I love your categories - they've allowed me to look at fight scenes through a new, more perceptive lens. I'm curious to hear how you would classify one well-known "fight," the brief au mouchoir duel in Michael Jackson's "Beat It" video. Obviously, this would be a 3, "stylized," but would you categorize the other half as "B - Dramatic," since both fighters are clearly apprehensive about the stakes, or "C-Swashbuckling," since the main purpose of the scene is to wow the audience with their choreographed moves and dancers' timing?
PS - My mental shorthand for the letter definitions has now worked out to "A=Ha! B=Ooh... C= Wow!" :)
Oo, interesting question. Well I would say that it's more important to look at character to character interaction as opposed to how wowed (or squicked, or whatever) the audience gets. In this case, the two central fighters are showing off, not to the audience, but to each other--this is what all 'dance battles' do; they allow the dance-fighter to win the fight by upping the dance ante. In this case, the swashbuckling is inter-character tactics. Does that make sense? (kudos for 'au mouchoir'! Gotta love some specific jargon!)
I should ask, have you done a fight analysis of the Naatu Naatu scene in _RRR_? (I admit, I haven't seen the movie yet, but that's a great scene and, in case you haven't seen the director's analysis it's amazing -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QU0OaucfRbM )
ETA: Just starting that video he mentions that it was shot in Kiev, and I am now sad . . .
You're new article and my new article should be companions. Yours fits in with mine. And you've described what younger generation of wrestlers do when describing Expression fighting. It's accurate. The newer generation will do "spot" after "spot" after "spot" with no selling of the pain just to get the crowd to react. It's annoying to watch. I talk about it all the time. Thanks for writing this. I'll add this to my comment section.
I love your categories - they've allowed me to look at fight scenes through a new, more perceptive lens. I'm curious to hear how you would classify one well-known "fight," the brief au mouchoir duel in Michael Jackson's "Beat It" video. Obviously, this would be a 3, "stylized," but would you categorize the other half as "B - Dramatic," since both fighters are clearly apprehensive about the stakes, or "C-Swashbuckling," since the main purpose of the scene is to wow the audience with their choreographed moves and dancers' timing?
PS - My mental shorthand for the letter definitions has now worked out to "A=Ha! B=Ooh... C= Wow!" :)
Oo, interesting question. Well I would say that it's more important to look at character to character interaction as opposed to how wowed (or squicked, or whatever) the audience gets. In this case, the two central fighters are showing off, not to the audience, but to each other--this is what all 'dance battles' do; they allow the dance-fighter to win the fight by upping the dance ante. In this case, the swashbuckling is inter-character tactics. Does that make sense? (kudos for 'au mouchoir'! Gotta love some specific jargon!)
I should ask, have you done a fight analysis of the Naatu Naatu scene in _RRR_? (I admit, I haven't seen the movie yet, but that's a great scene and, in case you haven't seen the director's analysis it's amazing -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QU0OaucfRbM )
ETA: Just starting that video he mentions that it was shot in Kiev, and I am now sad . . .
Oh wow! No,I have not, and I haven't seen the movie either. That looks like a heckuva lot of fun.
It's a great example of a dance scene as a fight scene . . . (and is just a bravura performance)
I am sadly not up to speed in wrestling--I am intrigued though, and would love to learn more. I just discovered Danhausen and am obsessed...
You're new article and my new article should be companions. Yours fits in with mine. And you've described what younger generation of wrestlers do when describing Expression fighting. It's accurate. The newer generation will do "spot" after "spot" after "spot" with no selling of the pain just to get the crowd to react. It's annoying to watch. I talk about it all the time. Thanks for writing this. I'll add this to my comment section.
Have you watched any WWE Cinematic matches?