Bogan's Blog

“Back in Dakar they must be saying: ‘Diouana is happy in France. She has a good life.’ For me, France is the kitchen, the living room, the bathroom and my bedroom.”  This harrowing quote is recognized by the main character, Diouana, and to ears of viewers as a complete lie. La Noire de … is the first African film that made a notable impact on European and North American audiences back in the late 1960's. This landmark film was directed by Ousmane Sembène and was loosely based off of the true story of a young African girl who was hired by a similar French couple during this time [ Hoffman, 2016 ] . La Noire de … directly translates to Black Girl in English which is how I will be referring to the film from now on. I found Black Girl to be extremely hard to follow due to the following reasons: 1. there were a multitude of flashbacks alternating back and forth from the time when Diouana was first hired as a caretaker for the children and back to present time where s...

The first film screened in my MVC 201 class was Orson Welles' The Third Man. The 1949 film noir follows American Holly Martins through post World War II Vienna and tracks his efforts to discover the true cause of his childhood friend's (Harry Lime) death. Riddled with mystery and suspense, this film keeps the audience guessing as they too try to discover the identity of the third man. The almost documentary-like technique of this film allows viewers to have a unique look in to what life in Vienna was like post-war; this is achieved through a combination of jaunty dialogue and beautiful cinematography. Albeit The Third Man is an older film, this classic stands the test of time. A s the film progresses, we find Holly Martins further entangling himself in the crooked world that Vienna has become. Within the four zones that make up Vienna (the French, American, British, and Russian) there is an underground penicillin ring that is wreaking havoc in Vienna and coincident...

Yep, that's me. I bet you're wondering how I ended up here. As you probably already guessed, I ended up in this blogosphere due to a requirement for my Critical Writing in Media & Visual Culture Studies class. My name is Hannah Bogan and I am very much looking forward to venturing in to this aforementioned blogosphere. I am currently a Junior at the University of Redlands double majoring in Media and Visual Culture Studies and Business Management with an emphasis in Spanish. What will I do with these majors following graduation you ask? I have no idea but what I do know is that want to get better at assessing films and receive a better understanding of what exactly directors intended to do with their films. A blog can mean many different things to many different people. Blogs can be pathways through which people communicate consistent thoughts and feelings to a loyal audience or they can simply be  a place where people come to vent without giving a flying fuck who...