Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs 2 (2013)/Jurassic Park (1994)

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2 isn't nearly as good as its predecessor, but it still does some pretty cool stuff:

The World of Mean Girls (2004), Part 1

Everyone who has seen the movie Mean Girls knows that this is how Regina George dies (Just kidding!):

 

 But do we realize that the film foreshadows this, gives it away, in fact, in the first five minutes, where we learn that Evanston High School has the worst bus driver ever?

Also, there's this:

Subtle.

There's also a brilliant bit of visual storytelling, this time in the form of costuming, that signifies the end of Gretchen Wiener's story arc:

Pssst... it's the earrings. I'm talking about the earrings.

These two clever bits are really just the beginning of how brilliant this film is. Read on, bee-otches!

Fight The Power

A new homage I realized in the opening credits of Spike Lee's Do The Right Thing:

Probably direct references to:

Martin Scorsese's Raging Bull. Both are films where music and score play an essential part of the narrative, and given Do The Right Thing's themes of Lee's frustration with the fighting between the Blacks and Italians in Bed-Stuy, this homage can be seen as Spike Lee stepping up to Scorsese's level. He's paying his due respects, while also declaring that he is capable of creating something just as good, however different. The fact that  Scorsese was and is well-known for showing the "dirty side" of NYC, yet Lee was ready to do the same thing, in a side of the city that hadn't received mainstream representation yet.

Of course, DTRT has plenty of more blatant references:




Then finally, a three years later, another film took a great throwaway line from Spike Lee which also owed a great deal to the films of Scorsese:

Sweet Dick Willy: Shit, Mike Tyson even dream about whoopin' my ass, he better wake up and apologize.

Mr White: Shit, you shoot me in a dream, you better wake up and apologize.

The Switch (2010)

Let's be clear about something. The Switch, starring Jason Bateman and Jennifer Aniston, is not a good movie. It's not a terrible one either, there are moments of brightness to it. However, it's impossible to get over the premise of the film, wherein Bateman drunkenly replaces the sperm sample intended to be in vitro inserted into Jennifer Aniston's womb with his own. Therefore, he literally hijacks her uterus and she spends years believing the biological father of this child is someone else.

There is one incredibly subtle gag in this film, however. It made me laugh out loud in the theater when I caught it, and no one else understood why I was laughing. In what is supposed to be a sad, introspective moment of the film, Jason Bateman's character is walking down the street, in the rain, moping. Don't pay any attention to Jason Bateman (A good rule in general), instead focus on the background and look at the truck that drives behind him.

That's not an edit, that's actually in the film. The movie about the worst possible in vitro fertilization situation features a giant turkey baster on screen during what is supposed to be the sad moment. This is evidence that most of the people involved did not take this project seriously at all. (Further evidence: The script)

Chip N Dale Rescue Rangers (1989-1990)

I apologize for the dumb meme, but this is worth mentioning:

Chip's Indiana Jones outfit has always been an obvious reference, but I'll admit to never seeing the Magnum. This reference is made doubly entertaining with the knowledge of the common trivia that Tom Selleck was Lucas and Spielberg's first choice to play Indy. (Un)fortunately, Selleck was unable... because of his contract commitments to Magnum P.I.

Raging Bull (1980), Jake LaMotta's Swan Song

Anyone who has ever seen Raging Bull is very aware of how important the films score is, filled with classical, almost peaceful, swooping symphonies. Martin Scorsese and DP Michael Chapman understood how important the music was going to be when he filmed it, as he does with most of his films. That's why the opening shot, held through the entire credits sequence, turns a boxing ring:

Into a musical staff:

LaMotta is of course, the Treble Clef here. Which is why he never leaves the left side of the ring. He walks up and down the side, but never further into the center, remaining the beginning of the music the whole time.

Now, considering that the ropes are the lines where the notes are placed, that means that the last note of Jake LaMotta's symphony is of course:

Mulan (1998)

One of the greatest things about animation for storytellers is that it allows directors to present information to the audience in ways that you can't necessarily do in live action, allowing you to physically alter the universe your characters live in, in order to drop subtle hints visually preparing your audience for what they are about to encounter. Animators must be careful to make sure that their designs and ideas all "fit" together, because they are literally creating a world, and if there is, for example, a drastically different, unexplained switch in animation style or character design halfway through the film, it's jarring in the minds of the audience, which are already busy at work processing the fictional universe in front of them. 

Disney's 1998 animated film, Mulan (dirs. Tony Bancroft and Barry Cook), offers many examples of the proper way to play with an animated universe in order to prepare the audience for a satisfactory payoff. In this case, most everything in the film is preparing you for the movie's most exciting sequence, the avalanche scene. Let's take a look at some of the changes and visual motifs present in Mulan.

