Analysis of "Gran Torino"

The movie "Gran Torino" was produced in 2008 fronted by Clint Eastwood not only as director, but also actor. The nationality of the movie is American, and some of the actors in the movie in addition to Eastwood, is Ahney Her, Bee Vang, Brian Haley and Geraldine Hughes. 

The movie follows a widower named Walt Kowalski, who has taken part in the Korean War. This has given him an especially angry personality, besides he is not very enthusiastic about his multicultural neighborhood. The young boy in the nearest house, Thao, is forced by a cousin and his gang to steal Walt's unique 1972 Ford Gran Torino. However, Walt finds out and threat him and the gang with his riffle. Thao's family want to stay friends with Walt and begin giving him gifts, which after a bit somehow leads to a relationship between the neighbors. 

The conflict in the movie is probably the problems Walt's neighbors fall into, in which he has to help them. Furthermore, I think the theme is mainly focusing on life and death, confession for sin and sacrificing for the ones close to you. Continuing, there are obviously several symbols in this film. Walt's car for instance, is a symbol for his past, and the better times. He's more proud of it than of anything else, and in some ways it symbols the good in his rather sad everyday. Its proved how much Walt cares about Thao when he gives him the car, instead of letting the family have it. 

The soundtrack in this film is well chosen, and it especially affects the tension. They have also done a great job in form of use of camera. It switches between filming close and further away, which makes the film much more interesting to watch. When it comes to the multicultural society the characters live in, I think the movie shows how smart and effective it can be to live with and socialize with people from foreign cultures. I am convinced that Walt in the first place was against living among multicultural people  and wished he rather lived in a neighborhood with only one culture. However, after a while he got to know them and realized it could be a good thing to be introduced to different people.

As a whole, all the elements above end in a great result. They function great together, and with both evocative music, variation in use of camera and an active usage of symbols, the movie turns out brilliant. 

World news: IS oil targets in Syria

Today in English-class, we were going to find a piece of news that was written about in four online, international newspapers. The piece of news I chose was about the fact that US has hit IS oil targets in Syria. Here are the links to the different articles: 
BBC, CNN, Al Jazeera, Foxnews. 

All of the websites had chosen different photos, however in common all of them were really dramatic and showed shooting and destroyed areas. However, both CNN and Foxnews had added short footages as well, and BBC and Al Jazeera used pictures of fighters. When it comes to headlines, it looks like the websites are trying to make them as dramatic as possible, just like when they decide which photos to use, and I believe these are important details to make the article more interesting.

The style of the language is quite the same, its really short and concrete, and all of the texts mostly include necessary facts. I would say that the piece of news on the websites is very detailed written to include all important information, and I think the presentations of the theme are extremely good. When it comes to sources, Al Jazeera's news article is only based on their own agencies, however Fox News used a man named Justin Fishel as well as The Associated Press. CNN has involved quite many sources like for instance CNN's Barbara Starr and many individuals or witnesses, however on BBC News' news article I couldn't find the list with sources.

Personally, my favorite news article was the one made by BBC News. It had a great overview, which made it easier to follow, and besides they included many interesting facts as well as a map that showed were the oil have been found. The piece of news was also not too long, so it didn't become boring reading it. However, I enjoyed reading all of the four news articles and believe this was an especially interesting subject.

A visit to the Nobel Peace Centre

Last thursday our English-class went to Oslo to visit an exhibition at the Nobel Peace Centre. The exhibition was mainly about social media and how this has affected people all over the world, as well as loads of interesting and a bit shocking facts about this subject. I found the exhibition extremely interesting because it contained many things people can relate themselves to, and besides there were many things i didn’t know about social media and the usage of it before I went there. I would absolutely recommend the exhibition to others, and besides I believe it was a very educational trip.

The picture below shows an interesting research that has been done on the occasion of the  exhibition. It tells that in one hour, the equivalent of seven billion DVD's worth of information is created on the Internet. If we had put all these DVDs on top of each other, the height would be as much as Mount Everest seven times. I believe this is totally unbelievable, and I was completely shocked when I read it.

Social media

Social media is the media we use as a virtual community to talk to other people and share thoughts, information and ideas. Social media is quite different from traditional media, for instance when it comes to reach, usability and quality. In addition, according to many statistics Internet users spend more time on social medias than any other type of sites. Personally I definitely believe I’m one of those who spend most time on social media as well, due to the fact that this is something I do everyday.

In today’s society, there are loads of social medias. Some of those I can think of are Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, snapchat, Tumblr and blogs, and I believe these are the ones I can come up with because they are the ones I mostly use. They are basically used to talk to friends and family and share pictures and thoughts, however also to discuss and give attention to things you find important and want to tell the world.

There are both many pros and cons of social media and the usage of it. One pro is that it is a lot easier to reach many people in a fast way, besides get information about things extremely quickly. Additionally, the usage of social media is an easy way to keep the contact with people you live far away from, and generally being able to talk to people all over the world. However, there are also several cons. Most recent is maybe the fact that social media makes us extremely unsocial, and sometimes we might even end up staying home being on social media instead of actually meeting each other in person. In addition, it unfortunately occurs loads of bullying on social media, especially on sites where people are able to write comments and texts anonymous. It’s obviously much easier to express your thoughts and opinions if you do not have to stand for them.

To sum up, I believe there are both many pros and cons with the new, social media. It’s a brilliant way to share thoughts and make yourself heard, however it has also brought a whole heap of new problems we’ve never had to deal with earlier. I believe we must appreciate the good sides about the social media, but also focus about using it wisely and not in wrong ways. Besides, it’s extremely important to stay social outside the social media too!

Welcome to my blog!

Welcome to this International English-blog! I’ve made this website to post tasks and assignments I work with in my English-classes, and I hope you like it :)