movie to watch on a Sunday evening.

Mufasa - Simba, let me tell you something my father told me. Look at the stars. The great kings of the past look down on us from those stars. Simba - Really?
Mufasa - Yes. So whenever you feel alone, just remember that those kings will always be there to guide you. And so will I.