Cinematography No Country for Old Men - 275 Words

Cinematography: No Country for Old Men (Essay Sample) Content: Name Course Tutor Date Cinematography: No Country for Old Men From an academic lens, movies are judged based on four universal elements; editing, cinematography, mise-en-scene and sound. While each element is indispensable and constitutes the essence of the movie, I find cinematography to be the most interesting element. Cinematography involves all manipulations of the camera and shooting so as to enhance the visual narrative. The manner in which lighting is done, framing of shots and coloring are all part of cinematography; all these aspects can tell a story. In "No Country for Old Men," Cinematographer Roger Deakins uses his prowess to create a beautiful piece that scooped Oscar awardsÂÂ  for best film and nominations for cinematography. He is particularly creative in the movie and manages to create some unforgettable scenes. In the desert, for example, Deakins uses wide angles to film the mountains and wide plains with shades of orange and yellow to add a stunning glow to the whole scene. To complement these shots, Deakins includes shots of natural light at sunset to add life and boldness. Another feature that is obvious throughout the film is the use of shadows. This extra element heightens the suspense particularly in murder scene. Deakins also uses various camera angles .In the scene where Chigurh is strangling the D...

The College Boards new accommodations policy - a sharp change of direction

After my recent  post  about the College Boards announcement that students already receiving accommodations in school would automatically be granted equivalent accommodations on all College Board exams beginning on January 1st, 2017, I started wondering whether/how the  test-taking population receiving extra time, etc. had changed in recent years.   As I was browsing  the web searching  for information, I came across an interesting 2006  article by Jed Applerouth of Applerouth tutoring.   Written just after the previous round of changes to the SAT (2005), the article details the effects of the College Boards (forced) decision to stop flagging the scores of students who had received accommodations. Unsurprisingly, requests skyrocketed (the percentage of students taking the SAT with accommodation grew  about sixfold between 1988 and 2004), and the CB responded by granting accommodations  more sparingly.   In that context,  two points from the article seemed particularly striking.   First:   A 2000 California audit found that white students were over-represented by 45%, students coming from families whose incomes exceed $100,000 were over-represented by 139%, and students from private schools were over-represented by 100%. The report also concluded that 18.2% of the requests granted were of â€Å"questionable† merit and gave students an â€Å"unwarranted† and â€Å"unfair† advantage. The report cited weaknesses in the College Board’s approval process as the cause of some of the unfair distribution. That was very much in line with my observation of which types of students were  most likely to request/receive accommodations; it was good to see something to back that up.   But theres more. Basically, the last time it was faced with accusations of unfairly privileging more advantaged students, the College Board responded by  altering its approval process to make  it harder for such students to receive accommodations. This time, in contrast, the College Board is responding to these accusations in part by making it  easier for such students to receive accommodations. Naturally, it is doing so under the guise of helping disadvantaged students.   And second:   When the College Board plotted the 2005 results of students taking the test with accommodations, the results yielded not a bell-curve but rather a bi-modal distribution (meaning the distribution was top and bottom heavy with a disproportionate number of low scoring and high scoring students rather than a tendency toward the mean). This greatly alarmed the College Board that the population of students receiving accommodation did not mirror the rest of the population. I suspect that  the College Boards new policy will likely have little to no effect on this distribution.    On one hand, the number of disadvantaged students (who are more likely to have IEPs or be in special education) receiving accommodations will presumably rise; however, that  number is likely to be artificially inflated because some states are now using the SAT as a graduation requirement. Essentially, students who in the past past would not have taken the SAT at all (and thus never have even applied for accommodations) will now be taking the test with  accommodations, regardless of whether they even intend to apply to college. At the same time, the increase in the number of disadvantaged students receiving accommodations will most likely be counterbalanced  by an increase in the number of affluent students receiving accommodations students who will almost certainly apply to college. Furthermore, as affluent parents become aware of the ease of obtaining accommodations from the College Board, they will likely push even harder for their children to obtain accommodations in school whether they are are merited or not. And since private schools have a financial stake in keeping families happy, it seems reasonable to assume that  the over-representation of private-school students will increase even further.