What books can I learn to write book reviews and film reviews?

Hello: "How to Write a Film Review" is an introductory guide book for film review writing, which appears on the recommendation list of various film critics all the year round. This book comprehensively introduces four similarities and six methods of film criticism, how to prepare, how to write and how to modify. It is worth mentioning that there are a lot of excellent works in the book for us to compare and learn. The content is academic, and the sixth and seventh chapters mainly introduce the writing methods of film analysis papers, which are also suitable for amateurs.

Timothy J. corrigan, the author of How to Write a Film Review, is an English professor and director of film studies at the University of Pennsylvania. He has taught film courses in Tokyo, Rome, Paris, London and other cities. His representative works include German New Film: The Influence of Displacement, Werner Herzog's Film: Between Illusion and History, Film and Literature: Introduction and Reading, and Critical Vision in Film Theory.

A good film review needs to include three elements: thinking in the brain, movies in the eyes, and talent in the pen. These three points can be learned through long-term accumulation and practice.

0 1, if a worker wants to do a good job, he must sharpen his tools first.

We need to make it clear that professional film reviews mainly solve the problems of film analysis and art evaluation. Film analysis is not only a simple audio-visual analysis, but also a reference to genre, its history and the development of film language. It is based on this reference that it is possible for an analyst to make an appropriate aesthetic evaluation of a film. Audio-visual analysis methods, film types, film language development and other knowledge need to be learned.

This is also a problem for most of us. After watching the movie for two hours, we only remember a few empathetic plots, but turned a blind eye to the theme, shooting techniques, editing techniques and some intertextual metaphors of the movie. I watched Sunny Day during the Spring Festival, and I always cried and laughed with the rhythm of the movie. At the end of the movie, I just said, "It's too depressing. Being born in a family has a great influence on people." Why big? How is it shown in the film? What do film directors and editors want to express? I never thought about it.

"How to Write a Film Review" said, "As soon as you enter the analysis, many authors appear weak. The main manifestations are: (1) unable to find a suitable analysis angle; It is difficult to convince people on the basis of being stretched; Improper opinions or no opinions at all. "

Watching movies is not "watching" movies, watching is an action, and "what you see is the key" behind the action.

Preparation before watching a movie

Film is essentially psychology, and it is the expression of the director's language. Smart viewers will know the background of the director in advance before watching the movie. The expression of creators is either the place where they grew up, their ethnic group, or their familiar lifestyle. Many writers we are familiar with have their own spiritual geography, such as Shangzhou in Jia Pingwa, Tibetan areas in Alai, Gaomi Northeast Township in Mo Yan, Shanghai Lane in Wang Anyi and Tianjin in Feng Jicai. So is the director.

For example, A Ling, the heroine of Tropical Rain, has several labels. She is a 40-year-old teacher in China, and a wife from Malaysia and Singapore. She has been trying to have children for eight years. We can easily associate these keywords with the life background of director Anthony Chen. Singapore is more exclusive. Marrying from Malaysia to Singapore is a challenge. English is the first language, and Chinese is not valued. The only way for Ling to integrate into Singapore is to have a Singaporean child. In this context, it is easy to understand many problems of tropical rain.

In addition, it must be clear that movies are commercial activities, and input and output need to be calculated. When watching the low-budget movie Gon Rinpoche, don't compare its scene setting and light and shadow adjustment with the big production of Fantastic Four. Knowing the film production cost and production team can make us adjust our psychological expectations reasonably. The film A Drawn Sword directed by rian johnson, with Agatha-style story expression, was nominated for best screenplay in the Academy Award for its ups and downs. If a new director hands in such an answer sheet, he will get an absolute high score, but rian johnson can't. The preliminary preparation is too much for the audience's patience. As expected, the ending didn't feel like the suspense movie's hormones rose, so he just passed the exam.

Can't read well, can't write well.

The only way to start reviewing movies is to concentrate on watching them. Of course, being absorbed does not mean not moving. A good memory is better than a bad pen. Writing a film review requires taking notes.

