Moonstruck Essay

The film Moonstruck (1987) demonstrates the concepts of Freud’s Jokes and the Unconscious through the use of tendentious jokes, specifically those that are hostile or aggressive. The film also illustrates the narrative concepts for “New Comedies” laid out by Northrop Frye, which are the senex or authority figure that the protagonist competes with for the object of his desire, the “Green World,” and the social renewal via the uniting of one or more romantic couples. One notable example of a hostile tendentious joke is during Johnny’s call to Loretta from Italy. The first shot begins with a medium shot of Johnny, a middle aged Italian man in a button down shirt, open suit vest and undone tie, speaking on the phone to Loretta in the foreground. …show more content…
In Moonstruck, this place is the opera. The shot sequence in which this idea is illustrated is when Loretta gets out of the cab to meet Ronny outside the opera house. The first shot is an establishing shot overlooking the street curb where Loretta’s taxi has parked to the front of the building. There are many people wandering around this area, and the focus is drawn to the large fountain illuminated by light in the top left corner of the frame with a shadow of a man standing there, who we later discover is Ronny. As Loretta walks closer to the fountain, the camera pans up for a low angle of the setting below until the fountain is fully in center frame. In the next shot, Loretta walks in center frame in medium shot with her back to the camera as she walks toward the building. Many people in the crowd pass in front of and behind her, and soon she stops to turn slightly towards the camera, looking around for Ronny. Before it cuts to the next shot, Ronny can be seen out of focus in the background of the frame in front of the fountain. In the next shot Ronny is in a close up shot, wearing a black tuxedo and looking off to the right of the frame as he sighs and turns his back to the camera to look at the fountain. The next shot begins with a close up of Loretta, slightly off to the right side of the frame. She turns her head back and forth as she looks around. Her face is turned to the left side of the frame just as the next shot cuts in with Ronny looking off to the left of the frame with his back towards the camera. This is a match cut, symbolizing that the two are meant to be together as even their movements are beginning to line up to one another. The shot continues with Ronny looking to the right of the frame until he turns his body to the side and