Breakfast at Alexa's

Being a part of Gen Z, there are always new sayings, catchphrases, or inside jokes that are being created and get thrown around social media. I'll admit, Gen Z can sometimes be out of touch, but sometimes they come up with some of the most eye-opening things. Specifically, I have been interested in this one saying that goes along the lines of, "They were written by a man!" or "They were written by a woman!"  This saying started going around, normally to critique aspects of fictional work, mainly works of entertainment such as novels, movies, and TV shows. The idea behind whether something was written by either a man or a woman does not literally pertain to the gender of a work's creator, but rather seeing one's work through the male and female gaze.  Megan Fox in Transformers Cameron Diaz in The Mask Unfortunately, the male gaze is very prominent in cinema. In many films, there are multiple moments when a woman character is set up around a stereotypical ...

  Jaws (1975) Believe it or not , the first time I ever watched Jaws was last week, in my film class.  I know, I know, I'm really late. But at least I have a one up on people when it comes to Hitchcock's Psycho, Vertigo, and Rear Window.  That being said, I'll admit, I think the film really lives up to its fame. It was a lot more suspenseful and scary than I thought it'd be. Although I wasn't sure what I was expecting, it definitely was not graphic, bloody kills, a child victim, and an actual realistic looking shark. For 1975, Bruce (The Shark) looked pretty legit and I'll admit made me scream a few times. After watching and analyzing aspects of the film, something that stuck out to both me and my professor was how menacing and sharp Quint's eyes were during his Indianapolis speech. After looking into it a bit more, I made a connection between him and the shark that I thought worked in the storytelling and revealed deeper meaning behind Quint's characte...

Swiss Army Man (2016) Just last week, my film class watched probably what I'd consider to be the most bizarre film I've ever seen: Swiss Army Man (2016). Now I probably should not have been caught off guard that much, because the film was directed by The Daniels, the same duo who'd later go on to dominate the 2023 Academy Awards with their equally bizarre and mind-boggling film, Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022). To this day, I still can't comprehend that film, and ever since last week after watching Swiss Army Man , I still can't comprehend what to take from that film. But, similar to Everything Everywhere , I think I was able to take away some parts of the film and put meaning into them. So really, this blog post is just me trying to make sense of the film by talking through my thought process. Enjoy.  Did Everything Actually Happen? The film starts off with Hank Thompson, played by Paul Dano, on the verge of ending his life after struggling to survive on ...