39 Steps

Key Movie Elements in:  39 Steps
Production:	My Movie Elements	My Comments and Observations
Producer	Michael Balcon and Ivor Montagu	Typical style for the 1930s
Director	Alfred Hitchcock	This is not one of Hitchcock’s better movies.
Screenplay	Charles Bennett	Adaptation of the book to movie was not done well.
Story	John Buchan	Well written. The thriller feeling of a good spy story. Very imaginative.
Production Designer	Unknown
Director of Photography	Bernard Knowles	The images are all up close and very flat. The filming is disjointed.
Music Director	Louis Levy	Music plays very little role in the movie and has a heavy circus feeling
Special Effects	N/A
Film Editor	D.N. Twist	Clean cutting and transition
Actor #1	Robert Donat	Somewhat Believable
Actor #2	Madeleine Carroll	Performance seems forced
Actor #3	Lucie Mannheim	Ok actress
Actor #4	Godfrey Tearle	Believable
Movie:
Character #1	Hannay	Polite Gentleman that is pulled into several situations that always seems to end bad.
Character #2	Pamela	Bit on the snobby side, does not believe
Character #3	Annabella Smith	Female Spy
Character #4	Professor Jordan	The “Bad” guy. Head of the “39 Steps”
Setting	Europe Early 20th Century	The black and white filming brings out the night time settings in all of the movie. The dark imagery stylizes the Spy movie feel. Starts in London and moves on to Scotland and then returns to London for the ending.
Story Line	Boy meets girl. Girl is a spy on the run. Tells her secret and gets killed. Boy is accused of the murder and tries to prove he is innocent. Boy meets new girl and is on the run. Proves he is innocent.	The adaptation of this story from the original book leaves a great deal out. The movie is dry and hard to watch.
Point of View	Third person	The outside view that gives one a good view of everything going on.  There are times that you see everything from the view of the main character, but main view is third person.
Theme	Spy Movie

Overview

Acting was well underdone. There was no sympathy for the characters. There was no flow between the characters due to the lack of familiarity between the actors. The book that this movie is based on was well written and very suspenseful. This adaptation leaves a great deal to be desired. The acting seemed forced and was far from entertaining.

Sherlock Jr

Key Movie Elements in:  Sherlock Jr
Production:	Movie Elements	Comments and Observations
Producer	Buster Keaton Joseph M. Schenck	Buster Keaton took on several rolls thought out this film and he was the main drive I getting it in to the theaters
Director	Buster Keaton	his style was simple, he over played all the acting and action to counter the fact that there was no dialogue.
Writer	Clyde Bruckman, Jean Havez and Joseph A. Mitchell.	they wrote to an audience that was not used to seeing a lot of films keeping the plot simple and over stated
Production Designer	Fred Gabourie	the sets were limited to what was easily and cheaply done witch kept in line whit the setting of being in the small town great depression
Director of Photography	Byron Houck Elgin Lessley	a lot of close up and wide shots were used to setup and exaggerate the scenes to make up for lack of dialogue
Music Director	none	the music I heard was not the original score it there was any
Special Effects	Ernie Orsaztti	not much in the way of special effects just some stunts and back drop movie back lay low budget stuff now but top of the line in the films day
Film Editor	Roy B. Yokelson Buster Keaton	the cut were smooth and none jarring. they seem to blend well together and not interrupt the story flow
Actor #1	Buster Keaton	a good actor for using his facial fetchers to tell what he was trying to convey to the audience
Actor #2	Kathryn McGuire	a little less in the way of over acting would like to see her spice it up more
Actor #3	Joe Keaton	again would like to see a little more over acting to get the feeling across to me
Actor #4	Erwin Connelly	he over exaggerated his acting real well emphasizing what he wanted to get a cross well
Actor #5	Ward Crane	thought e could have been more evil did not seem to push that contrast between when he was playing nice to when his true nature came out

Movie:
Character #1	Projectionist / Sherlock Jr.	A love struck young man with his head in the clouds and little touch with realty
Character #2	the female love interest	smart and in love with Sherlock Jr.
Character #3	the females farther	stereo typical farther figure that easily excepted what was in front of him
Character #4	the second bad guy / butler	a truly evil and creative. but new to killing
Character #5	the first bad guy	a not very wise thug who thinks his size and strength make him in the right to do what he wants
Setting	small town during the great depression	a small poor town were people take things in to there own hands to get stuff done
Story Line	a young man competing for the ability to marry a young lady is framed for stealing the young lady's fathers watch by his rival. he try to prove his innocence the way he thinks Sherlock Homes would.	the story is simple plot of young dreamer goes after girl gets in trouble girl helps save the dreamer to have the dreamer ultimately saves the day
Point of View	most of the story was told from the point of view  Sherlock Jr.: but small parts were told from the female love interest	Sherlock Jr. is most of the story's point of view with small parts from the young girls thrown in to show her interest in  Sherlock Jr.
Theme	love and the righteous will prevail	the plot / theme was an over simplified young dreamer becomes a true hero

Overview

 from the films I have seen form the silent era this one stack up rather nicely the special affects were better and less noticeable. the hole righting on the front of the bike thought town was done with a movie screen back drop but the angles were not wrong it looked natural for the most part. A common mistake even today in that kind of special effect is to have the angle off and you pick up on that making the scene awkward, and a lot of the silent movies were way over acted to try and make it easier to fallow, witch was not really necessary. This film had a nice balance between over acting and subtleties. the plot it shelf was a little over simplified I think Buster Keaton should have trusted in his audience to except a little more going on in the move with out getting lost. over all i liked the move even though it had a sappy theme. Maybe he should have thought of having more laser beams in it.