Fencing
Background
This is a short clip barely fifteen minutes long and is purposely meant to usher in the audience to the boxing match that is to follow. The film is set on the 2009 Tokyo world boxing competition. The match in the movie is that against an Italian one Andrea Baldini a veteran boxer who has been in the boxing circles for years and currently is ranked number seven by the world boxing governing body. Baldini is up against Benjamin Kleibirink another boxing veteran from Germany currently ranked fourteen by the very body.
The movie begins platy with the scene all set for the fight that is to come, the referee is in position and so are the boxers. The crowds of spectators in the stands are all cheering for their preferred candidates and the noise that is emanating from the stadium is simply deafening. The bell finally rings and the boxers move into action. They spend the first five or so seconds studying one another with their short athletic jumps and sprints constituting the better part of the show. Finally the German strikes first and from the look of it, the blow must have been a strong one as the Italian who was on the receiving end recoiled from the very landing of the blow.
The fight that follows is a very tight one as both the boxers knew their play so well. A blow from the Italian is given an immediate follow up by the German and the German despite being ranked fourteen appears very strong and promises to outsmart the fortunately ranked Italian.
The movie is a live coverage of a boxing event. It gives the details as the eye of the audience in attendance could have witnessed them. The noises from the stands bring out the ambient that goes a long way in determining the environs within which the film is set. The only pitfall of the movie is that it is a minute by minute coverage thus slow.
Video journal 3
This is another short movie running for nine minutes. Just as the previous one it is also a recount of a live recording. It is a recording of the team fencing match taken from the 2010 junior boxing championship that was held in Baku, Azerbaijan. The match shown in the movie is against the American team competing against an Italian tem.
Being the team fencing match, the movie rolls into play with the first shot establishing the field of play. It is thus a long shot of the pitch with players and the referee in place ready for the match. The stands are full of spectators who are loudly cheering their respective teams and from within the stadium it looks like the fans are in deed having fun. After a short while barely three seconds, the bell goes and the expected short preoperational sprints that w3ere expected come to play. The boxers jump and run left and right while sizing up their opponents.
Being a team match the movie promises more drama which in deed one does not have to wait long for. A young American boxer moves on the offensive and with small but very steady bouts his Italian counterpart is overwhelmed and when his team mates realize these one moves to offer a helping hand and the process of offering a helping hand right in the midlist of a fight proves difficult as he is also held up in a fight of his own. The resulting confusion hand the American team the victory that they dearly needed.
The movie is exciting and worth watching especially by any lover of the sport. It gives finer details of the pitch with the camera angles catching all the most impotent parts of the entire event. The only set back that the movie suffers is that suffered by all live recordings and that the movie gets unnecessarily slow since some of the events to be recorded can never be rushed and are just at the mercies of those taking part in the very event being recorded.
Video journal 4
This video still is a recording of a boxing match only that this is a recording of the 2008 CIA competitions held in Paris France, this video runs for twenty seven minutes and is that of a tight fight between Japan’s Ota and Poland’s Glonek.
The movie comes to play with the players already having started the off the play. It is promising to a be tight fight as both the players are experienced boxers Ota who is on the left is playing offensive and is pulling tricks on the Poland’s player. He pulls up instances of the second intention there and then and these play off well as he appears ahead of the game. The first instance he pulls is that in which he appears to go straight to hit below the belt and as the boxer from Poland bends down to cover his essential he comes face to face with a bout that nearly knocks him off.
He regains his footing and moves with speed to recover the points that the Japanes had harvested out of his sluggish moves but then again another is pulled at him, the Japanese pretends to have lost concentration the game and as the other contender tries to capitalize on this bout, he strikes out a blow that lands on the left side of the neck of this great player from Poland and with that the play comes to an end with the Japanese emerging victorious.
This movie is a hilarious one and would entertain even those who do not love boxing. The little instances of tricks that the Japanese pulls for his Poland’s counter part offer an entertainment like no other. The quality is high and the camera works are simply superb. The fact that the movie begins right with the fast blow shows that the editors had realized the boring effect that the waiting in live recordings create and this one is a live recording of a kind. All the positions are captured through the various camera movements that are employed to reveal parts of the pitch and the stadium at large.
References
The 2008 CIA Competitions. Paris, France
The 2009 Tokyo world boxing competition.
The 2010 junior boxing championship. Baku, Azerbaijan.
