One of the hardest things you’ll be faced with in the commentary project is the task of organizing and combining your scripts, because your comments as a group will have to match up to the film in your full commentary track. You’ll need to be proactive about organization from the beginning! Here’s one way you might organize your thoughts as you prepare to write your commentary. Make copies of this sheet, make one of your own, or just keep notes in your notebook using a similar format—trust me, it will be useful!

Timecode                Notes: Editing/Sound                             Other Comments:

0:00:00

0:05:00

0:10:00

0:15:00

0:20:00

0:25:00

0:30:00

Your script will look and feel very different from the first essay—or from what the goals of the first essay were. Instead of subordinating your analysis to a single thesis or overriding argument, your commentary will be a collection of comments. Therefore, your form may take that shape. You should consider your commentary a collection of two- to three-sentence points that identify a key feature in the film and then describe what its effect or purpose is. Include your best points in your finished individual script. Remember that your individual script should be at least 10 pages in length, double-spaced, with the appropriate header information and pagination demanded by MLA principles.

What if you want to make a comment that isn’t tied to a specific moment, but is important nonetheless—for instance, characterization, plot development, or the incorporation of your contextual information?  Note where a lull in your commentary falls, and use that space for other comments.

Formatting/Planning Tips for Combined Script:

If you’ve planned effectively, and if you used the template I provided, you should have a good collection of notes and observations tied to specific moments of the film from beginning to end. Now what you’ll need to do is merge all the individual scripts into a single group script, which you’ll use for your narration/commentary track. You will need to be careful about ensuring your points match up to the film at appropriate times! One way to go about doing this is to divide up the film by :30 intervals; have one person collect those pages of everyone’s individual scripts, and then combine them into a single document. In workshop, you can discuss what to keep in and what to cut.

How do I incorporate my contextual information?

Each team member will be responsible for incorporating two additional sources into your commentary. This will present certain difficulties when you come to actually recording your narration. How do you deal with direct quotes and paraphrases, what do you say? You should paraphrase everything except in very significant cases when a phrase just cannot be put into other words—a key concept or a particularly illuminating image. This will simplify the process, and it’s just better writing. In your script, you should incorporate your research material exactly as you would in an essay—introduce the author, the source, and the concept, then parenthetically cite (216) the page number. You won’t need to state the page number when you record your audio track. If you use a direct quote, however, you’ll need to indicate that you’re quoting directly in your audio narration. You might do so by saying something like this:

According to the November 15, 1968 New York Times advertisement for Night of the Living Dead, viewers could expect to be quote shocked and terrified beyond belief endquote (Night, Advertisement). This tendency to sensationalize Romero’s film—it was routinely shown at drive-in theaters as part of risqué double-features—led to enormous box office profits, as David Bordwell has discussed in his book Horror Films (29).

Note that I wouldn’t need to state the parenthetical citation information, but I would need to clarify that I’m using a direct quote. (Incidentally, the passage above would be a suitable length for one of the brief collections of points in your commentary!)

Frankie Allen <https://www.interfolio.com/portfolio/FAllen/>

Rolando Roque Alvarez <https://www.interfolio.com/portfolio/Roque/>

Avideh Amini <http://interfolio.com/portfolio/avidehamini/>

Daud Bahtti <http://www.interfolio.com/portfolio/DBhatti/>

Udit Bhatnagar <http://www.interfolio.com/portfolio/Udit-Bhatnagar/>

Santiago Canseco <http://www.interfolio.com/portfolio/SantiagoCanseco/>

Emily Giroux <https://www.interfolio.com/portfolio/EGiroux>

Kimberly McLeod <http://www.interfolio.com/portfolio/KimberlyMcLeod/>

Elizabeth Moigula <http://www.interfolio.com/portfolio/EMoigula/>

Ellen Moulton <http://www.interfolio.com/portfolio/EllenMoulton/>

Lauren Real <http://www.interfolio.com/portfolio/LaurenReal/>

Jared Tobyne <http://www.interfolio.com/portfolio/JaredT/>

Jordan Von Lange <https://www.interfolio.com/portfolio/jvonlange/>

Emma Wallace <http://http://www.interfolio.com/portfolio/Emma-Wallace/>

Narrative:*

• Character and characterization
• Cause and effect
• Plot and story
• Time: Order and duration
• Space
• Beginnings and endings; patterns of development
• Range of information
• Depth of information
• Narrator

Mise en scène:

• Setting
• Costume and makeup
• Lighting
• Staging
• Mise en scene in time
• Mise en scene in space

Cinematography:

• Tonality
• Speed of motion
• Perspective
• Framing (this is the most central!)
• Duration of the image

Editing:

• Graphic relations
• Rhythmic relations
• Spatial relations
• Temporal relations between shots
• Continuity editing
• Crosscutting
• Montage
• Discontinuity editing

