Senior Thesis & The Art of Watching Films

Topic: How women are depicted in fantasy literature Focus: Do the descriptions of women and men vary when written by male or female authors? I would compare Eragon and Harry Potter because they are both series with a male protagonist and villain but Eragon was written by a boy and Harry Potter was written by a woman. In Eragon, the prominent female characters are Saphira, Arya, and Angela. In Harry Potter, there are far more but I would probably focus on Hermione, Luna, Mrs. Weasly, and Bellatrix. The number of female characters in each series in itself is interesting. Focus: The depiction of powerful women (by female authors) and the relationships they have with men and other women. I would use Harry Potter, The Naming (Alison Croggon) and Throne of Glass (Sarah J. Maas). I want to focus on how all of these books pass the Bechdel test. Even though it is arbitrary and not usually applied to literature. I also want to look into how women in each of these series are tre...

Topic: Women and their relationship with their families Focus 1: The idea of house vs. home and what it means and how it evolves for Alison in Fun Home and Nora in A Doll's House. Fun Home follows Alison through a large portion of her childhood and adolescence, while A Doll's House takes place over the course of a few days. It would also be interesting to examine the events that trigger Alison's and Nora's changes in perspective. Focus 2: How both girls/women (again in A Doll's House and Fun Home) cope with the treatment of the men in their life: Alison has an overbearing father, and Nora's husband is also very strongly paternal. Both women eventually manage to at least make steps towards becoming their own person, and I could look at the effects these men have in their life and how these relationships change over time (as well as what prompts these changes).

Topic: Ways of people dealing with the negative effect caused by traumatic war experience Sources: American Sniper & Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk 1. Psychological damage. Both productions depict an American soldier returning to home after fighting a brutal war in Afghanistan. There's clear evidence throughout the stories that both of the heroes suffer from mildly serious PTSD. Although their age and military service history differ, they share numerous common features when facing the haunting memory. Especially   Chris Kyle from American Sniper , who served four tours and had 160 confirmed kills as a Navy SEAL sniper, gradually becomes more and more and eventually extremely anxious, despairing and self-doubting with each additional enemy he takes down. It's a marvelous production that vividly captures the agony that most soldiers have to cope with. 2. Social pressure. As returning soldiers, both of our characters receive heavy focus from the society. It is mor...

Topic: The representation of women as superheroes Foci 1: How the visual aspects of the women superheroes of the Marvel/DC Comics and films project the physical appearance of the characters such as Wonder Woman and Storm for advertisement. I will use Mike Deodato's DC Comic version of Wonder Woman and Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy  by James Gunn to show how women are sexualized in order to raise sales in the franchise. Foci 2: Comparing the portrayal (in physical appearance and ability) of female superheroes in comics versus films. Overtime the Marvel Cinematic Universe has adapted the depiction of females somewhat according to the values of society that encompass equality for women superheroes, however, Marvel Comics have not altered the depiction of the female heroes which they have sexualized.  

Topic: the different "masks" we put on in different environments Foci 1: The difference between who we are in out personal lives is completely different than who we are in the virtual world. This is a little more undeveloped than my other foci. But based on the novel Ready Player One , Armada and The Matrix . I would form a thesis that who we are in the virtual world is completely different than how we display ourselves to our friends and family. Foci 2: I have a lot more examples for; I was thinking of doing the difference of who we are with our friends vs. who we are with our coworkers. Movies like Baby Driver, The Social Network, The Intouchables, Burn Country, Robot and Frank, Wolf of Wall Street, and the movie and novel of Fight Club. In most of these movies, the character works a 9-5 job and then after work is very crazy and creates mayhem, or, they are very polite during their office job and then completely ruthless to their friends. The two opposite masks of nice...

Topic: Novels to Film Adaptations Foci 1: How directors depict the characters from the novel onto the big screen. I would use The Maze Runner by James Dashner and the film to depict this and The Hunger Games by Susanne Collins along with the portions of the film. The Maze Runner is about the society burned by sun flares and how their government is trying to draw out those that are immune to the diseases that come from these flares. The Hunger Games  is about a dystopian society in which their are twelve districts that each end contenders to fight a battle to the death in order to win a better life. Each of these novels shows the characters personalities and their physical appearance and how they interact with other characters. Foci 2: Comparing the settings between the two novels and their films. Which would include the way the author paints the picture of the world and the way the director does. This could be through setting and how the world is constructed. Using the two n...

