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Title:
Everything is a Remix Part 2
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Description:
An exploration of the remix techniques involved in producing films. Part Two of a four-part series.
An additional supplement to this video can be seen here:
goo.gl/gtArc
To support this series please visit: http://www.everythingisaremix.info/?page_id=14
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Perhaps it's because movies are so massively expensive to make.
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Perhaps it's because graphic novels, TV shows, video games, books and the like are such rich sources
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of material, or perhaps it's just because audiences just prefer the familiar.
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Whatever the reason most box office hits rely heavily on existing material.
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Of the ten highest grossing films per year from the last ten years
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74 out of 100 are either sequels or remakes of earlier films or adaptations
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of comic books, videos games, books and so on.
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Transforming the old into the new is Hollywood's greatest talent.
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Everything is a Remix
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Part Two: Remix Inc.
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At this point we've got three sequels to a film adapted from a theme park attraction.
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We've got a movie musical based on a musical, which was based on a movie.
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We've got two sequels to a film that was adapted from an animated TV show
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based on a line of toys.
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We've got a movie based on two books, one of which was based on a blog,
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which was inspired by the other book, which was adapted into the film.
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Do you follow? We've got 11 Star Trek films, 12 Friday the 13ths, and 23 James Bonds.
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We've got stories that have been told, retold, transformed, referenced and subverted
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since the dawn of cinema.
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We've seen vampires morph from hideous monsters to caped bedroom invaders
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to campy jokes, to sexy hunks to sexier hunks.
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Of the few box office hits that aren't sequels remakes or adaptations
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the word original wouldn't spring to mind to describe them.
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These are genre movies and they stick to pretty standard templates.
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Genres then break up into subgenres with their own even more specific conventions.
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So within the category of horror films we have subgenres like
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slasher, zombie, creature and of course torture porn.
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All have standard elements that are appropriated, transformed and subverted.
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Let's use the biggest film of the decade as an example.
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Now it's not a sequel, remake or adaptation but it is a genre film, sci-fi and most tellingly
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it's a member of a tiny subgenre where sympathetic white people feel
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bad about all the murder, pillaging and annihilation being done on their behalf.
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I call this subgenre "Sorry About Colonialism".
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I'm talking about movies like Dances with Wolves, The Last Samurai, The Last of the Mohicans,
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Dune, Lawrence of Arabia, A Man Called Horse and even Ferngully and Pocahontas.
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Films are built on other films as well as on books, TV shows, actual events, plays whatever.
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This applies to everything from the lowliest genre film right on up to revered indie fare.
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And it even applies to massively influential blockbusters, the kinds of films that
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reshape pop culture.
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Which brings us toβ¦
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Even now, Star Wars endures as a work of impressive imagination, but many of its individual
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components are as recognizable as the samples in a remix.
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The foundation for Stars Wars comes from Joseph Campbell. He popularized the structures of myth
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in his book, The Hero With a Thousand Faces. Star Wars follows the outline of the monomyth,
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which consists of stages like The Call to Adventure, Supernatural Aid, The Belly of the Whale,
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The Road of Trials, The Meeting with the Goddess and a bunch more.
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Also huge influences were the Flash Gordon serials from the thirties and Japanese director Akira Kurosawa.
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Star Wars plays much like an updated version of Flash Gordon, right down
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to the soft wipes and the opening titles design.
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From Kurosowa we get masters of spiritual martial arts, a low-ranking bickering duo, more soft wipes,
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a beneath-the-floorboards hideaway, and a boastful baddy getting his arm chopped off.
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War films and westerns were also huge sources for Star Wars
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The scene where Luke discovers his slaughtered family resembles this scene from The Searchers
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And the scene where Han Solo shoots Greedo resembles this scene from The Good The Bad And The Ugly
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The climatic air strikes in The Damnbusters, 633 Squadron and the Bridges at Toko-Ri play very similarly to the run on the Death Star
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And in many cases existing shots were used as templates for Star Wars special effects
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There's also many other elemants clearly derived from various films
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We have a tim man like the tin woman in Metropolis
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A couple of shots inspired by 2001
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A grab the girl and swing scene like this one in the 7th Voyage Of Sinbad
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A holographic projection kinda like the one in Forbidden Planet
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A rally resembling this one in Triumph Of The Will
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And cute little robots much like those in Silent Running
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George Lucas collected materials, he combined them, he transformed them
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without the films that preceded it there could be no Star Wars
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Creation requires infuence
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Everything we make is a remix of existing creations, our lives and the lives of others
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As Isaac Newton once said, "We stand on the soldiers of giants"
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Which is what he was doing when he adapted that saying from Bernard de Chartres
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In Part 3 we'll further explore this idea
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and chart the blurry boundry between the original and the unoriginal.
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George Lucas was the most movie saturated film maker of his era
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but that baton has since been pased to
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Quentin Tarantino's remix master thesis is Kill Bill
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Which is probably the closest thing Hollywood has to a mashup
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Packed with elements pulled from countless films
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Kill Bill raises filmic sampling to new heightsof sophistication
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The killer nurse scene in particular is almost entirely a recombination of elements from existing films
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The basic action is the same as this scene from Black Sunday
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where a woman disguise d as a nurse atempts to murder a patient with a surynge of red fluid
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Darryl Hannah's eye patch is a not to the lead characher in The Call Her One Eye
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and the tune she is whistling is taken from the 1968 thriller Twisted Nerve
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capping it off the split screen effect is modeled on techniques used by Brian De Palma
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in an assortment of films including Carrie
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For and extended look at Kill Bill's referances check this out
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Hi there, I'm Kirby, I am the creator of Everything is a Remix
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and i hope you enjoyed this latest installment
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Now if you did, if you enjoyed it a lot and you would like to help me keep sluggin' away at it
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financial contributions are very much welcome and you can do that at the address that is here
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or you can go to my site and click donate
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This series really is a massive amount of work so all contributions really do help
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Also go to everythingisaremix.info if you'd like to learn more about the production this video
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the samples, the referances, all the stuff that went into the making of it
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Thank you for watching, my sincere thanks for your support, your feedback
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your praise, your criticism, the lot
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Thank you, i hope you like the video
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i hope you'll like the next one
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and I'll see you next time