Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Act 2 Scene 2 "Aeneas' tale"

2 comments:

Conor R1 said...

I am doing this writing on Act 2 scene 2 “Aeneas’ tale” on pages 109-115 and lines 445-545. I chose this one because this one got me thinking a lot of how the setting was, what the guy looks like how he acts out the story what his personality is. My theory or thesis Is what I thought he looked like and sounded like and how the setting was. What I saw was a young man maybe in his thirty's that was kind of not that good of an actor and was pushed around like he was wimpy or something and the setting was about the same concept as the movie.
As I watch the player and listen to him I get very into the story because of the way he is moving around and his voice is so powerful which puts so much more feeling and emotion into the tale that he is telling and the way he talks can bring out the deepest emotion in the listener, it is nothing as I thought he would look or sound he is kind of a big deal I thought that he would be this little man with not such a powerful voice the exact opposite as the one in the movie has.
The way the movie portrays the actor is in such a way that is not like an actor at all instead more like a person more high and mighty like a godly person the way that they play the music in the background while he is talking makes it even better and then the camera zooming in and out on him in a dramatically slow way. Also when he is talking there is a clip that comes up and it is of Priam and the battle that is going on and I can see that Hamlet absolutely loves his acting and you can tell when Polonius makes a smart remark about the player’s story Hamlet gets furious and starts to insult Polonius. But speaking of Polonius even thought he doesn’t speak that much in this clip I get an impression on his personality and even that is nothing like I thought he would be like when I was reading the book. In the movie he is this kind of cheerful person and I thought he was a grumpy old man.
Hamlet thinks that if he can get the player to perform to get everyone else so emotional then he is going to make the player perform in front of the king, his uncle and Hamlet will watch to see his reaction to the tragedy that Hamlet recommended the player should act out. It is like the same situation that he is in now and maybe it will get the king to get emotional with it and then that will be Hamlet’s motive and it is a better plan than just going all out and just killing him to get revenge
My thesis was completly wrong what i thought the setting would be like and the character's personality. It was the complete opposite but it is hard to think of what was going through your mind and what you thought when you were reading after you have seen the movie clip.But that is what I saw when I watched the clip.

Stephanie_C7 said...

Hamlet has the actor perform Aenea’s Tale
In this passage, the actor proceeds with the tale that Hamlet had started. Aenea’s tale describes exactly what is happening in Denmark, what Hamlet and his mother are going through even though his mother does not show the slightest bit of interest in what is happening to her kingdom. In line 535 in the passage, the actor describes what happened to Priam as the job of a poisonous animal which takes the form of a snake, “Who this had seen, with tongue in venom steeped.” I think that this line portrays King Claudius as the poisonous snake, because when he was killing his brother, he slithered across the ground so that no one could hear him while he did what he had to do. In this passage Hamlet shows a lot of enthusiasm, because he can see that actors are people too, and even though they are acting a part they take their work seriously because some of the things that they act out tend to be what is happening in somebody’s life, and they have to deliver the lines without sounding offensive or disrespectful to that person.
When I was watching video of Aenea’s Tale, it looked liked the actor had some type sickness that was taking over his body. Because he was delivering his lines with such passion you would think that he was there when it was happening. The actor delivered the lines with a sad face because what he was saying was something that could make someone’s insides feels like they had worms crawling inside them. In lines 493-504, the director uses music that would likely be in a mystery and suspense film rather than a tragedy. The music in these lines expresses the intensity of the words and how the actor delivered them. In lines 505-507, we see that the actor delivers the lines without moving anything but his lips. In this part of the passage, the music becomes softer to the ears of the ones listening to what he was saying. After delivering a line that had a powerful sense to it, the actor would take a deep breath before continuing. This shows that what he was saying had a greater intensity then any of them imagined it would, and he felt like he didn’t say the lines correctly; it would be an insult to Priam’s memory.
In line 529, when Polonius says; “That’s good. {‘Mobled’ queen is good}. He says it without an ounce of respect. The tone of his voice tells the people in the room all that they need to know about him, who is someone who does not for anyone else but himself. In this passage, Polonius thinks that he’s better than everyone else. How he shows this is in line 523 when he says “This is too long.” After Polonius says that, Hamlet lets his anger get the best of him. For starters, Hamlet does not like Polonius, and for him to be bringing out the worst of him is not a good sign. The room that they perform the scene in is a large room where they would normally have a ball or a banquet of some sort. The lighting in the room is not bright but rather dark like its raining or it’s near nightfall outside. I think that it fits the moods of the passage perfectly which are sad, angry, and lonely.
In line 518 when the actor says; “Out, out, thou strumpet fortune!” He performs the scenery with such passion that his face turns red altogether and the intensity of the words have an effect on how he portrays what he says and how he says it. In the video, the actor’s face looks like he is starting to get paralyzed from an illness, because his face shows that what he’s saying is making him sick to his stomach, and he looks like he’s his head is about to explode. He sounds like he’s shouting hatred words to the gods for making him sick. His face expression also tells me that he will never forgive the gods for what they are doing to him because now he has nobody and nothing to live for he might as well die .
In lines 538-544, the actor speaks about Priam’s wife and what she saw that was left of him, and how she reacted to it. After seeing her dead husband on the ground, Priam’s wife cry was one that demanded justice for herself, her husband, and all of the wives who had to go through what she was going through. She cried so much that it almost made the gods cry with her. How the actor portrays himself when he is saying what was happening to Priam’s wife was something that stood out to me because, he did it with such passion and feeling that you wouldn’t think that he was talking about her. He started talking in a sad tone but ended it with an understanding tone, which meant that he understood what she was going through, that the pain of seeing your sole mate lying dead on the ground could never be replaced with any other feelings ever again.