程泽楷
外交学院
FOREWORD
This thesis will focus on two movies: ‘Prometheus’ and ‘The Dark Knight’. And it includes seven parts （plot summary， authorship， narrative， ideologies， and genre）. In the end I will give my conclusion which focus on this two films in their similarities and differences and science fiction movies.
PLOT SUMMARY
Prometheus：
The alien at the beginning of the movie was a religious person. He was asked to perform a religious ritual in order to sacrifice himself to create life on earth. Then his body dissipated into the river and emptied into the sea. In the primordial oceans, these substances evolved into single-celled and multicellular organisms. Trilobites, fish, fish landing on land, gymnosperms, egg-laying animals, mammals... The alien became our ancestor. The aliens discovered the emergence of earth civilization and saw that earthmen were strikingly similar to them. They began to develop genetic weapons that would be used to wipe out humans (for reasons unknown) But the trip to earth was interrupted when a leak of the genetic weapon infected and killed all people aboard the ship which was docked at a military base. But humans had come here in search of their creator
But what people imagine and what people actually do always run counter to each other. When people come all the way to their destination, they are greeted with great misfortune and thus lay an endless future trouble for the whole human race.
The Dark Knight：
The story began with the joker taking over a mobster's bank. His men, caught in his tricks, began to kill each other. Eventually only the joker was left. Police chief Gordon, Batman and the new prosecutor Harvey Dent planned to exterminate the reactionary gang, and then Harvey could become an open hero. When the gang boss was meeting to discuss how to deal with the Batman, the Chinese reactionary gang accountant Liu told the boss that he had transferred black money to Hong Kong. This time the joker showed up and offered to pay him half the black money to kill the Batman, but he was turned down by the boss. After Batman caught Liu, the boss agreed to hire the joker to kill Batman. The joker said on live television that if Batman didn't turn himself in, he would kill a person every day. Batman used a ploy to arrest the joker, but the joker tells Batman that Harvey Dent and his girlfriend (Batman's ex-girlfriend) were being held in two different locations and Batman had only time to save one of them. The joker took advantage of the chaos to escape and warned to blow up the city. The government arranged two ships to carry prisoners and citizens. The joker planted bombs on both ships, and told the passengers the only way to save themselves was to use the detonator he prepared to explode another ship. Otherwise both ships will be exploded. In the end humanity didn't disappoint and Batman managed to beat the joker.
AUTHORSHIP
Prometheus: Ridley Scott
Ridley Scott directed his first feature film ‘the man who fought， in 1977. In 1979, he directed the science fiction film ‘alien’, which gained attention and established itself in the film industry. Directed the 1982 sci-fi film ‘blade runner’. In the 1991 action film ‘Thelma and Louise’ was nominated for six Academy Awards, including best director. He directed ‘the epic gladiator’, which won five oscars at the 73rd Academy Awards, including best picture in 2000. He directed the war movie ‘black hawk down’, which won two more Oscars in 2000. In 2012 he directed the ‘Alien’ sequel ‘Prometheus’. He won the British Academy Film Award in 2018.
The Dark Knight: Christopher Nolan
From 1998 to 2018, Christopher Nolan produced 10 big-budget movies in 20 years, maintaining a steady, efficient, and high level of production. With cumulative box office receipts of $4.2 billion, it is a member of the top5 highest-grossing directors in the world. As a commercial film director, he never lost money; As an artist, he never made a bad movie.
The film with the lowest career score was the 3-minute film, shot in a university club, with a score of 7.7 on douban. None of the films he has financed has been less than 8 score. He never disappoints his fans and never repeats himself.
By 2005, superhero movies had become such a sticky box office disaster. Warner has been nervous about the franchise since 1997's batman and robin suffered an unprecedented box-office failure. They wanted to resurrect batman on screen, but they were afraid of failing again and ruining this series. At that point, Nolan said to his agent, I'd like to try. Therefore, ‘Batman Begins’ was born. He completely broke the pattern of Batman in the past and remade the character of Batman, telling the story of the beginning of the superhero. A $130 million investment, $370 million at the box office, a net profit of $240 million and an 8.3-point IMDb rating make Nolan the director's fledgling superhero. ‘The Dark Knight’ was born on July 18, 2008, and fans around the world went crazy.
"It's a better movie than the original comic book!" Batman fans said. People had never seen a mad but philosophical villain like the joker or a twisted superhero like Batman. People packed into theaters in a frenzy, breaking the record for the highest midnight opening ever and becoming the fastest movie to take $100 million and the first superhero movie to break the $1 billion mark. Fans flocked to IMDb to rate the dark knight and sent it hurrying to the top 10 and even passing ‘The Godfather’ for a while.
