above is the Super Bowl Doritos commercial discussed in class early today. This was a low budget commercial ($20) which greatly contrasts the 3+ million dollar commercials the Super Bowl is known for previewing. It also comments on our discussion about youtube and advertisements. If you watch the video you’ll see advertisements popping up all over the page.

I decided to watch God Loves Uganda after Rodger William’s talk on Thursday. I was extremely intrigued by the conversation and the trailer. The documentary did a great job in showing both sides of the argument. The extremists in the film did everything possible to spread ideologies to the people of Uganda making it almost hard to watch. A lot of the things said seemed ridiculous and it surprised me how Williams was able to stay silent and film and even get really close to these people. There were times where I was extremely angry and I remember Williams saying he learned to love everyone even those against his belief. He got that close to them and that something extremely admirable as I’m sure it wasn’t easy. I really enjoyed this film. I was thrown into emotion after emotion getting specifically mad at how much Americans impacted the lives of these people. Williams was able to catch in perfect timing the build up to the anti-homosexual bill that passed in Uganda.

It was also nice to see a documentary that doesn’t show how this flm was personal to the director. It was evident without him being in the film specifically how important this was to him without his personal story in the mix. You can tell in just the shots how much he had to endure in order to catch the moment and put it in his film. He mentioned it in his talk but the scene where they were burying David Kato became a fight between both sides in one shot. He mentioned how rocks were thrown and how the activist had to be rushed away. He put himself in danger as most film makers do to capture the moment and spread it to the world. After watching God Loves Uganda I understood and was grateful that it got the attention it deserved.

http://www.movingimage.us/films/2015/01/09/detail/first-look-2015/

On the subject of experimental film another new form of film has grown into something deeper than we first imaged. We have seen these on websites like tumblr and is known as the GIF. Graphics Interchange Format are short clips of something with no sound seen all over social media sites. They have been seen as nothing more than a comical way to represent an emotion or response but is now seen as more. At the MOMA in January there was an exhibition of GIFs being seen as an art form. First Look is a festival that showcases new approaches to film making. It showcases “works that defy convention, experiment in form, blend fiction and reality, and allow us to see the art form—and the world—in a new way.” This year they showcased animated GIFs as an art form. We may never look at GIFs the same way again!

http://www.sesamestreet.org/parents/topicsandactivities/toolkits/incarceration

I know Professor Sikand posted the John Oliver’s satirical version on the subject of parent incarceration but I looked up the specific episode and found that there was a whole web page on the subject on Sesamestreet.com. This was a bigger deal on show then I expected. The subject went on for a while, they had animation on visiting dad in prison, they had songs, they had specific stories of kids with incarcerated parents, and multiple clips of parents giving advice on how to handle a situation like this. Then on the physical website there is a kid kit with many tools that parents and children can use to help deal with having a parent in jail. Then finally at the bottom there are 7 tips. I think it is important that this subject is being addressed and talked about but it says a lot about what is happening in America. The fact that so many kids are dealing with living with an incarcerated parent to the point where they need to be represented on Sesame Street shows just how many we are putting in jail. Seeing this online was very unsettling.

The House I Live In (Jarecki, 2012) explores the Jailing system in the United States. Jarecki uses interviews, real storiesm,  history to create this fascinating story. The most important message I received from this story is that no one, including people in power positions, are particularly okay with the situation of the jail system and the drug laws that are in place. When the media portrays a drug bust, they sensationalize the story and portray the drug dealer as the primary bad guy and the judge and officers as good guys. The fact is, no one in this scenario is the good guy. Jarecki does an incredible thing by documenting this. You never hear of a cop or judge resigning because of the harsh laws or feeling bad. Because they receive incredible payment, drug busts have been incentivized. The officers and Judge being interviewed tell the story unheard. The Judge has no choice, the law is in place, hence why so many judges have resigned, they feel terrible and feel like the sentence the give is unjust for the crime. The officers discussed the dangers of incentivizing officers to bust people for drugs. Officers receive more money for drug busts and can find and close cases much quicker than a murder or rape. They also have families to feed and bills to pay. This puts rape and murder on the back burner.  Jarecki’s stories he exposes are what is not shown to the media. He gains sympathy when exposing a talented inmate playing the guitar with his mother to really sway the audience. His interview techniques give the viewer sympathy to the people involved and also make you feel like the prison system is corrupt in America. If it is corrupt or is not corrupt does not matter, but Jarecki’s decision to frame the film like this gives a sympathetic feeling to the audience member in an effort to skew the viewer’s previous view points about this situation.

