May Merrill Gillespie

Film Essay

      Both Glory and 12 Years a slave help to give a better and deeper understanding of the effects of slavery in the history of the US. It is possible to develop great analytical skills and explore real events, circumstances, and attitudes just by watching movies in a critical way, and doing some research. 

     There is a huge difference between watching a historically based movie in the comfort of your home, and watching it in the classroom. Naturally you are not going to analyze and think deeply about a movie's true meaning and message unless there is a specific task at hand. When you watch a movie in the classroom and truly try to depict the message it is trying to portray, it can be an amazing way to learn. 

     The movie 12 Years a Slave speaks volumes to how cruel and mistreated slaves were treated in the US. The film director does a great job of getting the message across in a entertaining manner. By watching this movie, you can begin to try and empathize with he people of this era because you feel like you have experienced pieces of how it was to live in a time period where slavery was popular. Without a visual image of how difficult life was back then, it is more difficult to place yourself in their position. This relates to analytical thinking because of the word empathy. Empathizing with someone, especially a slave, takes a high use of analytical thinking. I feel that without watching the movie, the door to analytically thinking about what it would be like to live in this time period would not be open quite as wide. Having an image and watching how people that lived during this time period dealt with slavery is very helpful. The movie 12 Years a Slave is based off a book written by the man that the movie is based on, Solomn Northup. The fact that this movie was based on a book that was written by the person who actually experienced all of these things makes it that much greater of a learning tool. The filmmakers goals were to find the truth and to communicate it. Filmmakers sometimes really struggle with producing true stories. The reason is that they want to provide an educational, real film about what they are trying to communicate, but also have to make it entertaining. In 12 Years a Slave the filmmaker did an amazing job with achieving this goal by communicating the brutality of slavery while also making it attention grasping. 

     The movie Glory is known for it's powerful story telling. Although this film is amazingly produced and has a powerful story line, people have definitely questioned it's accuracy. Unlike 12 Years a Slave, the movie Glory didn't really have a fair amount of primary sources. This caused the movie to be told to have masked much brutality that took place. It doesn't do as well of a job portraying the feelings of the black enlisted men. This film is also told to have embellished the characters to create more of an interest of the viewers. This is an example of the struggles of filming a historical event. The 54th Regiment was pretty much wiped out in the end. A crude ending like this could leave viewers feeling awful, causing the film to get bad reviews. So, the film maker had to create a way to get a positive message across. In the end, he did a stand up job of sending the message that white and black soldiers came together in the end. Even if this film is not believed to have the amount of historical accuracy as 12 Years a Slave does, it is still a great opportunity to exercise analytical thinking. Analytical thinking could take place in the way of thinking how this film could be changed or edited to be more up front about how the black enlisted men felt. 

     Rather every fact in a historical movie is true or not, films are still an amazing way to learn about events of the past. It causes us to analytically think about how these past events have changed the world we live in today. These historical films also help for us to relate how these historical events, and what people have learned from them are still relevant today. 

Hyperlinks:

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/18/movies/12-years-a-slave-holds-nothing-back-in-show-of-suffering.html?_r=0

http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2013/10/17/_12_years_a_slave_true_story_fact_and_fiction_in_mostly_accurate_movie_about.html

http://a-bittersweet-life.tumblr.com/post/64783364652/the-adventure-of-filmmaking-12-years-a-slave-with

http://www.historynet.com/basking-in-two-decades-of-glory.htm

http://www.tcm.com/this-month/article/194041%7C0/Glory.html

Practicing Incorporating a Quotation

This film was not portrayed well from the colored man's perspective. The producer hid some of the intense mis-treatment and majorly down played it. "The film should have, if possible, integrated some primary-source material from an enlisted (black) man’s perspective." This quote reveals that the producer should've incorporated more of the 54th Regiment from the enlisted black men's perspective.

   I learned that paraphrasing should portray the same idea that the original passage does. It should not just be a summary of what the author is saying. Instead, you should take the exact same ideas of the author and put them into different words.

This is what Mrs. Lawson wanted me to learn today:

• Only use a quote when it adds power and style to my writing.
• Always make it clear, from context, that I understand the full meaning of the quote.
• Whether I quote or paraphrase, always be transparent about the source and how i'm using it.
• If I use another author's exact words or phrases, to any extent, I have to use quotation marks and give credit. 
• If i use another author's presentation of facts or ideas, but put their ideas in my own words, I better have a good reason for doing that, and I MUST give credit.
• Hyperlinking is so easy, there is no excuse for not being transparent about my sources. 

I understand what we went over today about paraphrasing.

Paraphrasing Practice

     "As well, the film paints race relations in the North as fairly rosy, with substantial prejudice but without virulent hatred. While a few white characters, such as the quartermaster who refuses to grant the regiment boots, speak rudely about black people, it is not particularly intense. This ignores a history of profound racism in the free state, with many black soldiers fighting in the war to prove their worth to society." This is by Alex Langer from McGillblogs.com

     The film gives the viewers the picture of race relations in the North as being fair, with a certain amount of pre-judgement, but no violent hate. There are several white characters, one being the quartermaster, that look down on black people and speak vulgarly about them, but it's portrayed as being not very intense. Through this movie the obvious racism in the free state is down played, and so is the fact that many black soldiers fought to prove their importance to society.

Empathy vs. Sympathy

     The way we defined empathy in class is having the intellectual identification or vicarious experience of the feelings/thoughts/attitudes of another. Another definition we gave empathy is having the experience of understanding anothers condition from their perspective. The way we defined sympathy is feelings of pity and sorrow for someone else's misfortune.

     An example of using empathy would be using your imagination and thinking about the situation that someone is in. Even though you may not have experienced the same thing, you can imagine yourself in the situation and try to understand emotions they may feel.

It would be important for someone who is studying history to be able to empathize because they study other people lives and events they went through on a daily basis. They should be able to put themselves in other people's shoes because it would help them to have a more accurate representation of past events to convey to the people they are trying to teach.