Sound:

• Perceptual properties; selection, alteration, combination
• Relation to film form
• Rhythm
• Fidelity
• Diegetic and nondiegetic sound
• Synchronous, asynchronous, simultaneous, nonsimultaneous sound
• Sound effects and narration
• Sound motifs
• Music

Key analytical tools/concepts relevant to different film elements:*

• Form: the “overall system of relations that we can perceive among the elements in the whole film” (55); the systematic relationships developed between individual film elements
• Cues:
• Expectations
• Conventions
• Meaning: referential, explicit, implicit, symptomatic
• Motivation
• Similarity and repetition (motif, parallelism)
• Difference and variation (contrast within and between patterns; variation in function of motifs)
• Development, progression
• Unity/disunity
• Pattern (in color, in motif, in action, in prop, in character, in framing, etc)
• Sequence, shot, frame
• Diegesis
• Style, salient stylistic techniques
• Genre

Research:*

• When was the film produced? (basic history books, encyclopedias; Aladin catalog)
• What salient historical or cultural  phenomena impact or inform the film? (more detailed history monographs; Aladin catalog)
• Where was it shown, how was it advertised? (New York Times and Washington Post historical databases)
• What were the conditions of its production? (monographs about film history, more specific monographs specializing in particular eras of film history, more specific monographs dealing with a particular director or film; Aladin catalog)
• How has it been interpreted? (detailed monographs about the film or its director; about the generic conventions it participates in, about the relation between film and culture; journal articles about a specific film or genre; Aladin catalog, MLA bibliography)

* Asterisked components should be included by each team member in addition to assigned film element. Each team member must research the group’s film and find two unique sources to incorporate into his or her analysis. Each team member should consider the basic elements of narrative and analytical concepts in his or her commentary as a matter of course.

C. Credits

1. An unknown car travels over a long road

1. Cemetery

1. Barbara and Johnny make their way to the cemetery.
2. The pair lay flowers on their father’s grave; Johnny teases his sister.
3. The first zombie appears and confronts Barbara.
4. Johnny intervenes, and the zombie attacks him.
5. Barbara runs for her life.

2. Car

1. Barbara seeks shelter in the car momentarily
2. Zombie pursues her, confining her in the car.
3. Barbara manages to drive off; the car wrecks.
4. Barbara runs on foot from the pursuing zombie.
5. Barbara discovers a lonely house.

3. Abandoned House

1. Barbara locks herself in the frightening, shadowy house, alone.
2. In shock, she wanders through the house as zombies approach.
3. Attempting to escape, she climbs the stairs where she finds the dead body.
4. Barbara, wild to escape, runs outside where she is blinded by lights and meets Ben.
5. Ben returns her to the house, locking the door behind them.
6. Ben boards up the house, while attempting to care for the silent Barbara.
7. Ben frightens off the massing zombies with a fiery armchair.
8. On the radio, we learn of the cannibal threat.
9. Cooper and Tom emerge from the basement, startling Barbara.
10. Ben berates Cooper for not helping secure the house, and a power struggle ensues.

4. Basement of Abandoned House

1. Mr. and Mrs. Cooper live a tense married life
2. Their daughter, seriously ill, lies in the basement.

5. Living Room of Abandoned House

1. Other inhabitants of the house work together
2. Upstairs, a television is discovered.
3. News stories discuss NASA, radiation, bigwigs in DC, rescue stations.
4. The party discusses a plan to escape.
5. Apart, Tom and his wife debate his participation in the escape plan.
6. Barbara, Mrs. Cooper retreat to the basement for safety
7. The men execute their plan.

6. Outside the Abandoned House

1. Mr. Cooper locks Tom’s girlfriend outside
2. The plan goes wrong, igniting the truck.
3. Tom and his trapped girlfriend cannot escape and the truck explodes
4. Zombies surround Ben who holds them off with a torch and returns to the house.
5. He finds the door locked.

7. Abandoned House

1. Cooper retreats hesitantly to the basement
2. Ben kicks the door in and struggles to withstand the zombie horde.
3. Cooper helps Ben board the door.
4. The tensions of their power struggle come to a head, and Ben assaults Cooper.

8. Outside the Abandoned House

1. The zombies feast horrifically.

9. Living Room

1. It is 2:50am; Ben, exhausted, keeps guard with the gun while Cooper sulks
2. Mrs. Cooper emerges from the basement to inquire about the next broadcasts.
3. Amidst debate about the next course of action, we learn that Cooper’s daughter has been bitten by a zombie.
4. Hope seems lost, and Cooper witnesses the zombies feasting.
5. The television broadcast details the search and destroy mission headed by local vigilantes and the National Guard.
6. The lights go out, and the house is thrust into darkness while Cooper plots for the gun.
7. Zombies make their assault on the house and Cooper secures the gun.
8. Ben and Cooper struggle for the gun, and Ben shoots him.
9. Mrs. Cooper is attacked through the boarded windows.