Through the above understanding, we will have some preset questions about a movie and write them down. Before watching The Portrait of a Burning Woman, my preset question is, Why are the directors, screenwriters, photographers and actors of this film all women? Director Céline Sciamma and the leading actor Adele Hanel are lovers, so will there be any problems in shooting? The film is set in France in 1760. What were the living conditions of the people at that time? There is no limit to the preset questions, but you can ask as many questions as possible, in order to stimulate your curiosity.

Movies are not only stories, characters or lifestyles, but also a way of watching. The audience has different backgrounds and sees different things. The essence of film criticism is to examine how a theme produces a specific meaning through the joint action of art, technology and business. Pay attention to the most attractive part of these factors. Keep questioning psychology from beginning to end.

Finding the right theme of the film is the key and difficult point, which is related to the audience's sensitivity, film reading and questioning psychology. Some suggestions on learning to ask questions are given:

Curiosity for knowledge. For every opportunity you encounter, you should seize the opportunity to find the reason and answer.

Open-minded, compatible with many realities. Seek and respect other views and opinions.

Flexible and inclusive. In the face of strong reasoning, always be ready to change your mind.

Be humble and tolerant of your beliefs. Admitting complete certainty is almost pure fantasy.

Intellectual suspicion. Evidence is needed before accepting assertions and opinions.

In movies, we often ask ourselves:

What's the connection between the title and the plot?

Why does the movie start like this?

When was this film made?

Why was the cast presented in a harmonious way from the beginning?

Why does the movie end with such a picture?

What's the difference between this movie and other movies or old movies I've seen recently?

What is the similarity between this film and the foreign films I know?

Is there any significant form of camera movement? Maybe an illusion, a superposition or a jump?

Which shots are more important?

In particular, we need to pay attention to the abnormal or chaotic places in the film, as well as those repeated scenes. In Portrait de la jeune fille en feu, there are two stories about finding a wife in orpheus's hades. One is a picture of three girls reading together, and the other is a painting by a female painter "Looking for a wife in the underworld of orpheus". Why choose this story? Why did Oedipus get a chance to say goodbye to his wife in the paintings of female painters? There are no unnecessary scenes in the film, and the director's intention can be seen in every detail.

Notes, how to write them down? When commenting on a movie, personal feelings, expectations and reactions are the beginning of an intellectual article. At the same time, we should also reflect on the origin of these feelings, expectations and reactions, and how they are related to the objective factors in the film: its position in the film history, cultural background and formal strategy.

It is obviously not enough to finish these two hours of movie memories. A good memory is not as good as a bad writing, and taking notes is a good supplementary way. This note can be shorthand of key lines, or it can be any factor such as shooting technique, viewpoint, clothing, etc. Experienced film critics have a unique set of shorthand skills, special marks and abbreviations ... the only requirement is that they can understand them.

If you want to write a good film review, you must watch the film several times, at least twice. Ideally, when you watch it for the first time, only write down what will immediately impress you in the movie. When you watch it for the second time, you should take careful and detailed notes. After the movie, you should take notes immediately, enrich the shorthand content and sort out the overall logical context.

Film criticism is essentially an argumentative essay. Questioning the image leads to the theme, sorting out the notes and watching the movie again to determine the argument. Finally, through notes sorting, background classification and repeated questions, the available elements in the film are oriented to the theme as an argument.

02, film related knowledge

Film is one of the youngest art forms, which absorbs many structures and forms of traditional art. When commenting on movies, we need to use other critical words of literature and visual arts. There are three commonly used words: narrative, role and viewpoint.

narrate

Narrative films can be divided into different parts:

Story: all events presented to us or events that we can infer.

Plot: The arrangement or construction of a series of events in some form or structure.

Narration: the perspective of organizing the plot according to specific emotional, physical or intellectual points.

In how to write a film review, take the film describing Napoleon's life as an example. His life is unchanged, including birth, childhood, rising power, war, French Revolution, and exile of Elba. However, different films choose different focuses and can describe different stories through different narrative forms.

You can decide the narrative style of a movie by asking questions. Is this movie a narrative movie? If not, what is it? Is the story told in chronological order? How does the plot unfold? What is the reason for adopting this method? Wait a minute. No one can stand to get to the bottom of it. After a few or a dozen questions, you can see that this is the essence of the film.

