America's Next Top Model

WANNA BE A TOP?
96540340 Jimmy

Introduction
America’s next top model is a reality show in the U.S which is also abbreviated as ANTM. The first season of it was on air in 2003; till last year, 13 seasons of it had already been broadcasted. Tyra Banks, the former super model also known as an actress and host, is the producer, host, and chief judge of this show. In ANTM, all girls compete for wining the title of “America’s next top model” with extra prices of one-hundred-million contract with Cover Girl Cosmetics, one contract with one of the top model agencies, and inclusive interviews and photo shoots for fashion magazines.

The host and judges

Just like what I’ve mentioned above, Tyra Banks is a former super model. She is the first African American model who was on the cover of GQ magazine and be the catalog model of Victoria’s Secret’s underwear collections. After the show being broadcasted, the audience entitles her “The mother of models” which is reasonable since she calls herself “mama” when getting together with those competitors.
As for the judges, except the three common faces, photographer Nigel Barker, runway coach J. Alexander, and the photo shoot director Jay Manuel, others either show up in a short period of time or be just guest judges. The legendary fashion icon Twiggy had once been the judge of ANTM from season five to nine.

The competition

In every season, only 13 or 14 girls chosen from thousands of them can start their ANTM journey. After entering the competition, makeover becomes the first challenge. They have to get used to their new images and show them in the photos. Some girls even give up half way because their long hair is cut to be too boyish. The following challenges and eliminations make the list all the way down to final three who have to make TV commercials and beauty shots for new products of Cover Girl Cosmetics to decide which two can compete in the final runway show with each others. It’s like a tradition that all the competitors can live in luxurious villas, and they can even go abroad to other countries as their competing stages when five or six of them survive from the panels. During every panel, “the bottom two” who might be sent home would be called by Tyra to stand forward her and given suggestions, and then one of the two would be eliminated. Go-see which is included as one of the challenges gives competitors opportunities to experience what they’ll actually do when modeling in the reality.

Varied competitors
From the first season to the latest one, competitors differ from their races to physical conditions. Whites, African Americans, Latinos, Asians, and Europeans show up no matter how tall, petite, slim, or large-sized they are. As Tyra Banks said, she wants to show the audience different kinds of beauty. Thus, she doesn’t limit those who have dreams but who are not as skinny and tall as the image we think of a model should be.

The impact of ANTM
With the popularity of ANTM, other countries begin to produce their own version of it. Top model fever rocks the world!
As for me, I am a big fan of ANTM though I haven’t really seen the first season. I don’t just enjoy those gorgeous models in the show; I also love to see the processes of them struggling to be the next big thing. It’s interesting to me that almost every season has at least one bitch (I mean bad girls). However, I don’t think they’re really that mean in real life because it’s a show after all. There must be some plots that are set on purpose. Most important of all, Tyra’s encouraging girls to fulfill their top model dreams without consideration of their personal background, such as they’re in some kind of illness or not, is admiring.

Cape No.7

96540317 Jocelyn


I seldom go to the theater to see a movie. Most of the time, I watch the movies on TV. I see the movie Cape No. 7 in a movie theater because people around me give a very high praise on this movie. They said that if I don't see this movie, I will feel regret. It's the best Taiwanes movie they have ever seen. I still remembered the night when I went to the movies with my classmates. There were so many people that want to see Cape No. 7,too. It is the first time that I see so many people waiting in line for a Taiwanese film. After I saw the movie, I know the reason why it is a successful movie. First, I think the movie is very inspiring. We can see people work hard to achieve their dreams. They are just normal people like us. But they try their best to practice the song in order to have a good performance on the stage. From them, we can learn that if we are dare to dream, the dream will come true in the near future. The characters in the movie can be a typical representatives of Taiwanese people who are very diligent. The workers in Taiwan always have to work over time. Second, I think the movie is very cultural. From this movie, we can heard many Taiwanese wrods, even filthy words. After seeing so many foreign movies, we must be eager to see the movie that is related to our culture. We find our identification in this movie. At first, I was surprised that how come filthy words played a part in the movie. Later, I could agree with the director that sometimes, filthy words represents the true feeling of one's inner thought. Some people say it because they want to express their feelings, some people say it because they just want to say it. Third, I think the movie is very simple. Simple story makes people feel like a breeze. We can't see the fantastic animation in this movie, but we see how the characters in this movie live their lives. The characters in this movie are described in a very vivid way. We can find that those characters are just as kind as our relatives or friends. I like the songs in this movie, too. "As happy as can be" is my favorite. The song is very positive. When I heard the song, I feel the atmosphere of summer. I think it might be very good to hear the song when people are driving fast on the high way. The songs in the movie also played a important part. Our mood will be affected when we heard those songs.

The movie also make Southern part of Taiwan become a very popular tourist spot. Many people go there in order to see the beautiful scene. The director successfully captured the audience's eyes through this movie. It's a movie that I am willing to see for many times. I think that people will have more confident about Taiwanese movie after they saw Cape No.7.

Twilight

We have already seen various films during the whole semester. Twilight is my favorite! I bought the four episodes of the books --- Twilight, New Moon, Eclipse, and Breaking Dawn. I had finished reading all of them. After reading them, I expected the movies to the fullest. I have seen Twilight for three times. I love the spot, characters, and music. The story is about a love triangle involved Bella, Edward, and Jacob. On the other hand, the love triangle involved a human, a vampire, and a werewolf.

In the first episode, Bella moves to live with her father in Forks. After moving to Forks, She is involuntarily attracted to Edward, who is mysterious and handsome. She eventually discovers that he is a member of a vampire family. Luckily, they drink animal blood rather than human. Bella and Edward fall in love. One day, James, a sadistic vampire from another vampire group, smells Bella, and he wants to kill her. The Cullens cooperate to protect Bella. In the end, she is seriously wounded, but Edward rescues her and even kills James.

