Cast Away plot and theme

Rating: 7/10 (8 December 2016)

Cast Away was released in 2000. Some are the main characters are Chuck Noland (Tom Hanks), Kelly Frears (Helen Hunt), and Ramon (Paul Sanchez). This film mainly revolves around the main character, Chuck, who gets stranded on an island after his plane crashes into the ocean. This film shows how he tries to survive on this island and try to get himself rescued. The film shows how hard it can truly be to try to survive and the emotional toll it would have one someone. Of course you have to watch the film to figure out whether Chuck survives this situation or not.
The theme of Cast Away is pretty straight forward. It is one that shows human survival when we are forced to try and survive or die. This theme focuses on the idea of the struggle for human dignity. Chuck is put in a position of disadvantage and dealt a bad hand when he gets stranded on the island. He is fighting against tremendous odds for his survival. There are also several other films that have a similar theme to Cast Away's theme. 127 Hours is one film that has a similar theme to Cast Away's theme. The main character gets dealt a bad hand when getting stuck in the canyons with his arm crushed and stuck. His is at a disadvantage and fighting against tremendous odds for his survival just like Chuck was in Cast Away.
There are a couple of film techniques that have relevance to the film's theme. One technique is lighting. There is a darker lighting during most of the movie, which helps show the significance of the theme. If the lighting was bright during the whole film, then it would be harder to portray the significance of this theme. Sunny and bright usually means happiness. You wouldn't want the audience to feel OK and happy during the movie, you want them to feel sad, nervous, anxiety, fearful at times. This way the audience can have a feeling of being there and have a sense of reality of what is going on in the film and about the theme.
The second technique is camera angle. The camera angles changes from the viewer seeing Chuck and his surroundings to seeing what Chuck is seeing, like they are looking through his eyes. Interchanging between these camera angles really gets the audience in tune with Chuck and what he is possibly feeling. Getting the audience involved like this really helps get the theme of this movie across to the viewers. This makes the theme very straight forward. A theme of survival against all odds is a great theme that most audience members enjoy and it works great for Cast Away.