Analysing the Weird Sisters
Mrs. Krieger’s class (with Mr. March and Mrs. Maronese) will use the beginning scenes from three versions of Macbeth to compare and contrast the choices directors make in staging their interpretations of a play.
We will use this handout as a starting point and the videos available on the Oxley College server. To access or download the three videos (and other rich resources), look for the “English - Year 10 ” folder on the desktop of a school computer. Open the folder and double-click the “Click_me.htm” file. You can now click the blue arrows for the first three scenes.
Analysing Macbeth’s death
View carefully the 3 clips of Macbeth’s death from the Polanski, Nunn and Wright versions.
(Note: the three preceding links open a very small 3 - 5mg version of each film. To access larger versions, log-on to a school computer and open the “Year 10 English” folder, open the “videos” sub-folder and open or download these three files: nunn_macbeths_death.mov, polanski_macbeths_death.mov, wright_macbeths_death.mov).
Compare/contrast the sequences in terms of the following criteria:
- Perspective – relating to character
- Knowing background circumstances
- Personality – essentially a good or bad person?
- Motives – reason for doing something
- How others influence the character?
- Language (“lexical chain” – groups of ideas) – the words the character says: words, how it is spoken (ambition, blood)
- Settings – dark/light, day/night, geographical & temporal choices, architecture, weather, use of space
- Structure – alterations to space (open and closed spaces, length of scenes), metaphor to camera angles, etc.
- Costumes – light/dark / colour, how they are worn, uniform,
- Actions –
- Characterisation – how the character is portrayed
- How the characters relate to each other – dynamics, time in scenes with with whom, how important to developing the plot
- Music and sound effects – harmony/disharmony,
- Props – realistic/representational
After you have analysed the sequences, rank each in terms of how heroic or how villainous Macbeth is. It might be useful to place them on a spectrum from hero at one end, to terrorist/villain at the other.
What is a Terrorist?
Definitions of Terrorists
- Towards a Definition of Terrorism - Ayatullah Shaykh Muhammad ‘Ali Taskhiri - Vol V No. 1 (Muharram 1408 AH/1987 CE)
- Terrorism: No Prohibition Without Definition - Suggests a clearly delineated definition
- The definition of terrorism - from the Guardian Unlimited - Raises many questions about the US state department’s definition
- Definition of Terrorism - by Carroll E. Payne Jr - Very brief definition offered by one individual
- FREEDOM FIGHTER: Dictionary Entry and Meaning - from hyperdictionary - Dictionary definition
- TERRORISTS AND FREEDOM FIGHTERS - from the CBC News - Provides a comprehensive overview of the implications and the media’s use of the word.
- CIA’s Director of Central Intelligence Counterterrorist Center - Provides the definition used by the US
Timothy McVeigh
- The worst terrorist attack on U.S. soil: April 19, 1995
- What happened at Waco?
- Timothy McVeigh Timeline - from CNN / People Magazine
- Oklahoma City Bombing Remembered - by CNN
- Wounds remain for bombing victims six years later
- Imitating Turner - from Crime TV’s Crime Library
Possible Questions
1) Where was McVeigh in 1991?
2) What was inside the rental trucked parked outside the Murrah Building?
3) How did McVeigh support himself before the bombing?
4) What were Ruby Ridge and Waco and what impact did they have on McVeigh?
5) What happened to McVeigh in June, 2001?
The Black Panthers
- The Black Panther: Guerrilla War in the US
- Nat Turner’s Rebellion - from PBS’s Africans in America
- Racial Equality - from the White Camelia Knights (KKK)
- Fred Hampton
- from the Vision of the Black Panthers
Possible Questions
1) What were some of the most important of the 10 Points in the Panther’s program?
2) What were the reasons for the arrests of Black Panthers in 1967?
3) Are the Black Panthers and Nat Turner’s rebellions mostly similar or different? In what important ways?
4) By the end of 1969, how many children every day were fed through the efforts of the Black Panthers?
5) What happened to Fred Hampton in 1969? How many shots were fired and by whom?
6) What is the source for most of the references used by the KKK to argue for racial separation?
7) How did the Black Panthers’ see Democracy in America? Do you think this is reasonable and logical? Explain.
Task: So what is a terrorist?
Mindmap or list all the characteristics of a terrorist.” If you can show relationships among the qualities, that’s even better.
What is an Anarchist?
Guy Fawkes
- Guy Fawkes - from the V for Vendetta Shrine
- The Life and Crimes of Guy Fawkes - from GuyFawkes.me.uk
- Historical Implications and Interpretations - from The Gunpowder Plot/Guy Fawkes Pages!
- The Gun Powder Plot Society - from gunpowder-plot.org
- Guy Fawkes - from Britannia
- Guy Fawkes as a Holiday
Che Guevara
- The Death of Che Guevara: Declassified - CIA documents
- Che Guevara - Time Magazine’s 100 Most Important People of the Century
- Che Guevara Internet Archive - from Marxists.org
- The Killing Machine: Che Guevara, from Communist Firebrand to Capitalist Brand, by Alvaro Vargas Llosa
- Che Guevara - brief biography
- Che Guevara - the 2008 film
Anarchism
Task: So what is an anarchist?
Mindmap or list all the characteristics of an “anarchist.” If you can show relationships among the qualities, that’s even better.
V for Vendetta
The NovelHow to write a good feature article…
Your chosen directer will, no doubt, have done many interesting and entertaining things in his/her life and career. Your feature article will, of course, be informative.
However, a really great feature article should also be interesting and entertaining.
- Click here for great ideas and hints on how to write a good feature article
- Click here for actual transcripts of real interviews with great film directors.
- Click here for video interviews with great film directors. and here for another video interview… and, yes, you guessed it -
- click here for another really cool video interview with yet another great film director!!!