10. Living Room and Basement

1. Cooper falls back into the basement and dies reaching for his daughter.
2. Upstairs, Barbara takes action to save Mrs. Cooper, who also escapes to the basement.
3. In the basement, zombie girl feasts on her father and kills her mother with a trowel.
4. Upstairs, zombies are breaking through the barricades, and Barbara is pulled out of the house.
5. Zombies, including the young girl, surround Ben, the only living human left, and he retreats to the basement.
6. Upstairs, the zombies try to break down the door and tear at the house.

11. Basement

1. Ben discovers the Coopers’ corpses
2. Cooper returns as a zombie, and Ben kills him
3. Mrs. Cooper returns, and Ben kills her.
4. Alone, Ben searches for tools.
5. Upstairs, the zombies mill aimlessly.

12. Dawn breaks

1. Helicopter flies over landscape
2. Militia advance on the ground, police arrive with dogs.
3. Militia gather to plan their advance, accompanied by a news crew.
4. Dogs advance on the house.

13. Outside and in the Basement

1. In the basement, Ben awakes.
2. Militia take out remaining zombies, who now appear harmless.
3. They discover the burnt out truck, and continue toward the house.
4. In the basement, Ben hears the militia’s gunfire as they shoot more zombies.
5. Ben emerges hesitantly from the basement.
6. The militia destroys the remaining zombies.
7. Ben makes his way upstairs and toward the window.
8. Militia shoot Ben in the head.

E. End Credits

1. Still images of militia dragging bodies with meathooks, building a fire, cremating zombies and men alike.

F. Bonfire of wood and human bodies. Fin.

• How well did the portfolio results describe you?  If you were not satisfied with your results, why do you think that was?  (Note: you can retake any of the assessments if you feel they weren’t reflective of you.)
• Using your results, which careers seemed to be the best fit for you?  List your top two or three choices?  Were they ones you had already considered?    What appeals to you most about your choices?
• Choose your top two careers and get a more in-depth look at them.  Check out the information about each career from the Focus Two as well as some of the other websites they recommend.  If you can, talk to a professor or someone in the field about what the job is like. After reviewing this additional information, are those two careers still your top choices?  If so, describe what you would need to do to enter these careers.  For example, what undergraduate majors, extra-curricular activities, internships, study abroad, etc. would help you get into the field?  Would you need graduate study?  If so, what kind and what qualifications are needed to get into graduate school?    If they are no longer on your list, why not?
• If you are not sure about your preferred major and/or career, or if it isn’t listed in Focus 2, how could you get information or experience that would help you make decisions?
• How useful was the Focus Two?  Which parts were most and least helpful to you?  Would you recommend it to other students?  Why or why not?

Go to https://www.focuscareer2.com/portal/login.cfm?sid=345 and set up an account using MU’s access code (saints).  Please complete all of the sections.  The Focus 2 is only as good as your responses, so try to be thoughtful as you progress through the program.  You can start and stop as you have time, so you may want to finish one or two segments each day for several days.

Once you have finished, the program will generate a final online report. Copy this report and paste it into a new page of your interfolio portfolio account titled “Career Survey.”

Read about the ILS online and then take the survey, also online.

• Summarize your findings in writing and reflect on them by responding to the following questions. Your reflection should be no longer than two pages in length. When you have finished your reflections, copy them into a new page of your interfolio portfolio account titled “Learning Style.”
• What were your scores on each of the four dimensions? In your own words, what do your scores mean?
• How do your results compare with your own experiences as a student? Do they seem accurate?  If they were not accurate, why do you think that happened?
• How can you use these results to be more successful in the courses you are taking right now?  Give some specific strategies from your current courses that you can use. For example, if you have a class that is taught in a way that doesn’t match your learning style, how could you use these results to help you adjust to it?
• How useful was the LSI for you?  Would you recommend it to other students?  Why or why not?

• Tell us a little bit about your background – where were you born and raised?  Who is in your family, and what types of careers do they have?  Where did you go to school and what interests you personally and academically? What led you to choose Marymount?
• What are your goals for this class? Your worries? How do you think this course might be useful for your future classes at Marymount, or in the world beyond campus?
• What kinds of things do you hope to get involved with at MU?  Beyond MU?  What are your hopes and goals for the future?  If you’re not sure of those things yet, what are some possibilities?

You do not need to answer all of these questions, but try to adhere to the spirit of the assignment: helping me get a sense of you, and helping you formulate a sense of your goals! You will have the opportunity to revise this; it should appear in your interfolio portfolio as a page titled “Personal Statement.”