Text Connections:
For my text connections essay I have chosen the genre of crime to study and make connections with. the texts i used to make these connections were Witness, Shawshank Redemption, Out of the blue and my own film Point Break. the two significant connections i made using these texts were the theme of violent crime, theme of crime in a conservative lifestyle. i also saw a connection through the aspect of unexpected crime.
A connection I was able to make between texts was the idea of violent crime I saw this idea in Shawshank Redemption and Out of the Blue. Shawshank Redemption uses this idea when the character Warden Norton orders Captain Hadley kills Tommy, this happens when Tommy has just told Andy and Red about how he had met the guy that had actually committed Andy’s crime however when Andy goes to tell Norton, Norton denies to help him and doesn’t believe him this is when Warden Norton requests to speak to Tommy privately about what he had said and to see if he was telling the truth and if he would testify for Andy this part of the film uses dialogue between Andy and Norton to show that Tommy plays a big part in the new situation “you know that wouldn’t matter. With Tommy’s testimony I can get a new trial.”- Andy) although we think that this is just a conversation and something good will happen for Andy Tommy is brutally shot from behind and left on the ground to die. Out of the Blue uses this idea when the character David Gray brutally murders 13 people for no reason including children. this occurs when David has just had an argument with his neighbour about trespassing “ Get out of it, you trespassing Holden!”/“Hey don’t talk to my kids like that. Calm down David”/“Don’t you tell me what to do! Think you’re king of Aramoana.”and out of nowhere shoots his neighbour then chases after his kids which then leads to him murdering more people that cross his path here the director uses a wide shot to show what is happening between both characters for example with the wide shot used viewers can see the reaction of the conversation between both characters. this shows the reader that violent crime can happen in different ways it is not always what people mostly assume for example beating of another person or a messy murder scene.
I think we see a very clear similarity between Point Break and Out of the blue with the theme of conservative lifestyle crime, because in Point Break the group that does the crime which is robbery of banks are infact surfers however they are not just any surfers they have a belief in surfing which has become apart of them extremely for example bodhi the main surfer in this film is the leader and convinces the others to do what he does it almost seems as if he has brainwashed them slightly, bodhi believes that you must be daring to surf any condition and one with the ocean the belief they have in surfing is part of why they do the robberies and are so good at them e.g not getting caught by the police dialogue is shown in this part when “they’re like Ghosts”. and in Out of the blue it is set in a small rural New Zealand town where it is very far from anything for example we see this setting in the beginning of the film when it is very quiet and it introduces where the place is and what it looks like music is used in this part of the film it is quiet and subtle and has a calming beach tone to show what Aramoana is. here the director is showing us that these two texts are trying to speak out to society about how things that seem so quiet and subtle can be misleading because sometimes with places for example a rural small town people in a society assume that nothing will happen and it is safe. also with Point Break it is more for Beliefs “Peace, through superior firepower.” “ If you want the ultimate, you’ve got to be willing to pay the ultimate price. It’s not tragic to die doing what you love.” and how they can make you think the opposite of something and make you think that it is a good thing when it is wrong. I think what the directors are trying to get across is that there are things that can be misleading and they can turn out to be something big or small and affect everyone.
A significant connection i made between some of my chosen texts, Witness and Out of the Blue is that the characters have similar characteristics of unexpected crime this is common in the texts because the characters show us things about this particular genre such as being in a totally different sense than a murder would usually be in. for example in Witness people wouldn’t think that a murderer usually wouldn’t be part of the police force/ an officer himself. Because typically people part of the police force are supposed to be good however unexpectedly it has twist and turns out that one of the police officers himself was the killer. Also in Out of the Blue we see that David is not a nice looking guy he seems suspicious however you wouldn’t guess that he would go and kill everyone in his way/neighbourhood especially when he already had killed one person that caused it in the first place you would think that he would stop but no that’s what makes this unexpected in the film. this proves to the viewer that having a characteristics of not being well or in the right head space like David you can end up having a trigger which makes you do things you wished you hadn’t. In a part of the film with david the director has used a close up shot of david’s face to show his reaction when his mind is messing with him.
In conclusion i made two significant connections between texts about crime. I think that in all four of these texts the Directors were trying to show different aspects of crime that can happen in all kinds of ways for example unexpected crime in Out of the Blue came from David being sick he wasn’t in the greatest mind set which caused him to do what he did, violent crime in Shawshank Redemption came from Warden Norton brutally murdering Tommy, Conservative lifestyle crime in Point Break came from bodhi’s belief extreme belief in surfing. Also crime in all of the texts shows that what happens can affect everyone not just the people that you see who get affect the most.
Bibliography:
Quotes-
http://www.imdb.com/character/ch0001392/quotes
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0111161/quotes
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0090329/quotes
http://http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102685/quotes
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102685/quotes
http://www.imdb.com/character/ch0012025/quotes
reneewatkins 