Topic: Parent and child relationships/child dealing with the death of a parent Foci 1: How a child copes with the loss of their parent. Although "The Love of my Life" and "Heroin/e" are both by Cheryl Strayed and her dealing with the loss of her mother, each story has a different way that she grieved her mothers death. Similarly "Coming Home Again" by Chang-Rae Lee is about the death of his mother, but this story is more about how he dealt with his mother dying and what he did during this time. Foci 2: Symbols used in the stories, life/death. I have noticed similarities in all of the stories I have read and I think it would interesting to dive into what these symbols could mean. For example, I was thinking today about why both authors would include the child cooking for their mother. One possibility I thought of was maybe it was showing the role reversal and how now the children were caring for their parents. There were many more symbols in these stori...

Topic: The animated movie WALL-E and other films related to the future of robotics and outer space. Foci: 1. The integration of robotics in the near future and the impact it has on human life. The primary sources I plan on using are WALL-E and Robocop/Chappie. Robocop and Chappie are both similar in that they consist of robots being used as a police force; the main difference being Chappie is more focused on artificial intelligence (robots with a conscience). WALL-E is mainly based on robots and artificial intelligence, given the plot is centered around a sentient robot who falls in love and defeats a robot "villain", while on a starship where robots aid humans in every form of labor. 2. How advancements in space travel and technology impact politics. The primary sources I plan on using are WALL-E and Elysium. WALL-E for similar reasons: as a result of drastic climate change, humans live in a utopian spaceship where no one works and everyone relaxes all day while robots d...

Topic: Mental State and Morality in The Metamorphosis and NBC's Hannibal Foci 1: How changes to mental or physical state, partially attributed to societal isolation or 'otherness', affect one's sense of morality, perception of life, and fit in society. Kafka's The Metamorphosis follows Gregor Samsa' sudden, surprising alienation after waking up as a large, cockroach-like insect. The short novel describes his subsequent isolation from his immediate family, and the rest of society, ultimately ending in tragedy, In NBC's series Hannibal , Will Graham, an FBI 'profiler' who struggles with conforming to societal norms from the get-go, undergoes numerous changes/threats to his mental state, accelerated by his complicated relationship to Hannibal Lecter, a "friend" and unofficial psychiatrist, who also happens to be a cannibal. Will's moral compass becomes skewed from a combination of traumatic experience, physical illness, and connecti...

1. The study of the Unfettered Ubermensch: A man so driven that all else that stands in his way is trivial. He works by his own code or morals, and by nobody else's. Anton Chigurh of the book/movie No Country for Old Men and Heath Ledger as Joker from the film The Dark Knight are two examples of two men who are absolute entities of chaos, seeking a goal through destruction and evil, letting nothing stop them. And they play by their own set of rules. 2. A lawless world where justice will never prevail: Anton Chigurh, the antagonist, is in pursuit of our protagonist, Llewelyn Moss, who is a thief and a straight up bad husband. There is only 1 truly good side, Sheriff Ed Tom Bell. Needless to say, Sheriff Bell doesn't win and evil prevails. In T he Dark Knight , Batman is an antihero, and pursues his own agenda of crime fighting at the cost of collateral damage to the city and law enforcement. In the end, the bad guys are stopped, but at what cost? The Joker is still alive, as...

Topic: child immigrants/ refugees Foci 1: Using The Kite Runner and a long way gone to compare the effects on guilt on a person as they grow older/ in general, in conjunction with the struggles they face as immigrants/refugees. In addition to exploring how their guilt influences their perception of the world. Foci 2: Using The Kite Runner and a long way gone to compare the childhoods of the two protagonists and look at what motivates them to end lives (figuratively and literally, respectively) as one comes from wealth and privilege while as one comes poverty. What would cause someone to ignore their conscious and what are the affects of ignoring said conscious?

Topic: women with mental illness Focus 1: The differences in how women with mental illnesses were treated in 3 different time periods (50s, 60s, now) using The Bell Jar , Girl, Interrupted , and OCD Love Story .  This includes stigmas around mental illness, as well as approaches and attitudes of doctors.  The Bell Jar  and Girl, Interrupted  include characters at the same mental hospital, so it will be interesting to compare their experiences 10 years apart.  Although the character in OCD Love Story  is not admitted to a mental hospital, she battles with OCD and anxiety in modern times (2010s).  In  The Bell Jar , the main character's doctor is "unsympathetic" and fails to listen to her as he prescribes unnecessary treatments.  She faces stigmas surrounding her gender and her mental illness.   In Girl, Interrupted  the doctors use ineffective and damaging treatments, and the protagonist faces discrimination due to the stigma ...