The role focuses on the behavior of the characters and the theme of the film, and is the protagonist of the film analysis. Take Portrait de la jeune fille en feu as an example. There are two protagonists in the play: a female painter and a rich woman, and two main supporting roles: a maid and a rich woman's mother. What's their relationship? The mother of a rich lady hopes that she can marry a suitor in Milan. According to the custom, she needs to send a portrait in advance, and if the other party is satisfied, she will propose to her. In the usual operation, the rich girl is a little turbulent. She is unwilling to accept this marriage without emotional foundation, and the way to resist is to refuse the portrait. A portrait connects several unrelated people and sets a time limit for the story. With this analysis, the whole story will become vivid.

In a broad sense, viewpoint refers to the position of looking, which implies the way that viewpoint decides what to look at. In a narrow sense, views are tangible. Simply put, it is the perspective of the problem. When we go to the seaside to watch the sunrise, we often choose the best observation point. That's the reason. Furthermore, the psychological state and subjective prejudice when watching movies will also affect what you see. In the eyes of fans, Xu Zhimo is a genius who bid farewell to Cambridge, but in my eyes, he hurt love rat in Zhang Youyi.

Film is a "way of seeing", and its viewpoint depends on what the director wants to convey. Generally speaking, there are two principles for discussing opinions:

Observe when and how the camera creates the character's viewpoint.

Note that the story is mainly told from an objective perspective, but it still comes from someone's subjective understanding.

Besides, the costume and makeup of actors, the setting of light and shadow, the length of lens angle, the expression of sound and the editing of films are all very important. As space is limited, I won't introduce it. In this respect, I chose Understanding Movies (illustration number 1 1) as an introductory book, and I will write another book review introduction when I have the opportunity.

03, how to change?

Good articles are all revised, and this general rule still applies here. Pay attention to logic, topic sentences and arguments when checking. To ensure that the whole article is logically smooth, each sub-argument is supporting the main argument and is in a progressive relationship; At the same time, it is confirmed that every argument is enriching the argument, rather than simply defending it with false words. Make sure that each paragraph has a topic sentence, and the topic sentences of the whole article can be linked together to clearly express the argument.

Then look back at the first paragraph and the end. The first paragraph of any kind of article is extremely important, it should be interesting, attract readers, and at the same time lead to the following arguments to be served. The end can be a simple summary, summarizing the full text, but it is difficult to shine. A better way is to sublimate layer by layer along the meaning of the argument to the end and raise the full text to a higher level.

Then read through the full text to ensure that the sentences are concise and powerful, and there are no typos.

Finally, go back and confirm the title. The title should be big enough to show the main idea; At the same time, it should be specific enough to attract readers, and it is best to bring some contradictions and conflicts. For example, the titles of the anti-underpants positions on the official WeChat account, such as "Born as a human being, silently self-destructed", "Thank you, finally derailed", "I was happier when I got divorced than when I got married" and "I found the courage to live after reading this book", all meet the above requirements.

Whether a film review can be written well is related to a person's artistic feeling, the accumulation of film knowledge and the ability to express words. The sense of art can be improved by watching movies and writing film reviews. Film knowledge needs systematic study. There are many books and courses to choose from, and written expression can be improved by writing, thinking and reading more.

To sum up, there are nine steps to writing a qualified film review:

Get ready for the movie. Ask questions in advance to understand the background.

Watch the movie carefully and take notes.

Lead the question to an easy topic. Don't be too big, too big, too broad, and you can't understand three thousand words.

After determining the theme, watch the movie again to confirm the arguments and arguments.

Clarify the argument Good articles generally start from uncontroversial topics and then develop to more complicated points such as style and technology.

Make an outline. (I wrote to find it myself)

Start writing.

Continue to think about the theme and expand your thinking in the process of writing.

Modify.

If watching movies and understanding movies are our pleasure, then comments and explanations should be another exciting enjoyment. How to write film reviews can be used as a teaching material. There are many excellent habits in the book. Compare your exercises with them and learn from each other.

Hope to help you, hope to adopt!