Skip to main content

Introductory Blog

Hi all, my name is Jack Oberli and I am a senior at North Central College. I am studying economics and management along with playing baseball as well. I have completed most of my required class load putting me in a position to take courses I find interesting outside of my field, which has brought me here to Film 101! One of my favorite things to do is watching movies and going to the theater so naturally this class was on the top of my list to be a part of. I enjoy most film genres, anywhere from slap happy comedies to intense thrillers. I hope that I develop tools to see even deeper into the film world allowing me to expand my appreciation even further.

Other than movies I also really enjoy sports, hanging out with friends and cooking. I have played all sorts of sports throughout my life but as I mentioned earlier, I'm currently playing baseball here at NCC. I feel that being part of that team has helped a lot in building a friend group here at North Central especially saying I am a transfer student from College of DuPage. I'm a pretty social person so having a solidified group really helps. Going onto my fascination with cooking, I'm no chef by any means but growing up my mom would cook dinner almost every night (basic Italian mother) exposing me to the kitchen early on. Living on a college budget I rarely cook too extravagant of meals but it's something I would like to dive more into in my postgrad life.

A trait of mine I value the most is that I am pretty easy going. It helps with a lot from making new friends to dealing with adversity. However, some aspects of this may not all be positive. I also tend to be "easy going" with where I place things leading to terrible organization and a borderline impressive ability to forget where I put my keys.


Comments

  1. I am also no chef by any means but the vodka pasta sauce from trader joes is bussin. I was also exposed to the kitchen at a young age since my mom would always make meals at home. I also learned through trial and error which was rarely a pleasant experience. You being Italian, you don't need to cook extravagant meals, just throw some pasta in boiling water, add sauce and you good. Chefs kiss.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hi Jack! As a fellow transfer student athlete, I understand the importance of finding a good group of friends. I also enjoy cooking and hanging out with my friends. Sadly, most of my cooking has to be done in an air fryer #dormlife.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Jaws reflection

 When it comes to suspense, there is no more iconic film than Jaws. The shark themed thriller uses a wide variety of tactics from sound and music to cinematography that would make most anyone sweat in their seat.  Who wouldn't be able to recall the famous heart pounding bass and cello that is the Jaws theme. It is such an iconic rhythm and for good reason. When it appears in the film its hard not to get excited. Pair that with switching point a view between Jaws and their victim, and you have a perfect formula for thill. One of the most creative parts of Jaws is how they picture the legendary man-eater, in that they don't. With this film being developed in 1975, there would really be no way of showing Jaws without it looking cheesy and, in all honesty, it does not hold up well. However, showing the shark isn't largely necessary. Reflecting reality, what makes sharks so scary to people is that you really don't know where they are. The film makes it so you're on edge ...

Lost in Translation Reflection

 Sofia Coppola's rom com "Lost in Translation" takes on a melancholy theme to the genre. It uses changes of tempo and character contrast to build a large part of this theme. While not overly hilarious it does have its charming moments both in mix ups fitting in with Harris attempting to fit into Japanese culture and interactions with Charolotte.      As alluded to before, Lost in Translation is designed to be slower film. I believe that this largely plays to the pieces advantage. Harris is supposed to be going through a midlife crisis and has no idea what he wants to do with his life. While this may lead some to completely blow up in panic, Harris goes the other route and lulls out of caring. Meaning the slowness of the plot adds to the dullness Harris is feeling in his life. Of course, this begins to change when he meets Charlotte, but all the same their love is more romantic friendliness than overly passionate which ties easi...

Inspiration behind our Fascination Project

 Our Fascination Project revolved around being a goofy sports comedy. We also wanted to incorporate some elements of the films we have watched in class. We found that Wes Anderson's style would mesh well with our Will Farell inspired plot. When writing our film, we wanted to include dialog that seemed as if it would come out of a Farell film. Naturally this led to a lot of screaming and belittlement. A common dialog theme Farell encompasses is very rash comments that lead to overreactions. We took a lot of inspiration from "Kicking and Screaming" and "Semi-Pro". As far as our cinematography goes, we tried our best to show off some of Anderson's iconic shots. Some of the highlights being a symmetrical walk-off, a top-down shots and over the shoulder views. Since the majority of our film takes place with the characters sitting down at a table, these shots allowed us to maintain some movement to prevent any stale moments.