Analyzing a Film

 The film I decided to watch and discuss the camera shots of was Josee, the tiger and the fish. This was an animated film that I actually had intentions eventually of watching anyway so this task provided me the perfect reason to watch it. The movie is about the romance between college student Tsueno and Josee, whom has many dreams she wishes to experience, but is unable to do to the limitations placed onto herself by her lack of ability to walk, binding her to a wheelchair. The movie kicks off with a variety of wide high angle shots observing our male protagonist go about his everyday lifestyle. this provides the viewer with a good grasp of the settings we will likely be seeing often. The movie also uses this shot as a static when characters are in a store and are conversing about various topics. After a long day of work, we see trucking following Tsueno down the road when there is suddenly a whip pan and tracking to a girl speeding downhill our of control in her wheel chair until she comes to a stop and goes flying out of her seat. Flying into the arms of our protagonist, we get a slow-motion arc shot right before they come into contact with each other for the first time, emphasizing the importance of the relationship between the two characters as it would appear this will not be their last encounter. This arc shot wonderfully captures this moment. While the female lead is a bit cold to each other at first, they begin to get along. This is when we get an extreme close up of her correcting Tsueno, indicating he can call her by her first name from now on, which is a indicates a close relationship in Japanese culture. The importance of the scene is emphasized by how close up we see her lips move, showing how much weight her words truly hold. In an attempt to sneak the girl outside away from her sleeping grandma, we see a point of view of Tsueno peering through the whole in the door. This serves as a great transition to the various different adventures Tsueno and Josee go on without the grandma's permission. We see a variety of extreme wide shots in which we can barely see our main characters going from location to location. We then arrive at the beach, a pivotal location in the dreams of Josee. We see trucking as we follow her crawling on the sand towards the water to see how it tastes. There is then a low angle shot when our male lead picks her up and simple takes her into the water, showing the unfortunate difference of capabilities between the two. As the two arrive back home, we witness a beautiful arc shot of the girl's room that is filled to the brim with art and accessories. it brings forth a beautiful close upon the journeys that these two experienced in an attempt to satisfy Josee's desires. Throughout the film we saw a plethora of close ups showing the characters trying to hide a blush from the other, emphasizing their embarrassments towards their own emotions. Honestly a beautiful movies showing a youth romance drama, something you wouldn't expect from an animated film.