Final Project Review (Liz)

I will be covering the presentation shown to our class by Liz. She took film from her trip to Brazil and went that route in search of displaying some part of her identity. In the film, the shots used and slow motion in certain parts gave us a place to question what we believed liz herself was thinking in the moments we were seeing. For instance, the fact that the video was shot in a view from someone's eyes and we barely ever saw liz, except for maybe twice, made it as though we were becoming liz. This in turn helped us learn first hand a part of her identity, or what we made of what she saw and how she was seeing it.


The idea that the voiceover in the beginning told this brilliant story about her trip with all of this beautiful imagery embedded in the words helped out the video a lot. At first liz was a little shy about the voiceover or thought it wasn't going to work in her video, but i definately think it worked for the better, and without it i think the video would have been less effective. I liked the idea that the voiceover was like a broad overview of your insight on things in the trip, then the video pointed out the small details of the same trip. The black background while she was telling the narrative was key because it gave us viewers a chance to just sit back, listen to the words, and create the world she was talking about in our heads, creating expectations as to what we might see in the video, for some of us.


I wouldn't say anything distracted me about this video. Someone in the class talked about the idea that the music was sort of James Bondish, however, i really didn't have much of a problem with the music. I think it worked for the video visually. However, for the concept of the video, maybe a different, sadder song might have been more effective because Liz was saying she was trying to get across how these people were poor and hungry, etc. and they live this life everyday and for her it's sad to see this. However, she also mentioned how the people were still content with life, so the song does work.


The concept, having to do with identity, was how Liz related to this world around her in Brazil, and how her heart felt for what she saw, because she probably wasn't accustomed to the way life is there, coming from the U.S. I felt like we were literally seeing memories from her head in the moments where there would be some people in a scene, then there would be a still shot that faded away. Through this, we learn her identity through seeing what she saw.


New media was incorporated in the computer program Liz used to create the video, and the process of using film in general.


The work makes us question something deeper about the way we relate to the world around us, especially in other countries. We are from the United States, a completely different society from Brazil. We see how Liz had fun in this other country, and how the people there are living a way different life than us, however, there is one thing in common between the two lives, relationships. Throughout Liz's video, we saw the people in Brazil getting along with each other, talking, playing patti-cake, making Liz feel at home, etc. No matter where we go in this world there will always be love between human beings, so no matter what life you live, of course there will always be that feeling of happiness and contentment. In this way I connect with this video.


Overall, I feel as though I walked away from viewing this video with a better understanding of Liz's emotions towards this vacation, and even something deeper than that. In this way, she does address identity. Great job!