So far, his contribution to the film industry is far from being summed up in any award. And he got where he is today because of absolute focus. For example, he doesn't have a cell phone, he doesn't use social networks, he doesn't even have an email. Actors know his habits, so no one dares to play mobile phone on his set. At the time when many directors like to promote their films on Facebook or Instagram, Nolan's films are always released by Reuters or the authorities. Another example is that he doesn't spend much time on dressing, and the on-set work shots are always blazers, cardigans and light-colored shirts. In addition to his suit, Mr. Nolan also likes to wear a portable monitor around his neck, which is connected to a modified camera so he can see replays of recent shots at any time.
He took the exploration of commercial cinema a big step forward. He transformed the commercial film and his audiences to some extent. Let this simple and sad world is no longer ordinary.
NARRATIVE
Prometheus:
Prometheus alone would not be a classic. It doesn't have the value of being a stand-alone piece. What it does is it connects the worldview of the entire alien series. Its hidden vision not only covers all previous alien series, but also makes it clear how aliens came from, how humans came from, and how the creator of humans came from. So it becomes an interpretive film, explaining and asking new unanswered questions.
Get rid of the interpretive content, the plot of "Prometheus" backbone, motif, is almost entirely copied from the other "Alien" films, especially the first one, is about a group of men cave exploration, and then the harmful material to the ship, experiences the mother breeds, burst through the body, the process of the hybrid, eventually lead to the demise of all. In the end, the only remaining are a strong leading lady and a robot head...
The Dark Knight：
Almost every scene and every dialogue of this movie is classical, and the upsurge of this movie is the “life choose”.
The Joker placed explosives on two of the ferries, and one ferry with convicts, the other with civilians--telling the passengers the only way to save themselves was to trigger the explosives on the other ferry. Otherwise, he would destroy both at midnight. This time everybody had to face a cruel choose—die or kill. Then the most heart-warming scene came, a black man convict in the convict ferry stood out and walked towards to the policeman. The warden slowly handed him the trigger. The Prisoner looked at it. He looked the warden in the eye, and then tossed the trigger out the window. Warden, prisoners and officers were stunned. The whole ferry fall into silence. Finally, Batman beat the joker and saved the people.
IDEOLOGIES
Prometheus:
Ridley Scott, the director of "Prometheus," has a knack for controlling and telling the grand world view. In the film, he is good at pouring his thinking in modern society, the social reality and myth, religious metaphor, the combination of implementation in screen space for capital social class and the ideology of the displacement, and to elaborate images is presented to the audience, allowing people to release and thinking about the social reality of stress and anxiety.
The Dark Knight:
When we talk about ideologies of this movie, we always think of ‘joker’ this role. So I want to talk about this question: Why do many people like clowns in ‘The Dark Knight？ The reason is simple, he shows the audience the evil without logic. The movie would have been a lot worse without him
Batman and the joker are really the same kind of people, Dark Knights. We need heroes, but we only want great heroes who live in the imaginary world, and even then, we have to make him hurt, make him lonely and make him feel alone, this is the real world. In today's world, too many things which are not beautiful blind our eyes. But we have to insist on one point: Growth is not the doubt and loss of the good, but it is infinite pursuit of the truth of virtue.
Justice is a universal value, but it does not explain why one has chosen the path of light and justice since coming to the world, if one believes that everyone has not come with any value orientation. Individuals have their own positions and pursuits. The main conflict between Batman and the joker is between good and evil. The hero is still alone, but Batman's transformation is philosophical.
CONCLUSION
From the above description, we find that although both Prometheus and the dark knight of batman are science fiction films in terms of category, there is not much space for science fiction in this paper. When combined with other science fiction films, we can find almost all science fiction films have other labels at the same time. Like Prometheus, which is both a thriller and adventure movie. The dark knight is also an action movie.
By comparing the two films, we can see that the similar thing in the two films is high technology and they also show some other things while presenting high technology. The difference is that the two films show different connotations. Prometheus shows his world view, religion, etc. The dark knight shows the power of human nature. The two films also have different narrative approaches. Prometheus focuses on projecting a grand view of the world. The dark knight focuses on the description of the story and details of the description. Of course, both movies are very successful sci-fi movies.
When we try to academically define the genre as strictly as we do the classic genres of westerns, gangster movies and family melodramas, we find that the genre boundaries of science fiction are not that obvious. We could call it genre mixing, or science fiction. It is also possible to define one film as science fiction and another as non-science fiction, entirely in terms of an academic definition or corporate marketing. Science fiction films certainly cannot be understood simply as films with spaceships and outer space, nor just visual displays and special effects spectacles. Science fiction movies should give us more to think about. In the pursuit of visual effects at the same time let us understand reasons or think about some problems. So science fiction movies are not just science fiction movies. This is also the charm of science fiction, as the highest peak of human film technology, its definition and vision are constantly expanding.