In New Moon, the Cullens leave Forks because Edward dosen’t want Bella to be in a dangerous situation. Bella is extremely sad, until she develops a strong friendship with Jacob. One day, she discovers he is a werewolf. Moreover, Edward dicides to commit suidice because he thinks Bella is dead. Luckily, Bella stops him, and they meet the Volturi. The only condition they can leave is that Bella has to be a vampire in the near future. Besides, in thrid episode, Bella agrees to marry Edward. Then, in fourth episode, she gives birth to Renesmee, who is a half-vampire-half-human daughter.

I have different feelings and viewpoints when I saw Twilight. It gives me a fancy that my lover is a vampire. If I were Bella, I think I will make the same dicision as Bella, to be a vampire as well. When I fall in love with someone, I want to stay with him forever. .Love is blind, isn’t it? By the way, I prefer Edward to Jacob because Edward is so handsome. What’s more? Eclipse is set to be released on June 30, 2010. I cannot wait to see it!

96540312  Quinney

Cape No.7 By Amanda 96540337

     Cape No.7 (海角七號) is the most popular Taiwanese film in 2008. As long as you are Taiwanese, you must have seen this film. Some people even watch this film for several times at the theater, and the pirated version is very popular as well. Cape No.7 has become the third best-selling film in Taiwan’s film history, falling behind only two others (Titanic and Jurassic Park).

      I watched this film with my classmates at movie theater. Actually, that was my first time that I went to movie theater for Taiwanese film. Honestly speaking, before Cape No.7, Taiwanese films didn’t attract me very much. Fortunately, due to this internationally successful film, Cape No.7, many Taiwanese have more confidence in our local films.

I wonder why Cape No.7 can catch so many Taiwanese’ eyes. I find the reason is :

 

The language those characters used in this film is very local. Also, the audience are impressed by the filthy language in the very beginning. When I heard that, I felt astonished but excited because I have never heard this in such a big screen in front of all audience. I feel there’s an intimacy growing up between the film and myself. I think familiarity is one of the reasons why this film wins Taiwanese’ hearts.

Cape No. 7 reflection

I remembered that I was able to catch the train of Cape No. 7 fever in the year 2008. I remember that we always burst into laugh watching this movie. All the audience were controlled by the enchanting plot. I feel  I was lucky to see Cape No. 7; it's a representative Taiwanese-made movie and it embraced the applause and criticism from the movie industry. As for me, I think it's a great movie that successfully featured Taiwan. No matter what criticism people said about Cape No.7, I deem it a remarkable movie from the perspective of audience.

What is the purpose of seeing a movie? I believe most of the time we want to release our pressure and be entertained. So doesn't it mean that since we are entertained, Cape No. 7 is a good movie? No, besides the entertainment, it led the audience to a sad love story, which makes us so obsessed in it.  But it's not all about Cape No.7.  The courage to realize dreams is also presented. Let alone the criticism, I believe Cape No.7 stands its reason to be so popular.

The beautiful songs with this movie played an important role. The song like "wild roses" and " the southern border" cast the audience's minds while the "as happy as can be" stirs our emotion. Also, the gentle voice of the Japanese narrator was so moving, he genuinely told the story to us.  Due to the successful theme songs, we will be reminded the impressive plot whenever hearing these songs.

The beautiful scenery showed in this movie is also impressive. With the fever of Cape No.7, countless tourists crowded into Hengchun Peninsula. It boosted Taiwanese tourism greatly.  Even Hong Kong tourists are lured to go to Kenting.

The actors are all very entertaining. Although many of them are not familiar to us, the nature humor they showed proves to us they are so talented. I especially prefer the character Old Mao. He said his words in his own distinct style and he often burst some interesting dirty words. Due to these dirty words, the movie is more approaching and shows the the charm of the Taiwanese local culture. Old Mao's facial expression is also very interesting. His snaggletooth even makes his words more funny. His persistence to play his moon guitar is also impressive.

The above is my reflection to Cape No.7. Although the movie receives critism, no one can deny that it also bring the new phenomenon to the Taiwanese movie industry and its contribution to the Taiwanese tourism.

By Josie 96540331

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The Reflection of Cape No.7 by 96540342 Grace

I will always recommand people to see Cape No.7 if they are not familiar with Taiwanese culture or they want to experience what a true Taiwanese spirit is. This movie is the best of the best Taiwanese movie from my opinion. I am a huge fan of moives,after watching so many Taiwanese movies in my life,I can't really find any other film which is better than this one.Some may think the movie doesn't have a significant story, yet they don't know that sometimes a simple story is the best way to let the audiences feel what the characters try to show. I do believe that a fantastic film must be a touching one,it must can touch people's souls when they are watching it. And it must make people feel it is so vivid that everyone in that movie is actully there;which means the roles need to be close to the audiences' minds. Cape No.7 has its own storyline, it starts with a young man who can't make his dream come ture,so he is really upset and decides to go back to his hometown. When he goes back there,he has a chance to group a band and performance in front of many people,this encourge his dream again. He wants to be a singer for a long time. He wrote several songs for the show and has a romance with a girl who is the maneger of this band. In the film,there are many interesting lines that make all the audienced laugh to death,including myself. When it comes to the touching part,I can hear some of the audiences are crying. How can anyone possibly say that this movie is not sucessful? If you have experienced Taiwanese life style, then I am pretty sure that you will laugh with the roles and cry for the roles. This movie is exactly the best model of Taiwanese culture. I really enjoy Cape No.7 and I hope that all of Taiwanese people will watch this film,too. It will show you how wonderful the life is,and how humorous the life should be.