Azuhura Msofe
8B
18/1/10
English – Film Study Worksheet
Miss. Nickell
Opening:
a) What happens in the opening moment?
The film begins with the streets of Manhattan around the 1950’s. It starts off with a
long shot view of New York City then zooms in and shows New York streets from a high
angle. A few movies do this to tell the viewer where the movie is going to take place.
Most movies now days either narrates where the story is going to take place or write it
during the opening credits.
b) What mood does this set?
Mysterious, adventurous and excitement is the affect you feel at the beginning of the
movie because all the director shows you is New York City and nothing else. You cannot
predict what is going to happen next therefore leaving you hooked and open-minded for
what is to happen next.
c) How does the CAMERA, with shot selection and editing, suggest this
mood? Give details of three or four different shots.
One mood is justification because the camera shows the Sharks invading in on the Jets
territory and that what the Jets are doing is ok because they need to prove themselves.
Also it would be embracing to have outsiders take everything you have worked hard on
away. So the Jets fight and defend their territory. Another example is when the camera
shows you one end of a block and moves quickly to the other end and back, the mood
would be anticipation because you would like to know what is on the other end.
d) What place do SOUND and DIALOGUE have in this scene?
Without music now days in the 21st century you do not have a movie. Music creates
thrill and excitement and gets you hooked. When the sound is weak then the movie will
be hard to watch. In the opening of Westside Story the music is very faint and gets
louder. Then suddenly it stops and all you hear is snap, snap snap. This is very good for
grabbing attention.
Dialogue is also a huge part of movies. In Westside Story the beginning does not have
dialogue. There is only music, body posture and emotions to tell the story but you have
no words. It helps not make the movie predictable. A lot of movies now a day start off
with words and does not grab your attention until later on in the movie. You could predict
a movie just by some of their first dialogues and scenes. If you wait until later to use
dialogue you cannot predict the whole movie and thus making the movie more
interesting to watch and this is what Westside Story does.
24/1/10
Important Scene
a) Choose an important scene. What happens?
One of the important scenes is when Tony and Maria meet each other for the first
time in neutral grounds at the school disco. The Jets and Sharks are dancing in separate
groups. Pretending like the other group is not there. Maria and Tony caught each other’s
eyes when the two groups moved 4 or 5 inches over. They unthinkingly moved towards
each other and started dancing. The background went black and for those few minutes it
didn’t matter that one was a Shark and the other a Jet all that mattered was them two.
We might have seen a kiss but Bernado intervened and stopped it. Maria was then
quickly swished away by Chico.
b) Why is it important? (Effect on character/ situation/theme)
This is important because it showed that it didn’t matter that one was from south of
the boarder and one wasn’t. It was just about love and being human. Since Bernado
intervened and stopped a kiss it starts to show a theme of forbidden love and the
characters are given sympathy.
c) What mood is present?
In this scene the mood that is presented is sympathy and seriously dehumanizing. It
is dehumanizing because neither Shark nor Jet believes that the other group is good
enough to be with one of their own. You feel sympathy because two people who clearly
have strong feeling for one another are forced to be apart.
d) How does the CAMERA, with shot selection and editing, suggest this
mood? Give details of three or four different shots.
When Maria and Tony are dancing together the background shot goes black and
they force you to see only what the director wants you to see. The mood is mysterious.
You can guess what will happen but you aren’t very sure about it.
e) What place do SOUND and DIALOGUE have in this scene?
The only words spoken in this scene are when Bernado stops the kiss and then the
Jets and Sharks are ready to rumble but the teacher and the cop are an inconvenience.
Other than that there are only dance moves, facial expression and body language but no
true words. The music that is played is soft and is more of a romance song rather than
dance. It helps to emphasize the romantic aspect of the scene.
f) What effect did the scene have on you?
The effect the scene had on me was jealous, scared, empathy and anger. Jealous
because Maria looked gorgeous in the white dress with the red belt around her waist
and the red shoes to emphasize the red belt; she look sensational. Scared because I did
not know what would happen. Obviously someone from the two groups must have seen
them two dancing and maybe one of them would have pulled out a knife. I felt empathy
because they were guilty by association and could not be together. Anger because I
wanted them two to be together. I wanted to force them together but I could not and I
became angry.
3/02/10
Character
a) What aspects of this character do the directors pick out? (E.g. COSTUME,
VOICE, PERSONALITY, MANNNERISMS, CHARACTERISTICS). Mention use
of CAMERA in achieving this.
b) Describe THREE SCENES this character is in, and say what aspects of
his/her character are shown in each.
1. Lt. Schrank first appearance is in the beginning of the scene while the Sharks and
Jets are fighting each other at the basketball court after a Shark trips a Jet. Lt.
Schrank and Sgt. Krupke stop the fight and tell the boys to stop fighting on this
turf and if they want to kill each other that’s fine but not on his territory. Then Lt.
Schrank chases the Sharks away and allows the Jets to stay at the basketball
court. In this scene you start to see that as the character Lt. Schrank’s evolves he
will have some racism in him and malice.
2. Lt. Schrank’s second appearance is at Doc’s candy store where he finds the Jet
and Sharks all together, reading comic books, playing cards, playing darts etc.
They looked like they were all friends but the Lieutenant knew it was all a
charade. He knew that they were only pretending for his sake. He also heard of a
rumble that would take place and was trying to get the information out of them.
He tried, threatening, persuasion, reasoning but nothing worked. Nobody was
going to snitch (partly because if you snitch either the other gang or your own
gang will beat you up or ostracize you and outcast you, for snitching,) and tell him
where the rumble was happening. He was finally frustrated that nobody was
talking and kicked the Sharks out again leaving the Jets alone. In the process the
Lieutenant’s dialogue mention some very racist things toward the Sharks. Calling
them “spic.” This shows that the Lieutenant is racist, scared of change and
biased. He is racist because there was no need to bring in the Sharks ethnicity;
he could have simply have asked them to leave instead the character Lt. Schrank
felt the need to insult their race. Scared of change because he has been trying
everything to get the Puerto Rica back home even offering to help the Jets defeat
the Sharks during the rumble. If he gets them back home they take their food,
clothing’s everything Puerto Rican’s home and everything stays the same. Biased
because he is always removing the Sharks and not the Jet. Also another reason
the character Lt. Schrank is biased is because he offered to help the Jets during
the rumble.
3. The third scene the Lt. Schrank appears in is after Maria and Anita talk about how
Maria could still be in love with the man that killed her brother. The Lieutenant
shows up at Maria’s house to question her about the murder of her brother. He is
very inconsiderate about the fact that they are grieving for a lost loved one and
insists in question Maria even after she begged him to leave because she is
grieving.
Themes/Ideas (Not done with it still have to elaborate)

What are three main ideas this film dealt with?
Racism, forbidden love, violence/gangs are some of the three main themes this movie
dealt with.

What did the film make you think about them?