As a viewer, I too felt stuck. I don't know what an ideal situation would be. Obviously Farah shouldn't have been captured in an ideal world but I couldn't decide how I felt about the boyfriend. He was so rude to her once they were broken up, but I secretly wanted them to work out.

This made the film more approachable and real. It didn't sound auto-tuned, as many Western films have before. It made the film feel very realistic and as if the audience were looking in on someone's life opposed to a romanticized version of it.

Interesting idea. Can you pinpoint any moment in the film when it was the country opening its eyes to reality?

This makes sense as to why soo many youths were involved in the protest and uprising.

This also reminded me of the journalist filming everything whilst he was in the truck.

Again, this shows the importance of social media and how much it has changed the current world we live in. There is immediate widespread news accessibility and biased sources at our fingertips,

This is interesting and can be related to Trump and how he deals with certain issues. Trump tweeted about the shooting in Pittsburg but then tweeted a few hours later about the red sox game showing his "true self" and showing her doesn't really care about victims.

It is amazing the role that social media plays in political activism. A lot of movements are thrust forward by socials media's ability to connect people from all over the world.

I noticed in the film there was a range of people of different ages. Considering the emphasis on young people presented in this article, I think the film gave an accurate sample size of the type of person involved in the protest.

This method made it a little hard to discern what was real and what was fake

There is a danger in making art about such tramatic events. It comes off as insensitive and made to capitalize off of and for the audiences consumption, rather than honuring the lives of those who died.

The director was brilliant with the different P.O.V used in the film, ultimately utilizing the real footage and shocking the veiwers.

It was super interesting how the director used two polar oppsite emotional pieces to make one coherent piece. The calming music pefectly comliments the intensed war footage. It is almost eerie.

When I first read this, I didn't necessarily think it's true. I tried to come up with examples that aren't about human rights violations, but I cant think of any. Do you agree with this concept?

I felt a little freaked out by this scene. It was eeries how everything was set up, almost felt like a musuem how perfect everything was. It offered a nice juxtapossition to the cirvumstances (a man being shot and in need of taking care of).

The film felt almost diaryesque, depicting small scenes one after the other, each black fade out was a turn of a page in the diary.

I didn't neccesarily feel shocked at any point. Did you?

There were many beautiful tableuxs in the film. The characters were often framed by a window with the city glistening in the background creatingly an aesthetically gripping tableaux.

There was a lightness to the film. Vinnettes provided a quick glimpse of the life of the citizens. This particular scene reminded me of Wes Anderson, how the shot was set up and the picture. I also notices that the transtition between scenes was a slow black fade out. I think the purpose of that was to symbolize the passing of time while still linking everything together.

I noticed there were two scenes that depicted people driving in cars and then being blinded by their surroundings, the first is the driver being blinded by the rain and the second is the driver being blinded by the flag. What could this mean?

Interesting. We project our feelings and current ideas onto what we are watching. Creating art is a mechanism for coping.

This was definently very prevalent in the film by showing the juxtaposition of "normal life" to grafic scenes of the war.

Interesting thought. In the film, the father seemed to be proud of where he is from, not ashamed at all. He was too patriotic, in a sense, to consider moving.

This is very interesting. I agree to a certain extent. I enjoy going to the theater for comedies and scary movies because I feed off the audiences reactions. If this were completely true, then everybody would be renting movies at home all the time, granted this was said before one could rent movies at home.

I noticed the mother, who was the most prominent female figure in the film, wore mundane colors and her whole body was covered in loose fitting clothes. This is a sharp contrast with Hanouma, who wore figure-hugging clothes and showed more skin.

This is a really interest point. He is creating art with the intention of an audience not needing to pay attention. It begs the question do you create art for yourself or for an audience. I think it's nearly impossible to create something that is solely for yourself. What do you think?

I agree that is what makes a good film, but I also enjoy being emotionally moved at the end of a film. I am now reconstructed the film and thinking about it in a deeper sense because this is a cinema class, in any other setting, I don't find this a thought provoking film.

I felt the same exact way. I wasn't engaged at all. I think that was a combination of long, still shots, and very little to no action in the plot. I don't understand how an audience falling asleep at a film could ever be considered a compliment. How do you think this could be considered a compliment?

It felt as though I was watching everyday life. I didn't feel emotionally invested in the story although I did feel bad seeing the two kids sad. This wasn't because I actually cared about their story, I just hate seeing sad children.

I completely disagree. At no point did I feel like the film gave off a "documentary feel". It felt melodramatic.

This is popular in American culture. Woody Allen directs and stars in his own films.

Just because their aren't stock characters in a film doesn't mean the film is realism. Do you think the film was "real"? I thought it strayed too much from the lives of the characters and focused too much on the drama between Hanouma and Qinawi.

It is interesting that the most climatic scene in the film happens within the last 15 minutes.

As a viewer, I wasn't satisfied with the ending. I was confused with the last shot of the women, which seemed extraneous. The storyline of the women added nothing to the ending instead, came across as only existing to augment Qinawi's sexual frustration. It was excessive as I came to understand Qinawi's sexual frustration within the first 15 minutes of the film.

What was the importance of having Madbouli narrate if he is barely featured in the film?

The fact that the movie opens up with a prominent shot of a train is captivating. The image of a train has a lot of history in cinema. The Lumiere brothers are credited for creating one of the first moving images in 1896. The film depicted a train coming into a station, but since it was the first of its kind, many members of the audience ran out of the theater. They were startled due to the hyper realism and unfamiliar nature of the film.

Shakespeare has a plethora of words at his disposal, but he chooses to use the word “entertainment”. This is extremely important to the piece as a whole. This phrase is spoken by Lucentio, pretending to be Cambio, to Hortensio, who is pretending to be Litio. The word entertainment means, “an event, performance, or activity designed to entertain others” (Dictionary.com). The connotation of “entertainment” is something to distract people from the real world, which can be music, a play, and a movie. By using the word “entertainment” Lucentio reminds the audience that he is a part of the love triangle (between Bianca, Lucentio and Hortensio,) which is all just part of the grander plot of the play within the play. A few acts have passed since the last interaction between Christopher Sly and the people attending to him , so it is easy to forget that the audience is watching a play within a play. The play within a play starts to get dark and abusive once Petruchio's methods for taming Katherine are revealed, so the reminder of the story not being “real” makes it easier for the audience to digest and sit through. The use of the word “entertainment” serves as a less severe way of breaking the fourth wall. It doesn’t directly address the audience, as breaking the fourth wall typically does, but it makes the audience aware that the actors know they are performing a play. Shakespeare has utilized breaking the fourth wall in his plays before, so it is interesting that he decides not to in The Taming of the Shrew. One reason for this is so that the impact of the play isn’t completely lost. Shakespeare finds a balance between making the play within a play comical while not getting to harsh.