I'm very passionate about action, superhero, and fantasy world films, such as Guardians of the Galaxy, Marvel's Avengers, and Wonder Woman. Within those films I'm interested in the representation of female characters and their role in the group of other the characters they are associated with. Right now the book that I could relate this to is Zodiac.

I am interested in the rankings of different types of literature. Specifically the term escapism and how it is applied to certain books. I'm interested in using something from the Fantasy genre such as Harry Potter, The Naming or Eragon. Another option is writing about women (and girls) role in fantasy novels where I could compare either Lord of the Rings or Eragon with The Naming. http://themissingslate.com/article/literary-or-not/

Some of my interests are alternate dimensions and dystopian futures. A couple of books come to mind like Ready Player One, which will be a movie soon(ish) and the Phenomenon. Movies like Inception, the Prestige, and Burn Country are also interesting as they are more puzzles laid out in movies that may take multiple watches to fully understand. I would like to write about maybe the yearning to find a new self, or maybe something just that is just generally a confusing movie.

I have a love for movies and music. I've always had an interest in the concept of characters losing themselves in a fight for good and ending up not knowing if their cause was what it once was. Breaking Bad is probably a good example. Dazed and Confused is one of my favorite movies. That has a lot to do with coming-of-age. I'm sure theres infinite books to relate that to. The bad guy in No Country for Old Men is pretty cool. I could possibly write my thesis about psychopaths or something, which makes me think of American Psycho, which is also a book and a movie. I also like war movies a lot. Psychological damage is a pretty fascinating subject. Might hit that up. sharif made me think of interstellar and that movie is bonkers. alternate dimensions are good food for thought. that'd probably be super hard to write a whole paper on tho.

1. Mental/Physical Transformation and the Separation of Mind and Body basically just exploring mental or physical changes (good and bad, but mostly bad) or the disconnect between mind + body The Metamorphosis  by Franz Kafka NBC's Hannibal

1. War: especially modern warfare, its psychological effect on soldiers; profound influence on society's opinion toward military personnel.  - American Sniper  - Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk 2. Time travel: the main conflict in time travelling is that human can't control history. The path may be altered, but the outcome is inevitable.  - The Butterfly Effect  - Looper

1. I like factually accurate futuristic stories (especially those involving space), for example, The Martian, Interstellar, and Elysium. I read The Martian and I probably want to write about that. 2. I guess this is pretty similar to the first point but AI. Pretty much what Chiara said. No other topics really interest me.

During the fall semester I took Creative Non-Fiction and really liked the story Heroin/e by Cheryl Strayed. So for my thesis I was thinking of using this story and either.... 1. Read more Cheryl Strayed books and stories to compare them or 2. Use the mother/daughter relationship in this story and compare it to other stories with a mother/child relationship.

1. Sports: specifically women's roles in sports including pay gap and interest in their sporting events 2. Novel to film adaptations and the way directors make their decisions when filming

1. AI: what it means to be human; are robots capable of human emotions - Big Hero 6 - I will probably compare it to another novel about AI or that has AI, but I can't think of any at the moment so if any suggests I'm open! 2. Immigration/ children with troubled childhoods from other countries? : American dream; culture clash; guilt? --> how do they cope, how does this effect them  - Kite Runner - a long way gone (memoir of a child solider)

1.  Feminism: the treatment and empowerment of women in different eras and situations; some book ideas I had for this were A Thousand Splendid Suns ( by Khaled Hosseini) and A Doll's House (by Henrik Ibsen).  2. How a novel/written work is adapted into a musical; I could look at Fun Home (Alison Bechdel), The Color Purple (Alice Walker), War and Peace/Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet of 1812 (Tolstoy/Dave Malloy)

Psychology: mental illness, gender roles in mental illness (how doctors treat males vs. females), history of mental illness Feeling trapped/imprisoned/prison: prison culture, actual or mental imprisonment The Bell Jar One Who Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest

To post to the blog, go to www.blogger.com, and if you're logged in, it should direct you to the dashboard for the blog (and any other blogger blogs you've joined). From here, you can create a new post. Just click on "New Post." You can include images or videos by clicking on:  You can also create hyperlinks so ugly links don't show up. Just highlight the text you want to hyperlink, click on "Link" and then add the address for the website. You can also easily embed video by copying the video's embed code off of YouTube (under Share). Then change from "Compose" to "HTML" and paste the embed code in. Click back to "Compose" and you should see your beautiful video embedded on the page.