Essay 2: Writing a Review Essay Length: at least 700, max of 850 words Note: you must write at least 700 words to receive credit; that means anything less than 700 will receive a zero, not just a low grade, but no credit at all, because requirements will not have been met Movie for Review: You get to choose

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Essay 2: Writing a Review Essay

Length: at least 700, max of 850 words

Note: you must write at least 700 words to receive credit; that means anything less than 700 will receive a zero, not just a low grade, but no credit at all, because requirements will not have been met

Movie for Review: You get to choose. It must have come out within the past five years.

Format: MLA format; double-spaced, Times New Roman 12 pt. font

Sample Student Paper to Use as Your Guide: Tim Alamenciak’s “Monopoly: The Scandal behind the World’s Favorite Board Game” on pages 345-347. This is an example of how you will write your own paper. This the paper I refer to in the instructions. Note: this student is writing a book review, not a movie review, but we can still use it as our guide because it follows the tenets of writing a review. This is exactly what you are doing with the movie of your choice.

Instructions:

A movie review first summarizes what you’ve watched and then gives your assessment of it. So notice how this assignment builds off our first essay assignment. In the first essay, you wrote a summary of a text, then wrote about your reaction (your response) to that text. Now, instead of just your response, we are moving from response to assessment. An assessment is a judgment. As the textbook states, your judgment must be based on certain criteria that you make clear to your audience. So you can see how there is more to this assignment than to our first one.

 

We will begin the same way, though. The first thing you will do in this essay is summarize the movie that you choose. Keep in mind the directions from Everyone’s An Author for summarizing: “Summarizing calls for boiling down information and presenting it in your own words and sentence structure” (Lunsford et al 87). You will do this in your first body paragraph, not your introduction, this time. You can read sample movie summaries are all over the place. You are probably familiar with them, but have never really paid attention to how they are written and what they include or omit.

 

Let’s move back to the introduction first. The first thing you do in a movie review is begin with some sort of hook that will get your audience’s attention. See how the student does it in his essay on page 345, his very first sentence: “Sometimes the ironies of the world are stranger than fiction . . . .” This is the topic sentence, or first sentence, of your introduction.

 

After your hook, you introduce the movie. The student does this in the second paragraph, but we will do it in our first since our introduction is only one paragraph long. Name the movie and the year of release. Also, provide any other relevant info about the movie, such as genre, director, major actors, etc. Keep it brief, but include what the reader may need to know in order to follow your paper. Also, explain on what criteria you will judge the movie.

 

End with your thesis statement. Then the last sentence of your introduction will be your thesis statement. This gives your assessment/judgment of the movie. You will state this in one sentence at the end of your introduction. “It’s a story rife with controversy and scandal” is the student’s thesis. The topic of the thesis is “It’s a story” and the assessment is “rife with controversy and scandal”. Rife with controversy and scandal is a strong statement of assessment.

 

Your thesis should not use the word “I”. Notice how the student provides his opinion without writing “I think” or “I believe”.

 

So your introduction does 4 things:

1. Begin with hook
2. Introduce the movie and present any pertinent information about it
3. Name criteria of judgment
4. End with your thesis statement, which gives your assessment/judgment, in one sentence

 

After you do you introduction, you move to the body of your essay. In the first body paragraph, you summarize the movie. Like in your first paper, the summary should probably be at least 150 words, but no more than 200 words.

 

 

Then you will have two analysis paragraphs: analysis of one story element (setting, rising action, climax), which we'll call criterion 1 and analysis of one creative element (dialogues, characters, use of colors, camera techniques, mood, tone, symbols, costumes or anything that contributes or takes away from the overall plot), which we'll call criterion 2.

 

You begin each of these paragraphs with a topic sentence that names your element and gives your opinion of it. “The book is a compelling look at history through the lens of Monopoly” is one topic sentence from the student’s essay. Then the student analyzes the historical information in the book, explaining why it is compelling.

 

Notice, again, how the student provides his opinion without using “I think” or “I agree” or “I disagree”. You just provide your analysis of the movie in formal language.

 

Your last body paragraph is your opinion paragraph, where you give your overall judgment of the movie based on your two analysis paragraphs. The student’s opinion paragraph begins with the topic sentence “This is not just a book for Monopoly fans.” See how the student writes about how the book appeals to those who like history. So the opinion comes from the analysis and the criteria of analysis.

 

 

 

 

 

So you have 4 body paragraphs in this essay:

Summary

Analysis of one story element

Analysis of one creative element

Opinion

 

Lastly, you will write your conclusion. Begin by restating your thesis in a new way. Notice how the student begins his conclusion like this: “This is a great book for anyone who likes a good historical read.”

 

Then in the rest of your conclusion explain why the movie is worth your audience watching or not watching.

 

In all, then, this is a six paragraph essay: Intro, summary, analysis 1, analysis 2, opinion, conclusion.

 

To assist you in writing Essay 2 review the following pages in Everyone’s An Author:

• pages 86-88, “Summarizing”
• pages 328-370, “Writing a Review”
• pages 594-595, “MLA Style” for citing a film

You have only one source for this paper—the primary source—the movie you choose. So you need a Work Cited page with the film on it. Most likely you will stream the film, so use the rule for citing a film that you viewed through a streaming service.