Tricamo-Palmer: Things I learned

5 things I learned about film:
1. How to do a mis-on-scene analysis
2. How directors set up frames to convey things
3. What a rhyming element is, and how it is used in film
4. How to find political messages in film
5. How much movies are trying to get across messages, even when they seem to lack any

5 things I learned about politics in America:
1. The military operates with a law of their own, doing things like having a stop-loss policy that no one knows about
2. We use torture
3. Torture has been proven not to work and yet we still use it
4. The media does not report truth but uses fear to get ratings
5. Congressmen can get away with tons of stuff, like passing a law that makes them exempt from sexual harassment laws

How this knowledge has changed my views:
I now look at films very differently. Whenever I watch a movie now, I am constantly analyzing each frame and trying to do a mis-en-scene. This usually doesn't do anything for me, but sometimes I find some interesting symbols hidden in the framing of a scene. I am also more aware of the way in which everything in a movie is specifically put there to get across the message that the movie is trying to get across. As far as politics go, I am somewhat more skeptical of the American government, although I already was quite a bit. Every movie we have watched has shown someone struggling to do the right thing despite the overwhelming antagonism from the government. Some of the stories shared in these movies, most of which had a basis in reality, really showed my how much the people in our government are concerned with their own need for power more than anything else.