Component 2 - Section A - World Cinema - Ida & City of God

- Influence of wider contexts like time, place, spaces, culture, tradition
- World cinema offers unique narratives and stories outside of a mainstream cinematic worldview

Ida (Pawlikowski, 2013



- Influence of European tradition in terms of styles, takes inspiration from film movements such as Italian neo-realism, French New Wave, Polish New Wave
- Also taking inspiration from film noir - with the use of monochromatic lighting and colour scheme
- Narrative comes from European history and specifically from Poland and the Jewish community
- Relevant to the failed initiatives for an integrated Europe

Pawlikowski's first film made in Polish, funded by Polish film institute, uses their personnel, filmed on location in Poland
- Set in Poland 1962
- After WWII - communist rule (under Stalin and the Soviets)
- Many Polish-Jews died from the Holocaust
- After 1945, Poland mostly a homogenous nation
- Ruled by Polish People's Republic
- After Stalin's death in 1953 - some relaxation of political pressure from Soviet Union
- Early 1960s economic problem

Monochrome - historical setting, mood and themes
Compactness - 80 minute duration, layers of history, restrained
Cinematography - establishes place, themes of alone-ness/loneliness, struggle, secrecy, guilt, violence, identity and origins
 
City of God (Lund & Mireilles, 2002)



- Space, environment, and political agendas are relevant
- Distinct boundaries of the form
- Similar rawness to British social realism but extends into wider contexts
- Outsiders of society and class

- Non-professional actors
- Real places and spaces - location in world cinema
- Complex narrative structure - three major strands
- Spans the 1960s-80s
- Cyclical nature of narrative parallels idea of a cycle of crime, repetition and hopelessness
- Male world - representations of masculinity

- Gang chasing a chicken who is caught in between the narrator and the police
- Flashback to the 1960s from the 1980s
- Context of favela's -government neglect, lack of essential resources in the housing projects
- Motel massacre followed by shift in time to the 1970s, influence of drugs

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