“Everyone looks at us like these pioneers, like we know exactly what we’re doing. We have no idea what we’re doing” (Marcus Johns, Vine star). Johns mentions this when they began to film an idea for a vine. He has no idea really what they are doing but they know what they are doing gains popularity and goes viral within a couple hours. Most famous viners just experiment with everyday life situations. They use society as  their experiment. They portray societies flaws, such as racism, in a funny way and hope other people think it is funny, and people do. It is their realistic elements that attract people to their silly 6 second clips. For instance, people being themselves because they can be. Without the Hollywood star like titles, their credibility increases. If they promote Michael Jordan sneakers, people immediately believe they are great shoes. They subconsciously believe “He doesn’t have to promote those shoes for money, he really likes them”. Due to this promotion however, Bach met with the Jordan brand for advertising and more promotional videos. The use of experimenting with popular trends in society and the aspect of increased credibility catapults these vine stars into stars. Although these videos are shot on Iphones, they also use elements of film such as blocking and editing and pre/post production to make a 6 second clip complex and well made.

After watching The House I Live In, I couldn’t believe the jail time that many of the inmates were getting. There have been countless murder cases, even horrific ones, in which the offender had a lesser sentence than some of the mentioned drug dealers and addicts in the documentary. I couldn’t believe that some people can even get a life sentence on a drug charge alone. It was astounding that one small mistake can destroy one’s entire life. Many of the drug offenders should have been helped and treated instead of being thrown into a prison and transported far away from society.  I don’t think it is right to treat these people the same way a murderer would be treated and labeling the offender as a bad person. Most of the time the person was not raised in the best environment and is doing what he can to survive. With these kind of charges, it is scary that cops will do whatever it takes to bust as many people as they can in order to receive a higher pay check. In the documentary, police officers would get paid overtime for additional cases and filling out the paperwork that goes along with it. This documentary really opened my eyes to the unfair ways people with drug charges are being handled. They shouldn’t just be banished from society as a way of dealing with them. I hope change comes soon and we, as a country, figure out a better way of dealing with the war on drugs.

I found the talk with Roger Williams very inspiring and very interesting. I have never been in the presence of such a highly successful producer before and it was interesting hearing his story. I loved the way he went about making films and how passionate he was about them. It was interesting to see how he got his motivation because he thought the story wasn’t being told correctly. It was also interesting to see how his assistance was so involved with his career in keeping it organized. It shows he respected her by giving her the golden ticket to Sundance. I wonder how hard of a transition it was for her coming right out of school to become so organized. I also wonder what classes she wished she could have taken to help her more in her job.

After watching Jarecki’s 2012 documentary, The House I Live In, I consider it to be a huge eye opener. From a young age the stereotype of prisons is that “very bad” people are put away there. While that may be true, there are also some inmates in there that have made a few wrong turns down the wrong path and have been given a sentence of a ridiculous amount of years. It is amazing that how someone who murdered someone can get the same amount of years as some of the people in this film for selling drugs, or even more. I am not saying that I condone those actions of illegal selling but I do not believe that they should be treated the same as a murder or rapist.  This documentary exemplifies exactly this. One police officer in the movie gave an excellent statement of how it is almost like the prisoners are “paying for our fear instead of paying for their crime.” And then, for those who are released, it is almost as if they are still paying for their crime due to the obstacles that lay ahead of them when trying to begin again. The difficulties of finding a job are extremely hard and therefore no job leads to no money which leads to no housing, etc… Therefore, this leads them to right back where they started and the cycle begins again.

There were also certain aspects of the film that I really appreciated. I loved the level of intimacy the director showed with each person he interviewed. Each really opened up and showed the audience their story. Listening and seeing them in their own world created a personal connection with the viewers. The variety of locations helped show that this is a problem across the country and not in one area.

In this documentary, I loved the layout. I loved how the documentary talked about the drugs and the impacts it has on so many families first. Then, the documentary discussed the survival aspect of selling drugs. The idea that it isn’t for moral pleasure but for pure survival in a world that doesn’t hire ex criminals. The documentary continues to talk about the youth and how they are constantly being sucked into the whole drug dealing world at such a young age that they don’t know anything else. The interviews with affected victims were very powerful towards the end in that they carried the effect of drugs on their facial expressions. I could feel their pain through the screen. Lastly, I enjoyed the ending. The whole topic of the man who was sentenced to life in jail on probation for smuggling small amounts of drugs. I think it’s ridiculous that his mom had to go through everything she went through with her son and dead daughter. The ending really paved the way for the possible future of drugs and laws against drugs.