The Interview

The interview is a revolutionary film that was "released" at the end of 2014. This film was made by Sony Studios staring the dynamic duo of James Franco and Seth Rogen. The interview is about two friends who runs and star in a celebrity tabloid show called Skylark Tonight. They are never truly respected though as all they do is mock celebrities and never really talk about any serious matters. They decide they want to start being a more serious show and gain credibility, but they don't know were to start. The next day after discussing this guess who says that Skylark Tonight is his favorite show? Thats right Kim Jong Un. They take advantage of this and negotiate terms for Kim Jong to be on the show, but the CIA takes advantage of this as well and asks for the two to assassinate the supreme ruler. The entirety of the rest of the film, without giving too much away, is about there journey and emotional struggle in Korea with the Communist dictator.

The reason I have said "released" is that this film wasn't exactly released. It was so called leaked after terrorist threats were made on Sony Studios, and all theaters showing the film, for the questionable theme of the movie. This is also why I have stated it to be a revolutionary film. Never before in our history has a terrorist threat ever been made based on a movie. This is why this film is a cultural icon. Everyone of our era will remember this because the ordeals in North Korea are so prevalent.

Another reason I believe this film will be so important to our culture is the actors in it. James Franco and Seth Rogen are, in my opinion, two of the most influencial actors of our period. Look at their pasts together with epic comedy together such as "This is the End", "Pineapple Express", "Knocked up" and now "The Interview." But these twos careers together didn't just start in these films, it started much earlier. Going back to 1998 when both had their debuts on the ground breaking series "Freaks and Geeks." This series is where the two met and started their careers together. This is also so iconic because "Freaks and Geeks" was a show about how hard high school was back in the 90s. This theme only grows more appealing to the audience viewing it. As most people who are fans of the Franco and Rogen movies firs watched their tv show first. This means that the two didn't only impact the viewers for one time era, (There late 90s era) but also in a second.(The late 2000 and on era)

But besides the cultural element to this film there was also many aspects of the film that made it great. To start, the music in this movie was OFF THE CHARTS. Every time a scene came on the music that opened it was not only relevant to the scene but also seemed to be one of those epic classics that everyone remembered from some point in their life. The directors also did a great job of drawing the audience in with scenes. There was great examples of mise-en-scene throughout that used a combination of music, lighting, and epic props to truly suck in the audience. For example, there was a scene where the dictator was showing James Franco his garage(wasn't exactly a garage but where all his vehicles where). It started off with A Milli by Lil Wayne with complete darkness then proceeded to have spot lights beam one by one on all of his exotic cars until in ended on a tank placed in the middle of the room. The combination of all these elements made this scene and true attention getter.

Another scene that showed great principles of film was (spoiler alert) the battle between Kim Jong Un and his soldiers fighting Dave Skylark and Aaron Rapoport (James Franco and Seth Rogen) in the end of the movie. The two were trying to escape from Kim Jong's home after humiliating him on live television. Dave and Aaron are escaping in a tank while Kim Jong is chasing them in a helicopter. Now that you have a little background ill explain how this scene shows great principles of film. To start, it is much darker in this scene to show the chaos and drama that is occurring. They are doing the shot via crane to see the entirety of the shot, this makes it feel a lot more serious and intense. During this all, there is also very intense background music that only amplifies the feel of the scene. Next, they do quick camera shots back and forth of Kim Jong and Dave Skylark to show the fiery rage between the two, this give the audience an even greater feel of hatred between the two. Right after that quick back and forth shot between the two, dave fires a missile at Kim's helicopter. As soon as its fired  everything goes into slow motion, this lets us as the audience see the emotion on all the characters faces and puts emphasis on this point in the scene. As soon as it starts going slow motion they also change the music from intense battle music, to Katy Perry's hit song Fireworks. This plays on a past scene in the movie that involved that song, they used it to both out emphasis on the missile being fired(cause fireworks? ironic) and also to remind the audience of its importance in the previous scene, its film making genius. As we watch the missile it slowly heads toward the helicopter created dramatic effect. Then as soon as it hits the helicopter, the camera goes back to shooting in normal speed. These elements of camera angle, sound, lighting and slow motion really hyped this scene up and made it quite exhilarating.

To conclude, I really loved this film, it was funny and a joy to watch. I would highly recommend this movie to anyone who loves the Rogen Francoesk comedy or even someone who just wants to see a comical side of the whole North Korea ordeal.

Stay classy readers, Captain Klink

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Monahan, Dave. "Chapter 2." Looking At Movies. By Richard Barsam. 4TH ed. New York: W.W. Norton, 
2013. N. pag. Print.


"The Interview." IMDb. IMDb.com, n.d. Web. 17 Jan. 2015.

The Interview. Dir. Evan Goldberg and Seth Rogen. Perf. James Franco, Seth Rogen. Sony, 2014. DVD.