Mulan's Eyes:

When we first meet Mulan, one of her most distinct facial features is her narrow, almond-shaped eyes. They make her seem approachable and warm, and are adaptable for the animation team, allowing them to show both a sense of vulnerability (The "Reflection" sequence we'll look at later,) and of strength:

However, there is a drastic change in Mulan's appearance from that shot onwards. After she picks up her father's sword, the next time we see Mulan, she looks like this:

See the difference?

Mulan's new, wide, rounder eyes stay with her the entire time she is in her "Ping" disguise.

Until the avalanche scene, where Mulan is injured. She closes her eyes in pain, and when she opens them, they look like this again:

Indicating that she is about to switch back into "female" mode. Indeed, the very next scene features Mulan's secret being discovered, and the death of the "Ping" disguise. Her eyes remain their original shape for the rest of the movie.

The Swirls:

This is one of my favorite parts of the film. Take a look at the bubbles overflowing from the bath caused by Mulan as she prepares to meet the Matchmaker:

 

Now check out the design on the snow careening over the cliff during the avalanche, also caused by Mulan:

It's a very cool bit of visual foreshadowing.

This isn't the only time those swirls appear throughout the film. They're a visual motif that is used heavily to cause callbacks in your brain, as a way to make the way things look in this animated universe make sense to you. They appear in the clouds during the "I'll Make A Man Out Of You" sequence, as another reference to Mulan's relationship with buckets of water:

They also show up in pillars of smoke, which is a pretty crucial focal point for a film revolving heavily around fireworks with a dragon for one of the main characters:

They serve as the background for this shot during the training sequence:

 Which is the setup for this later shot, visually explaining the progress and confidence Mulan has gained through her journey:

Further, they serve as framing devices for these two similar shots of the film's Wise Elders, which is fitting as family and ancestry are one of the many themes in this film:

The swirls are an important indicator, a piece of visual narration that connects the sequences of the film into one cohesive world, without needing to say anything. They tell the audience "This is the world we've created that Mulan lives in, and this is what things look like in this world." This is why, although they're a simple background design, it's vital that their design be used frequently, and consistently.

Reflections:

This should be an easy one, as there's an entire song in the movie about it. It is literally the film's main theme. 

We've already looked at the shot of Mulan looking at herself in the reflection of her father's sword, now compare that to her observing her reflection in the water at the beginning of the song "Reflection"

In particular, look at the change in confidence between the two images, and how Mulan is drawn (Again, check the eyes), to portray that.

But Mulan isn't the only person who does this in the film.

Although we never see his reflection, it's very obvious given what we know, that when building a spot to honor his father, Shang is also looking into his father's sword and seeing his own reflection. Like Mulan, he's trying to see some of his father in himself.

Immediately following this, is the beginning of the avalanche battle. Shang, blinded by grief for his father, orders the last cannon to be fired directly at Shan-Yu, a tactic which would obviously leave the team to deal with hundreds of remaining Huns. Mulan, of course, has a better idea, and where does the inspiration for that come from?

Obviously, it would be just as easy to have Mulan look up and see the mountain and get her plan that way, but a deliberate choice was made to have her see it in the reflection. Homework time: Why do you suppose that is? Remember that Mulan's father was a renowned warrior in his time, and when looking at his sword to remember what he would do, Mulan finds the strength and inspiration for her own Warrior's Journey.

I mentioned earlier that many times films are building towards a visual payoff, and Mulan's ends with this. It is the culmination of all the themes discussed in this section, and such a beautiful shot that I feel it's the best possible ending point for this entry.

Intro and Jurassic Park (1993)

Welcome to It's a Visual Medium! In this blog, we explore the way movies (and TV shows) convey information to their audience, pointing out all the little visual touches that add themes and motifs in a visual medium. Some of these are original observations, some I take from various sources on the internet. (Mainly the SometingAwful forums' CineDiscusso subforum.) I'm always accepting submissions, and will try to credit everyone who contributes.

To start, I'll highlight one of my favorite bits of visual foreshadowing, from 1993's Jurassic Park. (dir. Spielberg) In the scene where our main cast is arriving at the island by helicopter, owner John Hammond, (Richard Attenborough) announces that they have to come in fast, and things will get shaky. Everyone immediately buckles their safetybelts without a hitch:

With the exception of Dr. Alan Grant (Sam Neill), who finds himself stuck with two female pieces, unable to connect:

Thinking quickly, Grant does what come instinctively, and just ties the two belts together, fashioning an improvised harness for himself.

Wait a second, here. Two female components that aren't supposed to go together, but they do anyway, to fulfill their natural function? Wait, that seems like it could be important later...

Life Finds A Way.